Contributing Writer
Carol Schultz as Mrs. Malaprop and Jessica Love as Lydia Languish photo by Al Foote III The Rivals by Eugene Paul There’s a persistent literary rumor that Richard Brinsley Sheridan’s perilously near fatuous hit play, The Rivals, was a particular favorite of George Washington’s. Yes, that George, “The Father of Our Country”. Doesn’t…
By Eugene Paul Audra McDonald Photos by Evgenia Eliseeva Beg. Borrow. Steal. In a breathtaking leap, famed Audra McDonald has vaulted past anything she’s ever done to this pinnacle of performance art, her portrait of Billie Holiday, the mesmerizing, tragic figure who haunts us still with the beauty and wreckage of her life, and…
Chris O’Dowd and James Franco in Of Mice and Men (photos by Richard Phibbs) OF MICE AND MEN by EUGENE PAUL If you’ve managed to keep up with the smoothly ongoing hype machine which has propelled James Franco into the front ranks of media stars you are also aware that New York City police…
ALL THE WAY Reviewed by EUGENE PAUL Bryan Cranston as LBJ There’s a classical theatrical bromide been around for ages: “There are no small parts, there are only small players.” Total bull ca ca. I don’t know how many brilliant actors are walking the streets completely unappreciated because they’ve never been zapped by the Fickle…
03/31/2014 Amaluna By: Eugene Paul Prospera in Amaluna Costume designer: Mérédith Caron (Photo credit: Yannick Déry) For perhaps its loveliest incarnation, Cirque du Soleil, the most unbelievably successful traveling circus in the world, has acquired renowned Broadway theater talents to weave and present the astounding human talents Cirque du Soleil scours said world to find,…
04/13/2014 A Respectable Widow Takes to Vulgarity & Clean By: Eugene Paul Gavin Jon Wright and Joanna Tope in a scene from A Respectable Widow Takes to Vulgarity (Photo credit: Jeremy Abrahams) Please allow me to give you the full title of the first of the two plays of the evening: A Respectable Widow Takes…
04/06/2014 If/Then By: Eugene Paul Idina Menzel and James Snyder in a scene from If/Then (Photo credit: Joan Marcus) Composer Tom Kitt and lyricist/book author Brian Yorkey, prize winners for their Next to Normal, have written an original show – “original” in the sense that it is not based on a film or another written…
01/29/2014 Machinal By: Eugene Paul Rebecca Hall and Morgan Spector in a scene from Machinal (Photo credit: Joan Marcus) If you look up “Machinal” in English dictionaries, you’ll find definitions centering on its reference to machines. The French do it better: they liken “Machinal” to one’s life becoming machine like. Rebecca Hall, lovely scion of…