Employing an authentic and strong Southern dialect, Ms. Meadows sounds and looks like she really is a person in the 1840's. This vocal expertise combined with Meadows' altering of her physio…
Writer-performer Bob Martin recycles his sweater-clad disaffected "Man in the Chair" character from his 2006 Broadway musical "The Drowsy Chaperone." The conceit is that he's a disgruntled E…
Playwrights Horizons has a real winner with the first entry in its new Redux Series bringing back worthy Off Off Broadway plays for a longer run Off Broadway. First up is "Miles for Mary," a…
The production is not helped by William Carden's heavy-handed direction. Scene transitions are punctuated by sound designer and composer Shane Rettig's blaring, pulsing and overwhelming …
Produced as part of the Flea's Season of Women, Del Rosso's freshman effort shows great promise. Under Marina McClure's insightfully freewheeling direction the members of The Flea's resi…
We are never told the name of the play being rehearsed or who the characters in the play within the play are. In the second act, the performers dressed in their costumes for Gabriele's play …
Darryl Reilly, Critic Maureen Stapleton by Raphael Soyer (1968) This striking portrait of Maureen Stapleton was painted by Raphael Soyer in 1968, a pivotal year in her life and career. It's …
If you're in the mood for a night of laughter, "The Outsider""a new comedy by Paul Slade Smith, receiving its East Coast premiere in January and February at the Paper Mill Playhouse--is grea…
Mr. Cusumano has crafted a scenario that though familiar is gripping. The timeless craving for lost souls seeking a purpose in life by handing over their existence to charlatans is fresh…
Whereas Kennedy became famous with plays that use myth, history, surrealism and Theater of the Absurd to tell their stories, this play tells a realistic tale in poetic form, its very brevity…
"September" by Earth, Wind and Fire was gorgeously mashed up with Kool & The Gang's "Celebration" and was the soaring opening number of The New York Pops' exhilarating rhythm and blues …
Presiding over the entire piece and working in close artistic collaboration with Keene was actor F. Murray Abraham; he read the King James Bible based narrative from Ascension's commandingly…
Though the production has been designed by its director, John Doyle, there is no scenery to speak of, except for a gold framed mirror on the rear wall, another framed mirror angled and dangl…
Stanley Houghton's once controversial "Hindle Wakes" explodes everything you have ever been taught about the double standard and the place of women in society. The irrefutable logic of the c…
... in Deen's mad dash to portray Shireern's elderly Indian father and mother--who live in Connectictut--her girlfriend, Molly, and so many other figures, including even a housecleaner at a …
The first act is a faithful and skillful hour-long condensation of "The Seagull." The second act is a clever hour-long vaudeville-style amalgam of "The Cherry Orchard," "Uncle Vanya" and "Th…
Greg Pierce, the author of "Slowgirl" and "Kid Champion," has often tackled hot button issues. Here in Cardinal being given its world premiere at Second Stage Theater, he takes on urban rene…
While the new cut-down version (performed concert style with book in hand) with nine actors instead of the original 36, now covers 100 years, rather than the sixty in the original show, it s…
The best reason to see Isobel Mahon's "Party Face" is to see the ever-lovely Hayley Mills who used to play mischievous teens and now is playing busy-body mothers. The play is diverting thoug…
Classic movies such as "It's a Wonderful Life," "Miracle on 34th Street" and "Moonstruck" are citied in the play and author June Daniel White is clearly inspired by and seeks to emulate them…
This comedy/drama/fitful musical also suffers from major tonal challenges, as it strains to push all of our emotional buttons. It's a shame, because the cast gives it their all. Particularly…
The first work on the program was "Indomitable Waltz" (2016) choreographed by Aszure Barton to dark hued music by the Balanescu Quartet and Nils Frahm. Barton achieved a graceful, yet dr…
Though there's a major surprise lurking at the top of the second act, and though it's about how sins of the past can impinge on the present, Scott Organ's "The Thing with Feathers" is ultima…
"I never met a peanut butter junkie" is one of the many sharp zingers in Fran Handman's romantic park bench meetup, "A New York Encounter" (directed by Elowyn Castle) between an older man an…
Playwrights Kevin Armento and Bryony Lavery take the well-known facts that have been explored in documentaries and in the feature film "Battle of the Sexes" and shovel on a cascade of imagin…