First Nighter: Daniel Kitson Strides Again at St. Ann's Warehouse by David Finkle

Daniel Kitson is not only a marvelous story-teller. He may be our foremost meta-storyteller, and possibly because...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:54pm on December 4, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Terrence McNally's "And Away We Go" Love Letter to Actors by David Finkle

Theater and opera crazo Terrence McNally loves writing about his passions, especially anything to do with their...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 4:52pm on November 25, 2013☆⚑

"Song of Spider-Man" Sings a Melancholy Tune by David Finkle

Glen Berger's book examines Julie Taymor's extravagant mediocrity.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 4:43pm on November 25, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Met's Second Cast Eugene Onegin Has Chekhovian Flair by David Finkle

The new cast of Eugene Onegin, the season opener at the Met, has weighed in. Turns out -- hooray! -- they're a troupe of heavyweights, especially as conducted by debuting Alexander Vedernik…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 1:07pm on November 24, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: In London With "Strangers on a Train," "Arturo Ui," "Barking in Essex" by David Finkle

London--Perhaps it has everything to do with what you choose to see, but right now in London there's a strong sense of déjà vu--a...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:37pm on November 21, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: London's 'Jeeves and Wooster in Perfect Nonsense,' 'Mojo,' 'From Here to Eternity' by David Finkle

As popular as P. G. Wodehouse and his creations, suave manservant Jeeves and first-prize twit Bertie Wooster, have been for almost 100 years, they've apparently never toddled onto a West End…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:06am on November 15, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Neat Tricks Pulled Off in Beckett's All That Fall, Nothing to Hide by David Finkle

Samuel Beckett wanted his plays done exactly as he wrote them and as he particularized them in his stage directions. Don't think of adding even a second tree, for instance, to the Waiting fo…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:51pm on November 13, 2013☆⚑

Philip Roth Comes Clean, Autobiographically by David Finkle

Claudia Roth Pierpont's "Roth Unbound" tells his story and stories.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 11:20am on November 11, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Mark Rylance and Company's Superb Richards III and Twelfth Night by David Finkle

Two-time Tony winner Mark Rylance is stage-obsessed. He's so taken with all aspects of the theater that he has the Shakespeare's Globe Productions company he's leading get into costume in fr…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:00pm on November 10, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Beth Henley's "The Jacksonian," The Seth Rudetsky-Jack Plotnick "Disaster!" by David Finkle

In Beth Henley's quasi-Southern Gothic play The Jacksonian, the establishment of the title is a Jackson, Mississippi motel...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:49pm on November 6, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Bruce Norris's Domesticated Yay, Wallace Shawn's Grasses of a Thousand Colors Nay by David Finkle

We may never know what Hilary Clinton was thinking during the 1998 Monica Lewinsky episode or how Silda Wall Spitzer was reacting when Eliot Spitzer strayed or whether Huma Abedin was severe…

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:16pm on November 4, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: "After Midnight" Is a Revue You Absolutely Mustn't Miss by David Finkle

Why go on about the spectacular After Midnight, other than to say that for pure entertainment it comes as near being...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 8:06pm on November 3, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Julie Taymor's "Midsummer Night's Dream" Hits and Misses by David Finkle

If you know William Shakespeare's Midsummer Night's Dream and Julie Taymor's several publicity-nabbing productions--many

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 9:04am on November 3, 2013☆⚑

Jews in Dire Straits on New York Stages by David Finkle

Three plays currently running delve deeply into Jewish anxieties.

SOURCE: Clyde Fitch Report at 2:23pm on October 28, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Craig, Weisz, Spall in Nichols's Angle on Pinter's "Betrayal" by David Finkle

Something Mike Nichols chose to do when directing the final moments of Harold Pinter's Betrayal--now at the Ethel...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:50pm on October 27, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: The Lisa Kron-Jeanine Tesori "Fun Home" May Not Be Non-Stop Fun But It Damn Well Hits Home by David Finkle

Musicals have dealt with incarceration (Kiss of the Spider Woman), hanging (Parade) and murder (Sweeney Todd,...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 5:28pm on October 24, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Nico Muhly's "Two Boys" Proves One Plus One Equals Disappointment by David Finkle

The thing I'm bursting to tell you immediately about Two Boys, the Nico Muhly-Craig Lucas opera at the Metropolitan...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:58pm on October 22, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Lee's "Luce" No Loser; Adjmi's "Marie Antoinette" Loses Its Head by David Finkle

Several years before JC Lee's stinging play Luce, at the Claire Tow, begins, Amy (Marin Hinkle) and Peter (Neal Huff) adopted a...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:21am on October 22, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: When Irish Eyes Aren't Smiling in Sean O'Casey and Maeve Brennan by David Finkle

Charlotte Moore as artistic director and Ciarán O'Reilly as producing director at the Irish Repertory Theatre form one of...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 10:17pm on October 20, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Terence Rattigan's "The Winslow Boy" Superb in Lindsay Posner's Roundabout Production by David Finkle

When in 1956 John Osborne's Look Back in Anger shook up the London theater--and much of the rest of the English-speaking...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 9:58pm on October 17, 2013☆⚑

Easy Reader: Donna Tartt's "The Goldfinch" Takes Flights of Imagination by David Finkle

It's beginning to look as if every 10 years or so--and no matter what the weather or geopolitical situation is--we can count on...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:18pm on October 16, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Donald Margulies's Hard-Hitting "Model Apartment" a Model Production by David Finkle

Depending on when you see--or have seen--The Model Apartment, you will either think playwright Donald Margulies has...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 11:22pm on October 15, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Westport Country Playhouse's "Room Service" on a Gold Tray by David Finkle

About the 1937 Room Service, now revived at the Westport Country Playhouse, I'm tempted to say things like "They don't write...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 6:01pm on October 14, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Britten's "Midsummer Night's Dream" Dreamy at the Met by David Finkle

Looking over the relatively lighter crowd coursing into the first revival of Benjamin Britten's Midsummer Night's...

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 7:46pm on October 13, 2013☆⚑

First Nighter: Tony Danza Puts the Honey in Honeymoon in Vegas by David Finkle

Tony Danza on stage--or anywhere, for that matter--is just about impossible to dislike. This contemporary show-biz given is both a boon and a problem for Honeymoon in Vegas.

SOURCE: Huffington Post at 1:32pm on October 11, 2013☆⚑