By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") It's been a full decade since Lin-Manuel Miranda's idea of a "mixtape" about the Founding Fathers was playing at the Public Theater to…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") When the season announcement was made last year that Jefferson Performing Arts (JPA) would be producing Billy Elliot: The Musical for …
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Throughout his life, Tennessee Williams knew tragedy. Whether through his sister Rose's struggle with mental health or the loss of his…
By SCOTTY BENNETT There are times in a person's life when the only rational response to the pressures of daily living is to escape into a different reality. Drugs and alcohol are often the d…
By SCOTTY BENNETT In the moments between daylight and evening, there is a time when it is neither day nor night. It is a time of transition, a liminal state between now and then, a twilight …
By ROY BERKO A juke box musical consists of pre-existing songs which are melded into a script to tell a story.  The songs, in contrast to lyrics and music, which are specifically integ…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") The Hans Christian Andersedn fairy tale "The Princess and the Pea" is the basis for Once Upon a Mattress, the 1959 musical that launch…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Le Petit Theatre du Vieux Carré has removed any doubt about whether it could creatively pull off the first local production of Je…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") It's hard to believe, but until three years ago there had never been a revival of Funny Girl on Broadway. The starring vehicle in 1964…
By SCOTTY BENNETT One of the fascinating things about humans is how easily they mask intense feelings in a cloak of smiles and good humor. Pain, both physical and emotional, can be disguised…
By ELIZABETH SCHABINGER The Bedwetter, based on Sarah Silverman's memoir of the same name, is an intimate look at Silverman's year as a 10-year-old. In The Bedwetter, Â Sarah is a fifth gr…
By ROY BERKO Parade, which is now on stage at the Palace Theatre as part of the Key Bank Broadway series, is a musical with a book by Alfred Uhry and music and lyrics by Jason Robert Brown. …
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") As hard to believe as it may be, Mamma Mia!, the ABBA hit jukebox musical is celebrating its 25th anniversary this year. It continues …
By LOU HARRY, Special to Theatrecriticism.com Yes, "Henry IV" is the complete title. Sans the "part 1" and "part 2" that traditionally complete the title of William Shakespeare's his…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Sam Shepard's powerful play about the toxic relationship between two brothers " True West " is back at the Jefferson Performing Arts' …
By LOU HARRY, Special to Theatrecriticism.com It's made clear from the first moments of "The Antiquities" that the human race is history. Jordan Harrison's play, a co-production of Playwrigh…
By LOU HARRY I've only seen Liza Minnelli once live. That was at a concert with the Indianapolis Symphony Orchestra, where her batteries seemed fully charged and she treated the audience lik…
By ANNE SIEGEL, Exclusive to Theatrecriticism.com MILWAUKEE " Okay, we're not Iowa. But when the Broadway national tour of Shucked opened this week in Madison, WI " the Wisconsin state capit…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") Capturing the wit and destructive lifestyle of humorist Oscar Levant is a daunting task for any actor attempting to portray the tortur…
By ALAN SMASON, WYES-TV Theatre Critic ("Steppin' Out") The biggest problem Broadway has with so-called "jukebox musicals" is they always seem to get mired down by the exposition of the stor…
By ALAN SMASON There are a lot of people capable of taking a beloved film soundtrack and adapting it faithfully into a theatre piece for presentation on the stage. There are also a lot of pe…
By ALAN SMASON Of all the holiday-themed shows that make their way onto stages in December, Elf: The Broadway Musical may be the one most resistant to the Grinch, Scrooge and other humbugs. …
By SCOTTY BENNETT Consider, if you will, a blizzardlike night, a cozy inn on the brink of closing forever, suddenly brought back to life by the arrival of two very different groups of travel…
By SCOTTY BENNETT Woman on a Ledge is an adaptation by Hershey Felder of harpist Rita Costanzi's writings about her life. Ms. Costanzi is a world-renowned harpist whose life experiences have…
By SCOTTY BENNETT Okuni: The Woman Who Created Kabuki by Ako Dachs is a limited, fictionalized account of the woman who is thought to have created kabuki. It is generally accepted that the d…