Wednesday, April 24, 2024
I don’t like Eddie Redmayne; I love Eddie Redmayne. I have admired his work in all of his films and plays and consider him one of the few genuine icons in the world of acting. But not in …
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 04:11PMThursday, March 21, 2024
Everything is so exaggerated and phony that it’s hard to believe the director is the same Jessica Stone responsible for the charming, imaginative Tony Award winner 'Kimberly Akimbo'
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 08:00PMTuesday, March 19, 2024
Tuesday, July 25, 2023
An cast of six actors yell, shriek and swallow two hours of uniformly overwrought line readings in this noisy, witless farce. When everything else fails, one whole scene is devoted to fartin…
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 01:28PMFriday, June 16, 2023
Run don't walk to see Juliet Stevenson in a production that marks her first trip across the pond in 20 years. As for the play, you're on your own.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 03:07PMMonday, June 5, 2023
The classic tale remains grim, graphic, and demanding, and Brian d’Arcy James and Kelli O’Hara give it all they've got. But burdened with bluntly conversational songs, this musical fails…
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 09:00PMFriday, April 28, 2023
This show—questionably claiming to be inspired by Martin Scorsese's 1977 movie—piles up a tidal wave of old John Kander and Fred Ebb songs worthy of applause. But the rest of the evening…
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 06:20PMTuesday, April 25, 2023
Sean Hayes is entertaining without pause in his sensational portrayal of Oscar Levant in one of the few Broadway shows that unimpeachably deserves its tumultuous standing ovation.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 10:51AMMonday, March 27, 2023
Josh Groban is excellent as the Demon Barber of Fleet Street, but the production is ugly and chaotic.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 08:00AMSunday, December 11, 2022
Dusted off, polished and revitalized to reflect contemporary values, 'Some Like It Hot' remains close to perfect.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 02:30PMFriday, December 9, 2022
In this Broadway revival of Adrienne Kennedy's 1992 play, Audra McDonald is more interesting than the show itself.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 11:31AMFriday, November 18, 2022
Set to the music of Max Martin, this moronic new Broadway show asks the question, "What if Romeo died but Juliet didn't kill herself and lived on to bore everybody else to death?"
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 03:54PMTuesday, October 18, 2022
The ovations (many of them standing) greeting Lea Michelle as Fanny Brice are contagious.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 01:20PMWednesday, April 27, 2022
Whatever charm exists in 'Mr. Saturday Night' is due to Mr. Crystal, but even he needs proper material.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 10:00PMSunday, April 24, 2022
The new production of 'Funny Girl' knocks your socks off before the intermission. By that time, the star's hidden magic has hit you squarely in the heart in ways you didn't see coming.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 10:37PMMonday, April 18, 2022
You will probably leave Tracy Letts' 'The Minutes' with very mixed feelings, but you will talk about it, think about it, and go away with the knowledge that you have never seen anything like…
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 11:17AMMonday, April 4, 2022
Real life has changed since 2003, but baseball has not. It's still the right time for a brave, powerful, poignant play about a gay professional baseball player who comes out of the closet at…
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 08:03PMFriday, February 11, 2022
Monday, December 13, 2021
It's better than 'Mrs. Doubtfire', but you will not be singing these tunes as you walk home from the theater — unless you love to rhyme "penis" and "Venus" or "smelly" and "Botticelli.”
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 10:05PMTuesday, November 16, 2021
Old-fashioned in the best way, 'Morning's at Seven' is about the sense of isolation and failure that hides beneath the surface.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 12:17PMFriday, January 31, 2020
Monday, January 27, 2020
Even if you like the easy, predictable clichés of dysfunctional family comedies, this is very boring theater.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 03:30PMThursday, January 16, 2020
The one-woman show gives her a chance to access a darkness she can't often show in her films.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 11:26AMFriday, December 6, 2019
'Harry Townsend's Last Stand' takes a serious subject and dusts it with humor.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 04:13PMWednesday, October 16, 2019
She is so fine in a role conceived for the volcanic Italian superstar Anna Magnani that holding center stage amid a swirl of overproduced, over-the-top distractions, she deserves an award of…
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 12:45PMFriday, October 4, 2019
It had a profound effect the night I saw it on an audience that was visibly moved
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 04:35PMThursday, September 26, 2019
The new Broadway season is officially in motion, and so far unofficially underwhelming.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 12:40PMThursday, May 30, 2019
As for the author, Fillinger is a brave, commanding new presence—a young American dramatist worth keeping an eye on in the future, and deserving of praise already.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 05:02PMThursday, May 2, 2019
Cori Thomas' 'Lockdown' cries out for change in the penal system. It's a good premise, but not a very good play.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 03:25PMFriday, April 26, 2019
Everyone in the cast has been hired according to how loud they can scream, which they do in an eardrum-shattering collection of what some people call music.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 09:39AMWednesday, April 24, 2019
Its rhyming of 'real good' with 'Gielgud' is a prime example of why 'Tootsie' is dead on arrival.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 01:54PMTuesday, April 23, 2019
Friday, April 19, 2019
Laurie Metcalf looks and sounds nothing like Hillary Clinton, yet in her role in Broadway's 'Hillary and Clinton' she is, as always, nothing less than mesmerizing.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 05:32PMWednesday, April 17, 2019
Even if 'Burn This' offers more ashes than flames, it's a fine chance to experience how bracing it is to hear real people saying real things.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 02:08PMSunday, April 7, 2019
The landmark 1943 Rodgers and Hammerstein production that marked the beginning of a new era in American musicals has now been cheapened and vulgarized at New York's Circle in the Square Thea…
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 09:01PMWednesday, March 27, 2019
'Smart Blonde' is a sluggish, uneven work in progress, but still worth seeing if you want to discover a dynamic talent on her way to stardom.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 09:46AMTuesday, March 12, 2019
Isabelle Huppert's theatrics are quite a display, but you'll go away from 'The Mother' baffled and exhausted.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 12:17PMWednesday, March 6, 2019
'The Cake' is easy on the eyes and charming to the ears, but it doesn't provide much nutrition to take home.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 03:18PMSaturday, December 29, 2018
Saturday, December 15, 2018
This is the first time I have not been moved to tears by 'To Kill a Mockingbird,' but that's my can and I'll carry it.
SOURCE: The New York Observer at 10:53AM