'33 Variations' at the Beck Center for the Arts fascinating and flawed
As Ludwig van Beethoven in Moises Kaufman's cerebral musical mystery "33 Variations," Dana Hart captures the single-mindedness and comic rudeness of a great artist obsessed.
As Ludwig van Beethoven in Moises Kaufman's cerebral musical mystery "33 Variations," Dana Hart captures the single-mindedness and comic rudeness of a great artist obsessed.
Set in today's world of sleek Armani-suited execs furiously tweeting, talking and texting, King Richard, Shakespeare's most popular and chatty villain (in the Bard's canon, only Hamlet has m…
Forty years ago, a musical and a man on a crusade saved Playhouse Square from the wrecking ball and set in motion Cleveland's downtown revival as an entertainment district.
"I went to a boarding school in Massachusetts for high school and I can remember calling him not only from there but also from Brown and also when I was at Juilliard and saying 'I don't…
Mary Bridget Davies and her "A Night With Janis Joplin," which opens Thursday, are part of a new wave of musicals featuring female singer-songwriters, a list that includes a Carole…
At first, Rajiv Joseph's oddball tale seems too thematically obvious. But soon, as the characters deepen and their relationships grow more complicated, like the pattern for that mesh sleeve,…
In director Victoria Bussert's hands, "Sweeney Todd" has both a winking, pop-culture sensibility and the dark, discomfiting tinge of true madness. It's not an easy line to walk, bu…
Though flawed in spots, and freewheeling in its use of Tchaikovsky's music, the lavish production of "Sleeping Beauty: A Gothic Romance" by Matthew Bourne is a spectacle that's bot…
Backstage at the Place Theatre after Tuesday's performance of "Matthew Bourne's Sleeping Beauty," his sensual, sumptuous, deeply moving and unexpectedly witty reimagining of Peter …
When celebrated British choreographer Matthew Bourne decided to tackle "Sleeping Beauty," his third Tchaikovsky ballet, he decided to make the 100-year span that the princess sleep…
Why don't regional theaters produce "She Loves Me" more often? Say, around the winter holidays? After all, the penultimate, frantic, antic number -- staged in Maraczek's Parfumerie, the epic…
Too many musical biographies cash in on an icon's songbook without the hard, messy work of having to examine a life and produce a structured, meaningful story. One of the best things about '…
Laura Kepley, who took over the reins of the Cleveland Play House as interim artistic director in May, has been named the ninth artistic director of the 98-year-old cultural institution.
Of course there are lighter offerings in Cleveland's 2013-14 theater season. But it's blood-red that rules, from "Sweeney Todd" and "Deathtrap" to a giddily Gothic versio…
Get ready to go Goth, as PlayhouseSquare's KeyBank Broadway Series opens with a Victorian vampire take on "Sleeping Beauty" from British choreographer Matthew Bourne and continues …
The Cleveland Play House unveils an ambitious season that ranges from folk legend Woody Guthrie to tap legend Maurice Hines, and from sentimental favorite "A Christmas Story" to th…
Great Lakes Theater isn't afraid of the dark this season, as properties master Terry Martin prepares his special "blood-delivery system" to pump gallons of the red stuff for Stephe…
The Beck Center for the Arts will open its new season with a show artistic director Scott Spence calls the "all-time perfect musical," "She Loves Me." In the lead role wi…
The sounds of classic rhythm and blues will shake Karamu Theatre for Lee Summers' "From My Hometown," which opens a 2013-14 season that includes a new holiday show and a reprise of…
Cleveland Public Theatre launches a season of decidedly femme-centric fare with an encore run of Holly Holsinger, Chris Seibert and Raymond Bobgan's "Insomnia: The Waking of Herselves,&…
Greater Cleveland's smaller professional troupes still offer up grand, ambitious and provocative productions, from Rajiv Joseph's "Animals Out of Paper" at Ensemble Theatre to Tom …
Thanks to 'The Bards of the Burning River', a trio is establishing itself as a bumper crop of playwrights in Cleveland.
In "Time Stands Still," Pulitzer prize winner Donald Margulies, who teaches playwriting at Yale University, has fashioned a brutally funny, contemporary "Days of Wine and Rose…
A blend of modern dance, Indian classical dance, classical ballet and live music, all of it from Northeast Ohio, this year's Dance Showcase at PlayhouseSquare represents the ideal of diversi…
The annual "Season on Sale" event at PlayhouseSquare begins at 11 a.m. Friday and is the time to score single seats to hot, upcoming shows, from the best of the Great White Way (th…