First Nighter: "The Merry Widow" at the Met With New Cast Trying by David Finkle

If there's one thing Susan Stroman's new production of The Merry Widow at the Metropolitan Opera House isn't,...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 1:02pm on April 27, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Anne Hathaway in "Grounded," Irish Troubles in "The Belle of Belfast," Red Bull Theater's "'Tis Pity She's a W by David Finkle

Synchronicity can be a scary, shocking and ominously timely thing. Only days after Barack Obama apologizes for a drone killing hostages held by al Qaeda in Pakistan, George Brant's Grounded…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 7:04pm on April 26, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Lisa D'Amour's "Airline Highway" Traffic Jam by David Finkle

Everybody knows about gang comedies, most often as television series. Something less talked about, if ever talked about, are...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 12:05am on April 24, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: 'Doctor Zhivago' Caught at Musical Malpractice by David Finkle

Before the lights go down at the Doctor Zhivago start, the tall, dark Broadway Theatre curtains are parted maybe six or eight feet. Filling the space between them is a compilation of grey c…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 9:02pm on April 21, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: 'Living on Love' Proves Insufficient, Even With Renée Fleming by David Finkle

What do you get when you cross Noel Coward's Private Lives with the Cole Porter-Samuel Spewack-Bella Spewack Kiss Me, Kate? You get cross. That's what you get.

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:39pm on April 20, 2015☆⚑

Overreaching Revisions of Broadway Revivals by David Finkle

"Gigi" and "An American in Paris" underline a disturbing trend.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 2:25pm on April 20, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Peter Sarsgaard in Shakespeare's and Austin Pendleton's "Hamlet" by David Finkle

It's surprising how many actors appearing as William Shakespeare's Hamlet don't take heed of the young Dane's advice to the players about speaking trippingly on the tongue and not sawing the…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:06am on April 16, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Flying Off Course While 'Finding Neverland' by David Finkle

Weinstein has certainly toiled industriously to render the movie he produced into a hit. Maybe the hordes of Peter Pan fans will turn it into one.

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:11pm on April 15, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: The Schwartz-Almond "Iowa," The Good-Time "39 Steps" by David Finkle

Towards the end of the Jenny Schwartz-Todd Almond somewhat musical Iowa--or Iow@, as the program has it--four Mormon sister-wives...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 9:52am on April 14, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Choreographer Christopher Wheeldon Sparks the Gershwins' 'An American in Paris' by David Finkle

Christopher Wheeldon's choreography for An American in Paris, at the Palace, is so spectacular that you have to forgive anything else wrong with the production--and believe you me, there's p…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 9:53pm on April 12, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Tracey Scott Wilson's "Buzzer" Fizzles; "Clinton the Musical" Frazzles by David Finkle

As Tracey Scott Wilson's Buzzer gets underway at the Public, Jackson (Grantham Coleman) introduces himself to the...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:47pm on April 9, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Little Girl "Gigi" Does Not Grow Up on Broadway in a Most Delightful Way by David Finkle

The reference to the release from Arthur Freed's incomparable MGM unit is recorded here as preamble to the unhappy news that a woefully cheap travesty of the gloriously romantic film has now…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 7:11pm on April 8, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Robert Askins's "Hand to God" Deserves a Big Hand by David Finkle

Tyrone is a puppet with sharp teeth that lives at the end of the right arm belonging to timid Jason (Steven Boyer). The fabric...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:21pm on April 7, 2015☆⚑

"Wolf Hall" Director Jeremy Herrin Holds Court by David Finkle

How one of the theater season's most anticipated events came to be.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 11:40am on April 6, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: New Dance Craze "Flexn" Fills Park Avenue Armory by David Finkle

Would the 21 dancers of Flexn, directed by Reggie (Regg Roc) Gray and Peter Sellars, object to their movement styles...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 4:02pm on April 3, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: The Royal Shakespeare Company's Regal 'Love's Labour's Lost' and 'Love's Labour's Won' by David Finkle

Both are surpassingly good treatments. I heartily recommend them, although I definitely question whether it's commercially wise to attach the Love's Labour's Won name to a script that would …

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:55pm on April 1, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: "Don Carlo" at the Met Is Grand Opera, "Soldier X" Marches Well at HERE by David Finkle

You don't hear the term "grand opera" much anymore. That's if you hear it at all. But it's going to be revived right now in regards to the opening night performance of Giuseppe Ver…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 4:23pm on March 31, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: "Don Carlo" at the Met Is Grand Opera, "Soldier X" Marches Well at HERE by David Finkle

<![CDATA[You don't hear the term "grand opera" much anymore. That's if you hear it at all. But it's going to be revived right now in regards to the opening night performance of …

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 12:23pm on March 31, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Bedlam Company's Double Go at 'Twelfth Night, or What You Will' Perhaps Too Much Bedlam by David Finkle

In the program's statement of company purpose, there's a sentence about the fun for them and the audience of "inciting laughter and chaos." There's nothing wrong with inciting lau…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 9:00pm on March 29, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: "Ken Ludwig's Baskerville," Richard Maxwell's "The Evening" by David Finkle

With his prolific works Richard Maxwell gives the inescapable impression that he finds the niceties of theatrical production -- things like scripting, acting, design -- compromising. The mor…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 4:04pm on March 23, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Wendy Wasserstein's "Heidi Chronicles" in A+ Revival by David Finkle

When Heidi Holland, studying for a degree in art history, is first seen, she's at a college dance with best-friend-forever Susan Johnston (Ali Ahn) where she meets admirer Peter Patrone (Bry…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:47pm on March 19, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: "Paint Your Wagon" Revival Paints Town Red-Hot by David Finkle

When Paint Your Wagon was first done and record companies still actively scoured upcoming scores for chart-topping possibilities, the ones selected were "I Talk to the Trees" and &…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 3:17pm on March 19, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Folk Music Honoring 'Lonesome Traveler' Sure is Folksy by David Finkle

As writer and director, O'Neil is so intent on keeping Lonesome Traveler at a good-time hootenanny level (remember hootenannies?) that though he brings in some of the harder crises and their…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 9:37pm on March 17, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: Melissa James Gibson Prescribes an Ineffective "Placebo" by David Finkle

Louise (Carrie Coon) spends her time at the lab working on a study of female desire--with desire-depleted Mary (Florencia...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 8:47pm on March 16, 2015☆⚑

First Nighter: A Strong Review for "Posterity," Des Bishop Is "Made in China" by David Finkle

Doug Wright loves to wrangle with deceased figures of greater or lesser fame, and in Posterity, at the Atlantic's Linda Gross Theatre, he comes up with a humdinger.

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 1:53pm on March 16, 2015☆⚑