348 stories by "Alan Smason"
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") For three and a half years, Joseph Kesselring was the toast of Broadway with his dark comedy Arsenic & Old Lace. The play, which o…
By JACK LYONS How does one cover 2000 years of religious history of the Jewish people and Gentiles in the Common Era (C.E.)?  Perhaps, a good start would be seeing life through the le…
When the worldwide theatre community shut down last March, Andréa Burns was riding high. She was getting ready to fly out to San Diego to be one one a group of actors who would be mounting …
By EDWARD RUBIN The first name that comes to mind whenever the name Hershey Felder comes into play is that of actor Sacha Baron Cohen. Not only do both men physically resemble each other, ar…
By ALAN SMASON, Special to Theatrecriticism.com For the past two decades, Stogie Kenyatta has researched, performed and perfected his one-man show The World Is My Home " The Life of Paul Rob…
By JACK LYONS, Special to Theatrecriticism.com (Desert Local News) " When the movie "Casablanca" merged the powerful elements of love, war, and destiny in 1942, the film and its producers ne…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") It might be easy to dismiss Estella Scrooge: A Christmas Carol with a Twist as another in a continuing procession of holiday fare we'v…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") The third entry in the Williamstown Theatre Festival's season using the Aubible platform was released in late December. This world pre…
Rebecca Luker, a three-time Tony Award nominated actress, whose crystal-clear soprano voice and stunning presence established her as a star in some of Broadway's more noted musicals of the p…
By ALAN SMASON Ever since the words "novel coronavirus" began to make the news circuits and theaters began what was hoped to be a relatively short downtime, the ingenuity of resourceful and …
By EDWARD RUBIN Of all the celebs channeled by drag queens and female impersonators, Bette Davis, like flies to honey, has always been at the top of every performers list. Her mannerisms, he…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Due to the ongoing COVID-19 restrictions limiting crowd sizes at public gatherings, local theatre companies have found themselves in a…
By ALAN SMASON With the current COVID-19 pandemic creating new and interesting virtual meeting places, university campuses have been marked by responsiveness and ingenuity. Last spring's vir…
The Tony Awards Administration Committee met on August 27, 2020 to confirm the eligibility status of three Broadway productions for the 2020 Tony Awards®. This was the final time the Tony…
By ALAN SMASON As the seconds ticked by to display a 2:00 a.m. CDT time on the computer, it was easy for me to imagine the sounds of a million click booms on TV remotes across the nation. Th…
The 65th annual Drama Desk Awards, which had been postponed during the COVID-19 pandemic, and then rescheduled for Sunday, May 31, only to be postponed again due to the emerging protests and…
By HARRY DUKE, originally published in NORTH BAY BOHEMIAN What is the point of reviewing theatre? If you had asked me that question 90 days ago, my answer would be to provide potential audie…
By EDWARD RUBIN Surprise of all surprises, the 1969 movie "Bob & Carol & Ted & Alice," thanks to The New Group and Pershing Square Signature Center, is back in the news again"thi…
By EDWARD RUBIN In or out of drag, whether on stage or page, the 65-year-old actor playwright Charles Busch, with some 40 years of show business under his belt, is a force to be reckoned wit…
By JACK LYONS, Special from Desert Local News.com (PALM SPRINGS, CA.) " Coyote StageWorks, of Palm Springs, presents playwright Lucas Hnath's A Doll's House, Part 2 as the debut production i…
By EDWARD RUBIN My Name Is Lucy Barton written by Elizabeth Stout and published to a chorus of Hosannas in 2016, is now a one-woman, two-character play " running through Saturday, February 2…
By EDWARD RUBIN I cannot remember any play that unnerved me to such a degree as the Vineyard Theatre's production of Tina Satter's brilliantly conceived Is This A Room. Not only did this one…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") With its current production of Something Rotten!, Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carré has set the bar so incredibly high that even they m…
By EDWARD RUBIN First things first. Before I delve into the Irish Repertory Theater's marvelous production of London Assurance by Dublin-born playwright Dion Boucicault (1820-1890) " extende…
By BILL HIRSCHMAN For even those who only knew Herbert Simpson in passing, likely what they remember was his voice " usually deep and sonorous, a bit scratchy, but brimming with passion. The…
