From the category archives:

Theatre

Stage Perfection: A Little Night Music

August 13, 2010
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Everyone has a film, television show, book, or play that they should have seen or read but for, whatever reason, never got around to doing.  I am a huge Stephen Sondheim fan.  I have multiple cast albums of every one of his shows, as well as DVDs of every shows of his to have been [...]

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“Sad Cypress”: Sonnet Rep’s Twelfth Night

July 29, 2010
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Two months back, I was completely wowed by Sonnet Repertory Theatre’s creative and invigorating production of William Shakespeare’s Richard II, which utilized the acrobatic arts to stunning effect, as a visual metaphor for the ascension and descent of hierarchies and successions in the play.  Whereas in a musical, a character breaks into song to illustrate [...]

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Pound by Pound: The Merchant of Venice in the Park

June 25, 2010
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The Delacorte Theatre is currently home to two flawed yet enjoyable productions of Shakespeare plays that can be especially difficult to mount successfully, in large part due to their arguably uneasy melding of comedy and tragedy–The Winter’s Tale and The Merchant of Venice.  Of course, when the latter was first produced, it is very possible [...]

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“Exit, Pursued by a Bear”: The Winter’s Tale in the Park

June 18, 2010
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Shakespeare’s The Winter’s Tale has always been a deeply odd play.  The first three acts are a veritable retelling of classic Shakespearean and Greek tragedy, heavily reminiscent of Othello mixed with a dash of Oedipus, with a king becoming extremely jealous of his best friend, the king of Bohemia, and mistakenly believing that the man is having [...]

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Chairman of the Bored: Come Fly Away

June 17, 2010
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Sometimes a theatrical event appears on Broadway that is so lavishly produced, gorgeously mounted, visually arresting, and full of such (at times) astonishing talent that it seems a shame to say that it just doesn’t work, as if deflating such a pretty-to-look-at spectacle is akin to popping a child’s balloon for fun.  The other night, [...]

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Shakespeare Taking Flight: Sonnet Rep & Matchbook’s Richard II

May 25, 2010
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Shakespeare’s Richard II is a play of tragic descents, triumphant ascents, and rapturous poetry.  New York City’s Sonnet Repertory Theatre, Inc. and Matchbook Productions teamed together for a new production, which closed last night, that perfectly captured the various highs and lows that the large cast of characters experiences over the course of the play [...]

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“Ah, But Underneath”: Sondheim on Sondheim

May 23, 2010
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In theory, Sondheim on Sondheim should be a rather fascinating evening of theatre–a combination of master class and revue of Stephen Sondheim, arguably the greatest American musical theatre composer who ever lived.  A cast of eight–including three relatively big names, Barbara Cook, Vanessa Williams, and Tom Wopat–perform Sondheim songs while HD screens play clips of Sondheim [...]

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Nuclear Family: Next to Normal

May 18, 2010
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Next to Normal is a different sort of rock opera.  It isn’t about young artists struggling to survive in the East Village in a plot borrowed from La Boheme.  It isn’t about messiahs or Argentinian dictators or pinball wizards or rebellious youth.  Instead, it is an intimate, unepic, yet still revelatory tale about an American [...]

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“Two Plays Both Alike in Dignity”: Romeo and Hamlet

May 17, 2010
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Romeo and Hamlet is a play with a very simple concept that pays off brilliantly.  It is exactly as it sounds, a mash-up of Romeo and Juliet and Hamlet, in which our lovestruck, teenaged Montague falls deeply in love not with that drippy Capulet chick but with everyone’s favorite soulfully brooding prince of Denmark, and [...]

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Finding Bliss: Sherie Rene Scott’s Everyday Rapture

May 15, 2010
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Self-professed “Broadway semi-star,” Sherie Rene Scott has one of the most distinctive voices in theatre today–a unique combination of brass and sweetness, it is a smooth, polished instrument with an alluringly husky undercurrent.  Her new show, Everyday Rapture, is so wonderful because it shines the spotlight not only on the voice that her devoted fans [...]

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