Thursday, May 10, 2012
John Jasperse's one-hour dance piece, Fort Blossom Revisited, begins when an attractive, curly-haired, and completely nude white man walks calmly onstage and lies face down, hands at side. H…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 10:30PMSunday, May 6, 2012
In northern Michigan in 1911, a nun was found murdered. In the early 1970s, playwright Milan Stitt wrote a murder mystery/courtroom drama based on this story and used it to examine love, rel…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 09:08PMWhile watching the not-particularly-enthralling New Group production of David Rabe's new play, An Early History of Fire, I had to wonder if we really need yet another coming-of-age story in …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 07:53PMWednesday, May 2, 2012
Today's Tony Award nominations underline that, in its own way, the Fabulous Invalid isn't dead yet, despite its attempts to commit suicide via obscenely high ticket prices. It has recreated …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:36AMRachael Hip-Flores, Isaiah Tanenbaum Photo: Justin HochIn August Schulenburg's wonderful new play, DEINDE, a Flux Theatre Ensemble production, it's 2051, and a virus is decimating the human …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:04AMSunday, April 29, 2012
A Midsummer Night's Dream may be William Shakespeare's most indestructible play. The plot is so solidly silly, the characters' desires and dreams so clearly etched, that the show is always f…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 05:29PMSaturday, April 28, 2012
In contrast to, for example, Liv Ullman's version of A Streetcar Named Desire (or David Cromer's or Edward Hall's), Emily Mann's version respects and serves the play. It is clear and straigh…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 12:34PMFriday, April 20, 2012
Really? Clybourne Park? This is the play that won the Pulitzer? That has a good chance at the Tony? That is receiving raves? Really?Let's take the depiction of the deaf character Betsy as a …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:55AMThursday, April 19, 2012
Bob Dylan's songs are so closely meshed with Bob Dylan's voice that the idea of a cabaret chanteuse taking them on is like tomato ice cream, both odd and intriguing. Award-winning British si…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 02:30PMWednesday, April 18, 2012
Stars are generally not low-key people. From Bette Davis to Patti LuPone they are often mannered, fascinating, and almost painfully distinct. They are never generic. Love 'em or hate 'em, yo…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:57PMMonday, April 16, 2012
The delightful Peter and the Starcatcher, the Story Theatre-esque prequel to Peter Pan, is now on Broadway at the Brooks Atkinson Theatre (my review of the Off-Broadway production at t…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:14PMFriday, April 13, 2012
It's almost silly for Barbara Cook to sing "Let's Fall in Love" to the audience at Feinstein's; we all fell in love with her years ago--and, as she proves yet again, with good reason.How do …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 08:23PMWednesday, April 11, 2012
Anyone want to join Show Showdown? None of us get paid, but we do often get free tickets, and it's great fun having a forum where you can write as long or short as you like and review the wh…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:29PMVictoria Clark, Kelli O'HaraPhoto: Jennifer BroskiThere are (rare) times in life when we get to experience perfection. One of mine was last night--listening to Kelli O'Hara's simple, elegant…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:21PMSaturday, April 7, 2012
Tim Moyer, Kristin Wiegand, Lauren Rooney, Ellen Ratner,Paul Dake, Joel MalazitaOn the first day of rehearsal of the Broadway production of his heart-warming two-character play, Tuning Piano…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 02:15PMFriday, April 6, 2012
Amy Lee Pearsall, Becky Byers, Alisha Spielmann, Nancy Sirianni, and Felicia Hudson Photo: Deborah AlexanderMany years ago, a friend of mine was extolling the virtues of ants versus humans, …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:05AMThursday, April 5, 2012
If you missed Advance Man, part one of Mac Rogers' "Honeycomb Trilogy," I'm sorry you did! But it's no reason to miss Blast Radius, part two, currently playing at the Secret Theatre (and rev…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:25PMWednesday, April 4, 2012
I know that one shouldn't judge a book by its cover, nor a show by its poster, but as soon as I saw the one for Porgy and Bess, I had serious misgivings about this production. For one thing,…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 03:25PMNellie McKay: Silent Spring--It's Not Nice to Fool Mother Nature: Nellie McKay fits into no category. You can't describe her by saying she's like so-and-so crossed with so-and-so. If you tri…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:22PMSunday, March 25, 2012
Court-Martial at Fort Devens, by Jeffrey Sweet, tells the true story of a group of African-American women who joined the women's army corps during World War II to be trained as medical assis…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 10:15PMAna Reeder, Jeanine SerrallesPhoto: Carol RoseggIn Jean Genet's intense one-act, The Maids, Claire and Solange are in service to a frivolous woman who treats them with a false bonhomie; she …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 07:29PMWednesday, March 21, 2012
(Caveat: at the performance I saw, not one, but two, women crumpled plastic bags on and off for the whole 100 minutes. They were really annoying, and they made it impossible to concentrate f…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:37PMMonday, March 19, 2012
Seth Rudetsky is arguably one of the most talented people in New York and definitely one of the funniest. His latest production is Disaster!, co-written with Jack Plotnick, and it is over tw…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:29PMSaturday, March 17, 2012
In 1975, Antonia Fraser, biographer of Mary, Queen of Scots, and Henry VIII's six wives, and Harold Pinter, renowned playwright, fell madly in love, pretty much at first sight. Over the next…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:25PMThursday, March 15, 2012
Kathleen Chalfant, John Cunningham(photo: Carol Rosegg)It's hard to know how to respond to Tina Howe's 1984 Pulitzer-Prize-nominated play Painting Churches in 2012. It's not the play's fault…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 01:43PMWednesday, March 7, 2012
The Poet is exhausted, and why shouldn't he be? He has been telling tales of man's inhumanity to man for years, maybe centuries. If a poet can have post-traumatic stress disorder, he does. O…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 10:35PMTuesday, March 6, 2012
This is a golden age of musical leading ladies. Donna Murphy. Audra McDonald. Marin Mazzie. Tonya Pinkins. Christine Ebersole. Bebe Neuwirth. Laura Benanti. Patti LuPone. Victoria Clar…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 11:39PMMonday, February 13, 2012
Early in previews, the SecondStage revival of Paula Vogel's How I Learned to Drive, directed by KateWhoriskey, was already in good shape, well-paced, well-acted, and emotionallydevastating. …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 07:00PMFriday, February 10, 2012
SeanPatrick Murtagh andCharlie Owens Photo: Bella MuccariSeeing Off-Off-Broadway and community productions is a bit of a crapshoot. Quality ranges from superb to “what were they thinking?…
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 09:43PMTuesday, January 31, 2012
Sarah Steele, Janeane GarofaloPhoto: Monique CarboniAt the beginning of Erika Sheffer's intriguing new play Russian Transport, we meet a Russian family who has been living in Brooklyn since …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 07:01PMMonday, January 30, 2012
Let's play a word-associationgame. I say, "Petula Clark." And you say?My guess isthat you say--no, sing--"Downtown." Or perhaps, "Don't Sleep inthe Subway, Darling." On the other hand, …
SOURCE: Show Showdown at 12:51PM 
