8,501 stories from Backstage
Keen Company turns "The Dining Room" into a cleverly clinical study of feeling; both the characters' emotions and the audience's reactions are displayed without any accompanying quote marks …
The presentation of Marcello Colasurdo as a sort of singing savior of the people wears thin even within the swift 50 minutes of this piece.
Were this only a reading, it would be well worth seeing, as Belgian playwright Fernand Crommelynck's play is such a rarity. In a stylish, full-out production like this one, it's quite indisp…
Clarity and immediacy are key virtues of Pearl Theatre Company's satisfyingly straightforward rendering of "Hamlet."
Euripedes' "The Bacchae" is a tragedy, but that fact comes as a complete surprise while watching "The Rockae," Prospect Theater Company's musical adaptation, because it's such a sexy good ti…
With minor tweaking, this heartwarming show could go places.
"Little Shop of Horrors," "Zombies From the Beyond," "Bat Boy," and "The Rocky Horror Show" all did it better.
In juxtaposing Catullus' works with his exploits, "Tully (in no particular order)" obfuscates the actual poems themselves. Instead of letting us in on the struggles of creation, the writers …
"The Boy in the Bathroom," a three-character chamber musical about 20-something David, who, suffering from OCD, has locked himself in the bathroom of his mother's home for a year, should be …
There's much promise in this generally smart and amiable musical variation on "Sex and the City."
The uniformly fine cast makes every effort to imbue the material with passion and lighthearted joie de vivre, but their professionalism and zest can't overcome what is essentially a highly p…
These three 1960s teleplays don't match the brilliance of Tom Stoppard's later work.
Playwright Jorge Ignacio Cortiñas and director Rubén Polendo combine to create a piece of beguiling if somewhat baffling theatre in Cortiñas' fablelike drama.
Lucy Thurber's explosive family drama about a brother and sister longing to escape poverty in small-town Massachusetts certainly is relevant. Unfortunately, it's also predictable.
Playwright Marie Jones has great intentions, but they're smothered by the conventionality of her execution.
Genuine and subtle in its feelings about the unexpected turns of life and the urge to create art, "The Angle of the Sun" is a finely wrought and superbly performed intimate musical. It's a w…
Historically, religion and homosexuality have gone together like peanut butter and chives. Leave it to provocateur Kate Fodor to address the conflict between desire and belief in subtle and …
Fortunately, Trevor Nunn and the Royal Shakespeare Company remember that Chekhov specified "The Seagull" is a comedy, and their production is as full of laughs as pathos.
Jonathan Whitton exudes talent and taste. He understands that songs exist to be acted and, furthermore, that show tunes written for dramatic situations frequently offer the richest acting op…
Librettist Toni Morrison and composer Richard Danielpour occasionally linger on some of the piece's least dramatic moments. Still, this new opera is a snapshot of a haunting and haunted peri…
Trevor Nunn gives us a robust, lively rendering, injecting just enough humor to bring the sorrow into high relief. The show flies by despite its nearly four-hour running time, and Ian McKell…
Director Woodie King, Jr. succeeds in keeping the energy high and the tone consistent throughout this revival of Charles Gordone's 1970 Pulitizer Prize-winning play.
Your grandma's "Kiss of the Spider Woman" this ain't. Perhaps a nonmusical version might have served the Vortex Theater Company's serious purposes better than this ambitious but enervating m…
With President Bush's recent announcement of his plan to decrease American troop levels in Iraq, the timing of the East Coast premiere of Jane Martin's Flags becomes even more disturbingly a…
The voices of Seattle visitors Trish, Hans, and Phil are a perfect blend. When the three harmonize, the sounds they make are enough to soothe the savage breast in just about anyone.
