Patrick Noonan, Jordan Ahnquist photos by Carol Rosegg by Judd Hollander Genre-bending hilarity is assured at Shear Madness at Off-Broadway’s New World Stages. Based on the 1963 German play Scherenschnitt by Paul Pörtner, the show is making its very long-awaited New York debut. The play opened in Boston in 1980 – where it continues…
By Michall Jeffers Hey kids, let’s get together and put on a show! This is the spirit of “Disaster!” A large part of the entertainment is that the actors on stage are having so much fun; we get the idea that they’ve known each other and worked together for a long time. Adding to…
Sarah Killough and Ellen Adair photos by Colin Shepherd by Eugene Paul New plays, new theatre companies, continue to seek the limelight from one end of the country to the other, nowhere more generously than on New York City’s turf. Its name trailing martially bold Shakespearean allusions, the Happy Few Theatre Company, producers…
Ito Aghayere and Melanie Nicholls-King Photos by Joan Marcus By Michall Jeffers The United States is a nation of immigrants. The tug-of-war between assimilating and keeping tradition alive is indeed Familiar to many Americans. And what better way could this conflict come to a head than planning a wedding. Marvelous Chinyaramwira (Tamara Tunie) and her…
L-R: Matthew Russell (The Bard), Ryan McCurdy (Mercutio), Christine Verleny (Mistress Quickly), Mick Bleyer (Ben). Photo by Gerry Goodstein by Julia Polinsky Verona Walls, by the talented young playwright Laura Hirschberg, presents a back story for Romeo and Juliet. It focuses on Mercutio, whose tale of love and death plays out against a…
Photos by Joan Marcus Reviewed by Eugene Paul They were the most successful religious community in the country. In addition to their farming properties and industries, their stunningly simple esthetic continues to affect millions with its beauty. At their peak, they numbered 5,000. Today, there are six. These are the Shakers, more properly, the…
Kellie Overbey, Emily Walton, Beatrice Tulchin, and Shannon Harrington Photo: Richard Termine. By Marc Miller The title Women Without Men evokes one of those 1950s women’s-prison melodramas, where Hope Emerson terrorizes Eleanor Parker or Ida Lupino bats Phyllis Thaxter around, while Agnes Moorehead or Howard Duff look helplessly on. Hazel Ellis’s 1938 drama, as…
Richard Johnson photo by Farnaz Taherimotlagh. Pappy on da Underground Railroad R. Pikser The Gene Frankel Theater is what used to be called a black box. A few seats, minimal performance space, a piano, and good lighting in what used to be an inexpensive part of town, allowed performers to hone their…
EMMA MEAD by Julia Polinsky Once the Hollywood machine gets hold of something like the Brothers Grimm or Hans Christian Anderson, or, in this case, the Oz books, it’s easy for us to forget how dark children’s stories are. How they come from spaces of loss and fear. Tales of orphaned or abandoned…
Hilly Bodin as Snow White and Courtney Giannone as The Prince By Edward Rubin The ad campaign for Company XIV’s production of Snow White at the Minetta Lane Theatre inspired by the Brothers Grimm’s fairy tale that we all grew up knowing – is being sold as an adult version of the folk tale, reflected…