744 stories by "Steven Suskin"
Nicole Kidman in Photograph 51. Photo: Johan Persson
Rosalind Franklin (1920-1958) was a British crystallographer...
The cast of Martin McDonagh's Hangmen
Martin McDonagh--the British/Irish author of such mordantly...
The trouble with "Razzle Dazzle," Michael Riedel's new book about Broadway, is that from the first page--on which a...
Megan McGinness and Paul Alexander Nolan in Daddy Long Legs.
Photo: Jeremy Daniel
Playgoers might have trepidations...
Sandra Mae Frank and Austin P. McKenzie in Spring Awakening.
Photo: Joan Marcus
Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater's...
Samuel "Biff" Liff
April 14, 1919 - August 10, 2015
Everybody on Broadway knew Biff, or wanted to know Biff.
Plays about religious philosophy can be mighty dry and uninvolving, not only to outsiders but to people of the faith in question as well. Playwrights Horizons' newest offering -- The Christ…
A comedy about drag queens might have a somewhat limited audience. The Legend of Georgia McBride, though, is not so much a comedy about drag queens, but a comedy which incorporates characte…
"Joy Ride: Show People & Their Shows" by John Lahr
The American drama critic John Lahr has been writing about the theatre and...
Those of us who watched the actress Madeline Kahn (1942-1999) as she slipped into prominence--with...
Daveed Diggs, Okieriete Onaodowan, Anthony Ramos and Lin Manuel Miranda
in Hamilton. Photo: Joan Marcus
"I am...
From 1927 to 1931, six major Broadway composers were born: (in order of appearance) John Kander,...
James Lecesne in The Absolute Brightness of Leonard Pelkey.
Photo: Matthew Murphy
The Absolute Brightness of...
We now have another Awake and Sing!, this time at the Public. But there is a major difference. This is a production of the National Asian American Theatre Company (NAATCO). The cast consists…
The authors and producers seem to be very much in earnest in this anti-slavery, pro-faith tale of the mid-18th century. They provide something of a history lesson, based on the life, adventu…
Penn Jillette and Teller in Penn & Teller On Broadway. Photo: Francis George
Penn Jillette and the mononymous Teller...
Shows for Days is closer, in style and genre, to Joseph Stein's 1963 adaptation of Carl Reiner's Enter Laughing. But that play--which launched the acting career of Alan Arkin and the direct…
Thirty-five years to the day after the first performance of the long-running Broadway musical 42nd Street, almost two hundred alumni gathered last night to celebrate. The David Merrick/Gowe…
Jonathan Groff and Aaron Lazar in A New Brain. Photo: Joan Marcus
Theatergoers with a keen interest in dramatic,...
How do you describe a play that is so surprising -- and so excellent -- that you don't want to give readers an idea of what they are in for?
Playwright Joshua Harmon burst into view in 2012 with Bad Jews, one of those plays that sounds like a bad idea but turns out to be very good.
The play itself, an LCT3 offering at Lincoln Center Theater's Claire Tow playhouse, turns out to be an intriguing, challenging evening of theatre.
Kate Arrington, Jeremy Shamos and Sarah Goldberg in The Qualms.
Photo: Joan Marcus
Bruce Norris, who has given us...
Since achieving stardom in 2010 as Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network, Jesse Eisenberg has diligently applied himself to writing plays. The Spoils, his third off-Broadway offering in five…
We page through Thomas S. Hischak's guide to "Off-Broadway Musicals Since 1919"; a problematic survey of "The Golden Age of the Musical Theatre"; a cornucopia called "The American Stage"; an…
