All stories by David Finkle on BroadwayStars

Monday, August 4, 2014

New York Musical Theatre Festival Disappoints Musically by David Finkle

The craft and art of the song is assailed at the annual new-tuner event.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 03:13PM
Wednesday, July 30, 2014

First Nighter: 'Sex With Strangers' Is Sexy With Straining by David Finkle

Since Laura Eason calls her tense romantic comedy Sex With Strangers, audiences can be forgiven for jumping to the correct conclusion that these strangers -- they're both writers -- won't wa…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 09:04PM
Monday, July 28, 2014

First Nighter: Sturges's "Strictly Dishonorable," Quinton in "Drop Dead Perfect" by David Finkle

Before he began writing as well as directing his celebrated movies, Preston Sturges uncorked Strictly Dishonorable, a...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 03:42PM
Monday, July 21, 2014

First Nighter: "Piece of My Heart: The Bert Berns Story" Works Piecemeal by David Finkle

Among the ground-shifting 1960s music and music-biz developments was the emergence of the singer-songwriter. ...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:59PM

Farewell to the Irreplaceable Elaine Stritch by David Finkle

Remembering the unique pleasure of interviewing the theater legend.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 12:54PM
Thursday, July 17, 2014

First Nighter: The Musicals Pump Boys and Dinettes and The Gig by David Finkle

Yes. Absolutely. No question. If you can get to City Center anytime through this weekend to see Pump Boys and Dinettes, which is the third and last of Encores! Off-Center summer series, g…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 05:51PM
Monday, July 14, 2014

First Nighter: Robert Boswell's The Long Shrift, John Banville's Love in the Wars by David Finkle

The last 10 minutes or so of Robert Boswell's play The Long Shrift, at the Rattlestick, are richly dramatic. During them Richard (Scott Haze) and Beth (Ahna O'Reilly) finally get to the conf…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 07:32PM
Sunday, July 13, 2014

First Nighter: Musicals "Atomic," "The Mapmaker's Opera," "ValueVille" by David Finkle

Atomic, at the Acorn, is the show that asks the musical question: Once the A-bomb was realized, was it wise to use it? Coming...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 09:06PM
Saturday, July 5, 2014

First Nighter: 'Henry IV Part I' and 'Henry IV Part II' on Screen With Antony Sher by David Finkle

William Shakespeare historians have tried and failed to find a figure during the reigns of Henry IV and Henry V who might have been the inspiration for Sir John Falstaff, whom many of the pl…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:14AM
Friday, June 27, 2014

First Nighter: Mantel's Wolf Hall and Bring Up the Bodies, Brook's Valley of Astonishment in London by David Finkle

Hilary Mantel persuasively presents the case for his preeminence at this relentless need in Wolf Hall, which won the 2009 Man Booker Prize, and then again in Bring Up the Bodies, which won t…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 12:17PM
Tuesday, June 24, 2014

First Nighter: 'Skylight,' 'The Pajama Game' Revived, 'Adler & Gibb' New in London by David Finkle

When Tom Sergeant (Bill Nighy) drops in on Kyra Hollis (Carey Mulligan) totally unannounced in the revival of David Hare's 1995 play Skylight, at Wyndham's, he's clearly there to fan the emb…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 04:11AM
Monday, June 16, 2014

First Nighter: "Fathers and Sons," "Khandan [Family]," "Handbagged" in London by David Finkle

LONDON--Ivan Turgenev's 1862 novel Fathers and Sons, which Brian Friel adapted for the stage under the same title in 1987 is just revived...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 04:34AM
Saturday, June 14, 2014

First Nighter: "Titus Andronicus," "Antony and Cleopatra" Expand the Globe by David Finkle

LONDON, THE GLOBE--Scholars aren't certain when William Shakespeare wrote Titus Andronicus, although they favor 1593. ...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 06:04AM
Thursday, June 12, 2014

First Nighter: New Musical "Fly By Night" Doesn't Fly, Then Does by David Finkle

Fly By Night, the Will Connolly-Michael Mitnick-Kim Rosenstock (who also conceived the enterprise) musical at Playwrights...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 06:14AM

First Nighter: A Gotta-See Alan Ayckbourn Festival by David Finkle

The big fact about 75-year-old Alan Ayckbourn is that he's written 78--count 'em, 78--plays during his long career,...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 04:12AM
Wednesday, June 11, 2014

First Nighter: Ayckbourn's "Small Family Business" Large and in HD by David Finkle

Alan Ayckbourn is the chronicler of the middle class. Up in Scarborough, England, where he turns his plays out and puts...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 07:43AM
Tuesday, June 10, 2014

First Nighter: Nancy Harris's Our New Girl Unsure of Herself by David Finkle

The cast members -- despite their now-you-hear-them-now-you-don't accents -- are up to their character's challenges.

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 07:33PM
Monday, June 9, 2014

A Press Room View of the Tony Awards by David Finkle

Jackman hopped, men kissed men, and McDonald made history.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 01:25PM
Thursday, June 5, 2014

Out, Out!: Branagh “Macbeth” a Grand, Flawed Spectacle by David Finkle

The Scottish play turns ticket buyers into clan members.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 11:30PM

Easy Listener: 5 You-Gotta-Have CDS From Five You-Must-Know Women by David Finkle

If you like great songs -- not necessarily great songs you already know -- and you like women delivering them, here are CDs that you'd be extremely foolish to think you can live without:

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 07:04PM
Friday, May 30, 2014

First Nighter: Pushkin's "Eugene Onegin," Poe's "The Raven" Take Flight by David Finkle

Guess it's blowin' in the zeitgeist, but two adaptations involving rhymed classics are available in Manhattan this weekend only...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 05:58PM

First Nighter: "Chalk Farm" at 59E59, Carrie Robbins One-Acts at HERE, "Anthem" at Lynn Redgrave by David Finkle

Turns out that AJ Taudevin, who wrote Chalk Farm with Kieran Hurley, and Julia Taudevin, who appears in the 55-minute...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:29AM
Thursday, May 22, 2014

First Nighter": A Feeble "Fable," A Lively "So, This Then is Life" by David Finkle

When Chandra (Dawn-Lyen Gardner) slips happily through an upstage door to smell the trellis roses at the start of A Fable, David Van Asselt's new play at the Cherry Lane, it's the extremely …

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 09:50PM
Friday, May 16, 2014

First Nighter: Under My Skin Doesn't Get Below the Surface by David Finkle

Usually the devil gets the best lines, but since there's no devil in Under My Skin, the comedy (?) by Robert Sternin and Prudence Fraser at the Little Shubert, it's the angel (charismatic Di…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 03:47PM
Tuesday, May 13, 2014

Tony Nominations: The Snubs Less Noted by David Finkle

What about recognizing artisans in wig making and video projections?

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 11:43AM
Monday, May 12, 2014

First Nighter: William Inge's Loss of Roses Somewhat Wilted by David Finkle

It seems to me there's more than one reason for staging a revival. The first one that springs to mind, because it's the most obvious, is that a well-written and successful play is always a …

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 08:49PM
Saturday, May 10, 2014

First Nighter: Encores! Irma La Douce Isn't So Sweet by David Finkle

What Irma La Douce really is is rampant idiocy, for which there may be no excuse but for which there may be a wacky rationale having to do with national tastes.

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 01:51PM
Thursday, May 8, 2014

First Nighter: Samuel D. Hunter's "The Few" is for the Many by David Finkle

In Samuel D. Hunter's outstanding play, The Whale, presented at Playwrights Horizons in the 2012-13 season, obese and...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:13PM
Monday, May 5, 2014

First Nighter: Noel Coward's Song at Twilight in Top-Drawer Revival by David Finkle

When you look over the plays Noel Coward trumpeted during his fabulous career, few give the impression of being in any direct way autobiographical.

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 07:01PM
Sunday, May 4, 2014

First Nighter: Alessandrini's Forbidden Broadway Comes Out Swinging! Sure Does by David Finkle

When Forbidden Broadway comes out swinging, not everything receives a knockout punch, which is more or less Alessandrini's usual result. Enough does, however, and after the kind of season we…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 08:16PM
Thursday, May 1, 2014

First Nighter: James McManus's "Cherry Smoke," Oni Faida Lampley's "Tough Titty" by David Finkle

It's not too often that great passion doomed--make that Great Passion Doomed--hits the boards. There's Romeo and Juliet and Antony and Cleopatra and Cyrano de Bergerac and West Side Story wi…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:36PM

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