348 stories by "Alan Smason"
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Crittic ("Steppin' Out") Tovah Feldshuh had described herself as a "transformational" actor. Among her previous outings in one-woman shows were Israeli Prime …
By JACK LYONS, Desert Local News The Desert Ensemble Theatre Company (DETC) of Palm Springs launched its 2021-2022 season in its new home at Theatre # 3, inside the Palm Springs Cultural Cen…
By JACK LYONS, Desert Local News Live theaters all over the country are mounting their various holiday versions of Christmas-themed plays and musicals. The Palm Canyon Theatre, the city'…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Coming just a year after the tragic deaths of George Floyd, Ahmaud Arbery and Breonna Taylor and last summer's massive Black Lives Mat…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Any child of the Sixties or worthy Deadhead would probably bet their monthly Social Security check that Harvard professor Timothy Lear…
By JACK LYONS, The world of theatre can become a transformative experience for many in the audience as each person views the production through different lenses at the same time.   …
By EDWARD RUBIN Manhattan Theatre Club's production of British playwright Simon Stephen's three-generation memory play Morning Sun runs through Sunday, December 19th at New York City Center.…
By ANNE SIEGEL MILWAUKEE, WI " It may seem unusual for the state's largest performing arts organization to open its doors after the pandemic with a comedy from the genteel South. Yet, a clos…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") There is an obvious conversation addressed early in Tootsie, the David Yazbek musical that won Santino Fontana a Leading Actor in a Mu…
By ROY BERKO In 2010 a gay Mississippi high school student was banned from coming to her senior prom by the school's Board of Education because she wanted to bring her girlfriend as her date…
By ANNE SIEGEL The opening of Zora Howard's Stew marks a return to the stage for one of Milwaukee's longstanding companies, Milwaukee Chamber Theatre. For the past 20 months, one of the love…
By ROY BERKO For the last several years more and more attention has been placed on The Black Lives Matter and #MeToo movements, woke language, microaggressions, radical feminism, transgender…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") With the opening of The Addams Family musical last week, director Leslie Castay added a new company, the Jefferson Performing Arts Soc…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") When Bryan Batt steps on the stage of Le Petit Theatre du Carré as the star of the one-man play Dear Mr. Williams, he is literally li…
By ROY BERKO The death penalty carries the inherent risk of executing an innocent person. Since 1973, more than 186 people who had been sentenced to death have been exonerated. Research b…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") When it was announced that Ricky Graham would be in the director's chair for  Hello, Dolly! at Rivertown Theaters for the Perfo…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") With its most recent production of God of Carnage, the Jefferson Performing Arts Society has taken the wraps off Yasmina Reza's contro…
By JACK LYONS When it comes to original stories made into movies and TV films about the subject of love and marriage, one would be hard pressed to ignore the angst-filled dramas of the great…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") There are times when a single performance rises above all others within a given production. While these times are rare, when they occu…
By ANNE SIEGEL (Dashland, OREGON) " Water by the Spoonful is perhaps even more relevant today than when it was staged at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in 2014. The play initially appeared …
By ANNE SIEGEL SPRING GREEN, WI. " This summer, while audiences were flocking to the large, outdoor theater to view Shakespeare under the stars, another small miracle was taking place inside…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") When the notices first went out proclaiming an upcoming production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's Sunset Boulevard at Slidell's Cutting E…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Rob Ulin must be a very happy man. He obviously has been saying his prayers and living a proper and pious life. That must be the case …
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Watch out, Sonny Crockett and Rico Tubbs, there are two dudes named Antipholus who are being confused for one another in the South Bea…
By ANNE SIEGEL Under a towering grove of old growth trees, on an exceptionally balmy evening, the Summit Players were hurriedly making preparations for their production of free Shakespeare i…
