All stories by Thomas Garvey on BroadwayStars

Sunday, August 26, 2012

More Republican racism (only closer to home); plus - did Mitt Romney make money from dead babies? And did David Koch buy the VP nomination? by Thomas Garvey

Hot on the heels of the racist voter-suppression tactics of Republicans in Ohio, we learn of this recent episode in Vermont:"A county Republican Party chairman in Vermont apologized Monday a…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 02:06PM
Wednesday, August 22, 2012

Republicans are apparently only racist "off the record" by Thomas Garvey

If you are an intelligent person, you already know this, but I'm posting it anyway, simply because it's somehow satisfying to watch evil people slip up. In case you haven't heard, the R…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 03:55PM
Saturday, August 18, 2012

Trying Wilde by Thomas Garvey

Exhibit A in the three trials of Oscar Wilde.The contrasts over at the Boston Center for the Arts these days couldn't be more intense. You can choose - as Boston's mainstream critics have a…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 11:28AM
Wednesday, August 15, 2012

A star-crossed Romeo and Juliet by Thomas Garvey

A theatre company's reach should always exceed its grasp, I suppose - but that gap looms particularly large in the Happy Medium Theatre's current production of Romeo and Juliet (at left, whi…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 12:31PM
Tuesday, August 14, 2012

The Springsteen Paradox by Thomas Garvey

Who's the Boss??I drove by Kenmore Square this evening, and with the windows open I could just hear the garbled echo of what sounded like "Tenth Avenue Freeze-Out" bouncing off the walls of …

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 10:52PM
Monday, August 13, 2012

Coriolanus and the commoners on the Common by Thomas Garvey

Coriolanus in triumph.  Photo: Andrew Brilliant.I finally caught Coriolanus on the Boston Common (across two nights; it closed Sunday), and as usual I was slightly mystified as to why p…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 10:21AM
Sunday, August 12, 2012

Sorry, I know this is crude, but it's just too funny by Thomas Garvey

Thanks Marie!!  Where did you find this?The Hub Review, the guide to everything that matters in Boston and elsewhere.

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 11:46AM
Saturday, August 11, 2012

Is Christopher Nolan the bane of 9/11 pop? (Part 1) by Thomas Garvey

Why . . . so . . . serious, Mr. Nolan?Was anyone really surprised when a masked figure stood up at the premiere of The Dark Knight Rises in Aurora, Colorado, and opened fire on the packed au…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 01:37PM
Sunday, August 5, 2012

Advice to Critics Young and Old, Part 1 - A Review is Not a Proof by Thomas Garvey

People who are unsympathetic to The Hub Review often collar me with questions like "Who are you to say what is art? And what is art, anyway? Can't anything be art?" Now these are valuable …

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 03:04PM
Saturday, August 4, 2012

Master Athol . . . and "the boys" by Thomas Garvey

Peter Mark Kendall and Johnny Lee Davenport in "Master Harold" . . . and the boys.Athol Fugard is a playwright with a great subject - the now-dismantled system of apartheid that held sway in…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 12:45PM
Friday, August 3, 2012

Now why exactly did the state just hand Harvard $150,000 to upgrade the ART's lighting? by Thomas Garvey

More cultural funding down the toilet.Sometimes you don't know whether to laugh or cry at the way this benighted state doles out its support for the arts.Is there any fatter cat than Harvard…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 11:34AM

Those were the days . . . by Thomas Garvey

. . . when a brilliant, aristocratic faggot had the balls to call William F. Buckley a crypto-Nazi to his face. On live television, no less!  And how Buckley reacts is priceless - he k…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 10:58AM
Thursday, August 2, 2012

Just another note about millennial cultural hypocrisy by Thomas Garvey

Millennial criticism of DWG (Dead White Guy) culture - particularly Shakespeare - has become almost de rigeur on many blogs and sites.So it's important to remember that Shakespeare is positi…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 04:22PM

Would I have voted for Vertigo? No. by Thomas Garvey

Kim Novak ponders taking the plunge in Vertigo.Word reaches us that after fifty years, Citizen Kane has finally been dislodged from its throne at the top of the Sight and Sound "greatest fil…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 12:09PM
Wednesday, August 1, 2012

At last, a clever way to close down the MFA mill? by Thomas Garvey

Is this what most MFA programs amount to?I've rarely been a fan of the HowlRound site, but they have posted an intriguing article by Marshall Botnivick which includes a very clever suggestio…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 09:44PM
Tuesday, July 31, 2012

If 2001 were being marketed today . . . by Thomas Garvey

A friend just sent me the following pastiche of 2001:A Space Odyssey, re-cut as if it were being marketed as a summer blockbuster.  In its bone-dumb acceleration into a meaningless…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 11:13PM

Prometheus bored by Thomas Garvey

Michael Fassbender plays at omnipotence in Prometheus.You know, I keep going to the cinema, and it keeps reminding me of why I go to the theatre instead.  My latest foray to the multipl…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 02:56PM
Saturday, July 28, 2012

Don Pasquale truly sings at Boston Midsummer Opera by Thomas Garvey

Leslie Ann Bradley and Ricardo Lugo make beautiful music in Don Pasquale.Okay, the short review of Boston Midsummer Opera's Don Pasquale is: go.And you have to go soon, as tomorrow is the la…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 02:47PM
Friday, July 27, 2012

The Young Person's Guide to Wes Anderson, Part 2 by Thomas Garvey

Suzy (Kara Hayward) on the lookout in Moonrise Kingdom.Some artists have to stumble onto their great subjects; but Wes Anderson (as I discussed in the first part of this critical diptych, se…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 12:50PM
Tuesday, July 24, 2012

High-flying Birdie by Thomas Garvey

The famous "Telephone Hour" from Bye Bye Birdie.This is just a quick post-mortem on Reagle Music Theatre's Bye Bye Birdie, which closed last weekend.  It was an enjoyable version of thi…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 09:51PM
Tuesday, July 17, 2012

Carnival of lost souls by Thomas Garvey

As the trusting Lili, Victoria Thornsbury only finds love at one remove.I'm torn over Gloucester Stage's current production of Carnival (which closes this weekend).  On the one hand, th…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 11:27AM
Monday, July 16, 2012

The Young Person's Guide to Wes Anderson, Part 1 by Thomas Garvey

Let's take a good look at Wes Anderson, shall we?  (A scene from Moonrise Kingdom.)Wes Anderson went to prep school in my hometown, Houston, and sometimes it seems that, at least in art…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 01:32PM
Friday, July 13, 2012

And now, what Ian Thal calls a crude piece of anti-Semitic agitprop by Thomas Garvey

This time seemed like a good one to revisit Caryl Churchill's Seven Jewish Children: A Play for Gaza, which I first posted at its premiere, but which Ian Thal has recently called "crude anti…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 12:04PM
Thursday, July 12, 2012

The fringe transformed by Thomas Garvey

Kiki Samko, Michael Caminiti, Michael Underhill, Luke Murtha and Elizabeth Battey in Polaroid Stories.Sorry for much of the radio silence of late - and my sincere thanks to the six hundred d…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 04:05PM
Tuesday, July 10, 2012

It's countdown time over at the Theater Mirror by Thomas Garvey

Boston's theatrical blogosphere is about to witness a landmark of sorts.  Larry Stark's Theater Mirror, which I believe was the first website devoted to local theatre in Boston (it…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 10:40PM
Monday, July 9, 2012

Just btw . . . my comment on Ian's article by Thomas Garvey

I did post a comment on Ian Thal's Clyde Fitch article some time ago - I believe last Friday. It doesn't seem to have worked it way through "moderation" yet, which has me a little worried; …

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 05:00PM

Is The Merchant of Venice now a tool of the Israel lobby? by Thomas Garvey

Shylock prepares to take his pound of flesh in Habima's Merchant of Venice.That's the intriguing question that Boston's own Ian Thal raises (I think unconsciously) in a post on the new Clyde…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 11:22AM
Sunday, July 8, 2012

I went to see Channing Tatum's butt, but I also got this lousy movie by Thomas Garvey

The opening scene of Magic Mike. I think I just saved you $10.I haven't been to a movie in a queen's age, but this weekend I had a free evening, so I thought - why not?  I've been meani…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 02:47PM
Tuesday, July 3, 2012

Sure, Twitter sparked the Arab Spring, but can it bring free speech to the Theatre Communications Group, too? by Thomas Garvey

Blogger and frequent Hub Review commenter Ian Thal has an amusing series of posts on his battle to be heard - despite his status as a volunteer - at the national Theatre Communications …

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 11:44AM
Thursday, June 28, 2012

Gloucester gets back to the Garden by Thomas Garvey

Steven Barkhimer, Richard Snee, and Barlow Adamson search for pussy up in Gloucester.Just in case you can't quite limn the theme of Round and Round the Garden, the last round of Alan Ayckbou…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 06:59AM
Monday, June 25, 2012

Rembrandt was really good, and other things I learned from Kenwood House by Thomas Garvey

Detail from Rembrandt's 1665 Portrait of the Artist.I spent the weekend down in Houston, sweltering in 99-degree heat, doing (happy) family stuff, escaping only long enough to drop by H…

SOURCE: The Hub Review at 10:51AM