Thursday, July 5, 2012
It was a busy spring and I feel like I'm only just caught up before the late-summer crunch begins, but I thought I should point out a few things that have made it into print at the publicati…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 01:15PMSaturday, June 23, 2012
I'm here in Boston for the TCG conference, and last night Mike Daisey offered a two-hour presentation of his newest monologue, On the Orient Express, which he'd previously presented at Spole…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 07:57AMTuesday, June 19, 2012
As my partner Isaac Butler points out, as much in amazement as celebration, it's been 3 1/2 years since he and I launched Critic-O-Meter, which just over two years ago morphed into StageGrad…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:32PMMonday, June 18, 2012
photo by Julieta CervantesI couldn't have been more on board for Soho Rep's indie-star-studded Uncle Vanya, and not just 'cause I got the chance to report on and contemplate it in advance. A…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 11:07AMFriday, June 15, 2012
A scene from As You Like It by Francis Hayman (c. 1750)Why do we keep returning with joy to As You Like It, one of Shakespeare's most plotless works? A delightful suspension of action may be…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 09:00AMThursday, June 14, 2012
Does the auteur theory stop at the stage door?The idea that playwrights shouldn't direct their own work is almost axiomatic; you can see it all over the reviews of John Patrick Shanley's Sto…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:23PMTuesday, June 12, 2012
What happens if you hold an online chat about the Tony Awards and only five people turn up? Could it be a sign that you're in the wrong city?
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 03:34PMThursday, June 7, 2012
The cast of Soho Rep's Uncle VanyaIn the spring of 2002 I appeared in an L.A. Classical Theatre Lab production of Uncle Vanya; I don't recall how they found me, but they needed a guitarist b…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:01PMAn “Uncle Vanya” with living-room comforts: that’s one of the aims of the playwright Annie Baker and the director Sam Gold in their latest collaboration.
SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 12:36PMWednesday, June 6, 2012
I've little to add to the encomiums (encomia?) for the late Ray Bradbury, except to recount that he was a source for my first Arts & Leisure byline back in 2006, when Godlight Theatre wa…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 12:29PMTuesday, June 5, 2012
by Rob Weinert-Kendt
StageGrade.com Editor
A competitive Tony broadcast? That’s something worth looking forward to—and a sure sign that there’s a strong season to look back on. Sure, …
SOURCE: StageGrade at 03:51PMMonday, June 4, 2012
(cross-posted at Train My Ear)I'm not entirely approving of the Tori Amos-ish direction of Regina Spektor's new record, but there's no arguing with the catchiness of "All the Rowboats." It's…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 11:32AMFriday, June 1, 2012
From crying to giving notes, the best of a month of American Theatre Facebook threads.Eric Grode notes Clybourne Park's possible debt to Norman Lear.Gotta say I'm enjoying the Orange Couch f…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 06:25AMThursday, May 31, 2012
American Theatre has an active and engaged Facebook community, and they’re not just using the shared wall to scribble and joke. Yes, there are some wits among our more than 12,000 fans, bu…
SOURCE: Theatre Communications Group at 01:09PMGiancarlo Esposito is portraying a character with a lot of similarities to himself in “Storefront Church,” a new play written and directed by John Patrick Shanley at the Atlantic Theater.
SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 09:00AM1989, the number, another summer: I fell hard for Spike Lee's Do the Right Thing; I saw it maybe half a dozen times in the theater. For all its tendentious politics, I think what I most resp…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 08:57AMThursday, May 24, 2012
Well, this got my attention this morning:LADCC Award-winning California Repertory Company is thrilled to announce the world premiere of B.S.: Bukowski.Sondheim., featuring the words of Charl…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 10:56AMWednesday, May 16, 2012
Food and Fadwa playwrights Jacob Kader and Lameece IssaqI didn't follow the New York Theatre Workshop/My Name Is Rachel Corrie controversy back in 2006 all that closely—I didn't have to, b…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 10:09PMA seriocomedy about life under occupation, “Food and Fadwa” is the inaugural production of Noor Theater, the Middle Eastern American company in residence at New York Theater Workshop.
SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 06:50PMTuesday, May 15, 2012
photo by T. Charles EricksonNot long after I moved to New York, I was on a bill with other singer/songwriters at a now-defunct Park Slope eatery called Night & Day, and among the standou…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 01:32PMPhoto by Brigitte LacombeThough my good friend Jim Martin is no longer the culture editor there, I'm still contributing the occasional theater review to the Jesuit weekly America (and since …
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 08:00AMFriday, May 11, 2012
In the current May/June issue of American Theatre, I sit down with Sarah Ruhl and Tracy Letts to talk about playwriting, with the pretext being that they've both recently done "versions" of …
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 10:34AMThursday, May 10, 2012
photo by Ozier Muhammad for the TimesDon't have time to really tee this up, but it was my great pleasure to sit down with Clybourne Park director Pam MacKinnon this week for the paper of rec…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 11:05AMA question-and-answer review with the director Pam MacKinnon, who is a Tony Award nominee for her work on Bruce Norris’s play “Clybourne Park.”
SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 09:50AMTuesday, May 8, 2012
One of the pleasures of having a child is introducing him to my own childhood favorites; just a few days ago, Oliver discovered Spike Jones, and is now requesting songs by name. To hear him …
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 12:13PMMonday, May 7, 2012
Forgive me if Emily Nussbaum's walkback on Smash feels like vindication:Since its delightful pilot, the show has taken a nosedive so deep I’m surprised my ears haven’t popped. All the c…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 08:34AMMonday, April 30, 2012
Is "Another Hundred People" the true New York anthem? Seth Rudetsky makes an excellent case.
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 11:05AMWednesday, April 25, 2012
"Art is rarely ever the ideal forum for getting one's point across. People who chose the so-called 'shock' route do it because it's the one with greatest likelihood of taking you where you i…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 01:07PMSaturday, April 21, 2012
James Corden, in a war of choice with himself.
There's something about being in the presence of performers who will do anything to make us laugh—whose sole aim is to tickle us—that is a…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 07:12PMFriday, April 13, 2012
Something strange is happening in Los Angeles: Its two biggest nonprofit theaters, on either side of town, currently feature plays not only cast largely with L.A.-based actors but directed b…
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:39PMA tantalizing prospect, no? (h/t Colin Mitchell; more here)
SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 07:24AM 
