Jiehae Park Makes Murder Fun in Macbeth Mash-Up by Barry David Horwitz Every detail in Jiehae Park's "peerless" goes way Over the Top. The Barbie-Doll dressed Chinese American twin sisters, …
Arthur Miller's Italian Immigrant Drama Still Meaningful Today by Tony Urgo Arthur Miller's "A View From The Bridge," first performed in 1956, is now over 60 years old. The cultural tragedy …
Danai Gurira Shines Light on African Patriarchy by Sydney Roberts In dark political times, Danai Gurira's  "Eclipsed," a wartime herstory from Liberia about five women, brings to light to…
Paul Ebenkamp is author of Parallel Realism (Despite Editions, 2017) and The Louder the Room the Darker the Screen (Timeless, Infinite Light, 2015); is co-editor of Modernist …
Jewelle Gomez Exposes Our Star-Spangled Bigotry  by Kim Waldron Playwright Jewelle Gomez and Director Arturo Catricala bring home a painful truth in the brand new play "Leaving the Blues.…
The play draws us in with the tension of competing narratives: the story as told by polished lawyer Sarah Weddington (Sarah Jane Agnew) who, along with Linda Coffee (a convincingly eccentric…
Wes Adrianson is an east bay activist and graduate student at UC Berkeley. He's worked against university tuition hikes, led campaigns against extreme fossil fuels in California, and organiz…
Annie Baker's People Are Haunted"Not the House by Kim Waldron A play that includes orgasm from congress with the universe, a shaky partition between the real and the otherworldly, looking fo…
Lieber and Stoller's Whirlwind Trip Down Memory Lane by Robert M. Gardner Imagine my surprise and delight when I discovered that two Jewish boys from New York wrote the musical timeline of m…
Millennial Notes Naomi Iizuka Mingles Myth with Modern Pain by Tyler Jeffreys Some youths are at risk, others passed that threshold before birth. We may not know their names, but we will cer…
Massenet Twists the Tale of our Favorite Knight by Robert M. Gardner "Don Quichotte," the second show of Island Opera's 2017 season, capitvates us with its comedy and romance. The intimate v…
Nurse Elaine Magree: A Night Shift to Remember by Jeremiah Wall In her shift as a nurse in late January 1986, Elaine Magree encounters death in the sky and on earth, and ends up not quite "H…
Lisa Kron Makes Healing Comedy of Herself, Mom, and Allergies by Barry David Horwitz When Lisa Kron, the writer of "Well," uses herself as a character called Lisa in her own play, the stakes…
Potterveld Challenges Us with Sex, Guilt, and Twins by Barry David Horwitz Around the four sided playing area, in a lovely Victorian living room in the Berkeley City Club, Central Works pres…
Julie Dimas-Lockfeld, has been involved in the local theatre scene for several decades. A graduate of Stage Group Theatre's full time acting program, Julie then joined the resident ensemble …
Lucas Hnath Strikes Again, Melding Mind and Body by Barry David Horwitz "Isaac's Eye" by Lucas Hnath is a wonder. You have to admire and love the Narrator/Actor (a sly Adam Niemann) who draw…
Shanley's Indie Lust Breeds Big Screen Brawl by Irene Nelson Director Robert Zimmerman goes full tilt to keep us on board for the ride in "Four Dogs and A Bone" (1993), a funny, bitter thril…
Vikas Dhurka's Airport Anxiety Flies Off the Charts by Susan Dunn In our high-powered, charged-up lives, where do we most need to feel safe and secure? The airport, of course. But "hurry …
A Boy Learns to Dance, Coal Miners Learn to Strike! by Barry David Horwitz In 1981, Margaret Thatcher's Conservative British government announced a plan to close 23 coal-mines in Northern En…
Millennial Notes Arthur Miller LIVES in Multi-Cultural America by Geordie Milne Arthur Miller's "Death of a Salesman" (1949) exposes the cruelty of the American Dream. Given the rise of Dona…
Alicia Dattner Seeks the Perfect Guru by Sweta Chawla More like a court jester than an L.A. princess, Alicia Dattner has not only performed stand up comedy for a dozen years, she actually ha…
Parody of Silence of the Lambs Gets Down and Dirty by John Chakan The success of a parody can often hinge on how well one knows the original work. And you will surely enjoy "Silence! The Mus…
 Adam Kaddoura is a Bay Area writer and editor, and a recent graduate of San Francisco State University's creative writing program. In addition to writing reviews for theater, film, a…
Just Doing Their Jobs  by Kim Waldron "Ideation" by Aaron Loeb asks us to think about things we would rather not consider. A dark comedy with equal measures of humor and dread, Loeb's…
S.F. Neo-Futurists BLAST 30 Plays in One Hour! by Buzz Goldberg I'm still buzzing about the San Francisco Neo-Futurists' show at Shotgun Players, part of Shotgun's three-week long Blast Thea…