How the Spectacle of British Pantomime Looks From Across the Pond by Alexis Soloski and Elisabeth Vincentelli

Thanks to streaming, two American critics got to binge a bunch of the holiday extravaganzas. So how does this silly British tradition translate?

Advocating and Agitating, Connecting and Inventing by Michael Paulson, Jesse Green, Scott Heller, Laura Collins-Hughes and Elisabeth Vincentelli

With their field rocked by unprecedented challenges in 2020, these people and groups — some notable, some new — stepped into the breach.

The Artists We Lost in 2020, in Their Words by Gabe Cohn, Peter Libbey and Lauren Messman

Stimulus Offers $15 Billion in Relief for Struggling Arts Venues by Ben Sisario and Emily Cochrane

The coronavirus relief package that Congressional leaders agreed to this week includes grant money that many small proprietors described as a last hope for survival.

Things To Do At Home by Katherine Cusumano and Emma Grillo

This week, stream Handel’s “Messiah,” listen to a conversation with Haim or check out virtual artwork from Judy Chicago.

We Begin Again: a musical for 2020 – video by Noah Payne-Frank, Jess Gormley, Amy Hodge, James Graham, Jim Fortune, Emily Lim and Lara Taylor

Written by the Olivier award winner James Graham and produced by the Guardian in partnership with the National Theatre, this short musical film is a unifying song for the country to take …

ACT’s ‘A Christmas Carol’ and ‘Scott Shoemaker’s War on Christmas!’ bring holiday-show spirit to your homes this year by Crystal Paul and Brendan Kiley

Even as we cozy up in our quarantine outposts for isolated holiday celebrations, much of Seattle's theater community has created virtual holiday shows to enjoy from the best seat in your hou…

Hudson imposes curfew to tamp down late-night rowdiness by James Walsh, Paul Walsh and Mary Lynn Smith

City hopes to makes crossing border less appealing to subset of Minnesotans causing trouble after 10 p.m.

'Christmas fiasco' as London move to tier 3 shuts West End theatres by Lanre Bakare Arts and Culture Correspondent

Industry figures warn of ‘catastrophic financial difficulties’ for capital’s venues and producers Coronavirus – latest updates See all our coronavirus coverage West End theatres ar…

‘I crave flesh-and-blood actors, an audience that laughs and gasps as one’: the magic of Christmas theatre by Arifa Akbar Interviews By Lyndsey Winship and Andrew Dickson

After a tough year for theatre, our chief critic celebrates the joy of the Christmas show, while five festive performers reveal how it feels to be waiting in the wings Remember your first ev…

PANTOLAND Palladium, W1 by Libby Purves and Friends

     O YES IT IS       I had booked us in the very day Lloyd Webber and QDOS announced that with antiviral door handles, fogging, separating of bubbles and teeth-gritted determination,…

A CHRISTMAS CAROL – OUTDOORS. Angel Hill Bury st Edmunds by Libby Purves and Friends

  ANOTHER ….GOD BLESS US EVERY ONE     Scrooge is testy, cold and solitary as an oyster, shocking as ever in his indifference to the poor who ought to die off and “decrease the surplu…

A CHRISTMAS CAROL Bridge, SE1 by Libby Purves and Friends

A SCROOGE TO REMEMBER       Beneath festoons of horrid chains, nimble amid strongboxes and trunks and safes, three actors bring the old text to violently emotional life.  Assisted only b…

FLIGHT Bridge, SE1 by Libby Purves and Friends

Great journeys told in tiny windows       The daily epics of the refugee crisis haunt us on every bulletin:: small boat crossings, lethal lorry journeys, arrests and detentions. It. Is r…

AP sources: Biden picks Lloyd Austin as secretary of defense by Robert Burns, Michael Balsamo, Jonathan Lemire and Zeke Miller

President-elect Joe Biden will nominate retired four-star Army general Lloyd J. Austin to be secretary of defense, according to four people familiar with the decision. If confirmed by the Se…

POTTED PANTO Garrick, WC2 by Libby Purves and Friends

MINIATURE REVELS They’re at it again. And in this dour year, crowned with the financially reckless renaissance of West End theatre, Dan and Jeff – Daniel Clarkson and Jeff Turner – are…

Best Theater of 2020 by Jesse Green, Laura Collins-Hughes, Scott Heller, Maya Phillips, Alexis Soloski and Elisabeth Vincentelli

It wasn’t the year for celebration. But watching innovation flourish inspired our chief critic, while other writers found the joys of the stage in other media.

Barbra Streisand Is, as Ever, Firmly in Control by James B. Stewart, Collier Schorr and Mel Ottenberg

Since her breakout in the 1960s, she’s been able to convince the world around her to listen — not by chasing trends but by remaining always and fully herself.

How Pittsburgh's arts groups are trying to connect performer and audience at a distance by Sara Bauknecht, Tyler Dague and Patricia Sheridan / Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

Sarah Bryan Miller, longtime Post-Dispatch classical music critic, dies by Amy Bertrand and Jane Henderson St. Louis Post-Dispatch

Miller, whose passion for classical music took her from performing on the opera stage to reviewing world-class orchestras, died Nov. 28.

Espresso Nutcracker, Trans-Siberian Orchestra and more virtual holiday shows to check out by Alex Biese and Anthony V. Coppola

New Brunswick's George Street Playhouse has partnered with streaming platform On the Stage to present a filmed production of Tony winner Jefferson Mays in a one-man staging of "A Christmas C…

When the Critic Is Also the Star. And the Audience. by Laura Collins-Hughes and Alexis Soloski

Connection or isolation? Intensity or escape? This spate of shows that put the watcher to work are rewarding, but often in contrasting ways.

“Conscience” Shows Why a Woman’s Place is in the House and the Senate Thanks to Margaret Chase-Smith by Sue Weston and David Dobkin

The performances at George Street were impeccable. The actors even bore striking resemblances to their historic characters. The depiction of life in the 1950s was authentic down to Margaret�…

Foreword to “Youth Theatre- A Casebook” by Heidi Wiley and Serge Rangoni

It’s now June 2020. In most European countries, the first wave of Covid-19 has started to slow down, and every week politicians announce which parts of society are to resume next. Theatre …

“Parts of Life Will Be Damaged Forever” — Arts Workers Describe the Pandemic’s Impact on Their Mental Health by Jacinthe Flore, Averyl Gaylor, and Natalie Hendry

The arts industry is among the most devastated by the pandemic. Artists and arts workers often rely on casual, project-based, or fixed-term contracts, and COVID-19 restrictions have left ma…

Things To Do at Home by Adriana Balsamo and Katherine Cusumano

This week, pick the best indoor plants, jam with the ‘queen of Kindie rock,’ dive deeper into the power of the X-ray and be swept away by the San Francisco Symphony.

Theater Review: THE PROJECT(S) (Stage Left Theater, Chicago) by Tony Frankel and Lawrence Bommer

THIS YEAR MORE THAN EVER, THE PROJECT(S) MUST BE SEEN It’s a continuing crisis seen from the inside out, fleshed out with warmth and truth. In The Project(s), the late, great American Thea…

From Stage to Screen: 5 Shows That Got It Right (And 5 That Didn’t) by Jesse Green, Elisabeth Vincentelli, Laura Collins-Hughes and Scott Heller

Our theater experts provide a guide to some of the successful (and failed) cinematic adaptations of plays and musicals — all for your streaming pleasure.

HOWERD’S END Golden Goose Theatre, Camberwell by Libby Purves and Friends

TITTER YE NOT: IT WAS TOUGH         An element of pilgrimage here: new-fledged theatre, new play, worth the long masked train to London and then a bus’s wild wanderings south of the ri…

New musicals win awards as virtual Oliviers honour theatre by Lanre Bakare Arts and Culture Correspondent

Newcomers joined stalwarts such as Matthew Bourne, who won his ninth award Newcomers and established theatre figures shared the honours at the Olivier awards this year in a ceremony which wa…

UNESCO Cities of Literature Short Play Festival 2019 by Hilary Halba and Stuart Young

In September 2019, the UNESCO Cities of Literature Short Play Festival took place in Dunedin, New Zealand. One of the major events marking the University of Otago’s 150th anniversary, the …