Little Mermaid, The
Lunt-Fontanne Theater

You can't win 'em all. Not even Disney. I'd blame much of the failure of The Little Mermaid (music by Alan Menken, lyrics by Howard Ashman and Glenn Slater, book by Dour Wright), which seems geared to eight year olds, on the director, Francesca Zambello and choreographer Stephen Mear.

Richmond Shepard
Date Reviewed:
February 2008
Homecoming, The
Cort Theater

Director Daniel Sullivan does Harold Pinter proud in the current production of The Homecoming. His meticulous direction of this profound but delicate play is impeccable, and his marvelous cast beautifully acts the complex twists of our most obscure yet revealing playwright. The negativity, the viciousness of the father (Ian McShane) holds the play together as his loser brother (Michael McKean) and three sons (Raul Esparza, Gareth Saxe, James Frain) interact in the family manse with a visiting wife (Eve Best, who can be more sexy doing nothing than any wriggler on Broadway).

Richmond Shepard
Date Reviewed:
February 2008
Beauty Queen Of Leenane, The
Steppenwolf Theater

Martin McDonagh is a brilliant 28-year-old Irish playwright who has a great future ahead of him.  He was recently represented on Broadway with The Lonesome West, and Northlight Theater in Skokie did an excellent job with his second play, The Cripple of Inishmaan.  His most celebrated work, The Beauty Queen of Leenane, is set in the small impoverished town of Leenane, County Galway.  Maureen, played by Laurie Metcalf, is a 40-year-old virgin who cares for her aging mother.  Mag, played by Aideen O'Kelly, is manipulative and always complaining.  At first she strikes the a

Richard Allen Eisenhardt
Date Reviewed:
July 1999
Beauty Queen Of Leenane, The
Actors Theater of Louisville

Vicious old Mag Folan is cagily and savagely brought to contemptible life by ATL veteran Adale O'Brien in The Beauty Queen of Leenane, Irish playwright Martin McDonagh's gripping tale of mother-daughter animosity and dependence. Emotionally fragile daughter Maureen, age 40, stuck in their isolated village with the demanding harridan, yearns for escape and comes close to achieving it but for Mag's spiteful scheming that brings doom crashing down on both of them.

Charles Whaley
Date Reviewed:
January 2003
Beauty Queen Of Leenane, The
Milwaukee Rep - Stiemke Theater

The Milwaukee Repertory Theater has back-to-back hits in January/February, with Of Mice and Men playing on the main stage  and The Beauty Queen of Leenane in the smaller, more intimate Stiemke Theater.  The plays, though separated by more than 60 years, share marked similarities.  Loneliness, isolation, desperation and love of the land weave the plays together, though the circumstances couldn't be further apart.  Beauty Queen takes place in a small house in rural Ireland, where a mother and daughter lead a bleak existence, not much different from the drifters in Of M

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
January 2000
Becoming Adam
Children's Theater of Charlotte

The futuristic setting of Becoming Adam is a collective where conformity is prized and individuality is outlawed.  People don't even have names  In this synthetic Eden, our heroine finds a book and convinces the man she fancies to read it.  As in the biblical story, his eyes are opened irrevocably, and he becomes human.  For their temerity and turpitude, they are expelled from their commune.  Composer/playwright Jason Rhyne sharpens the topicality by adding a non-musical frame.  Mark Sutton, the only post-collegian in the cast, sits frozen onstage before the story begins, undergoing

Perry Tannenbaum
Date Reviewed:
July 1999
Bed and Sofa
Cygnet Theater

Immediately dial 619-337-1525 for your reservations to Cygnet's production of Bed and Sofa, a theatrical event you must see.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
June 2004
Bed And Sofa
Goldman Theater of Morris Cafritz Center

Last season I was privileged to see the production of  this "silent movie opera" at New York's Vineyard Theater. I was so impressed I hesitated to attend the inaugural production at the Morris Cafritz Center for the Arts in Washington's lavishly renovated Jewish Community Center. No need for faint heart. Artistic Director Hoeflich has directed an exquisite show.

Barbara Gross
Date Reviewed:
January 1997
Beehive
Theater in Old Town

It's the 60s. You're sitting in your favorite cafe. At the end of your booth is a table-mounted jukebox record selector. You flip through the selections and pick your favorites and drop a nickel into the slot. Now imagine that image ten feet tall up-stage center and you're at The Theater in Old Town's latest offering, Beehive.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
February 2002
Beehive
Mary G. Steiner Egyptian Theater

Last summer, the Egyptian Theater Company got a great idea: Why not stage a couple of musicals in repertory throughout the summer? That way short-term visitors would get to enjoy one show, and residents or those who were around longer could see a couple of them. They called the program Summer TheatreFest, and the idea was so popular that this season it returns with two new, quite diverse musicals.

Barbara Bannon
Date Reviewed:
June 2001
Bee-Luther-Hatchee
Florida Studio Theater - Keating Mainstage

When white Irish American Thomas Gibbons appropriated black African-American slang to title his play, Bee-Luther-Hatchee, was it presumptive and maybe an attempt to be deceptive? Or artistic and justified? His play poses similar questions as it presents "an absurd or ironic situation," as well as a "last stop after a train to a folkloric Biblical hell" - the title's meanings.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
July 2004
Bee-Luther-Hatchee
Off Broadway Theater

Next Act Theater opens its 12th season in Milwaukee with a provocative new work, Bee-Luther-Hatchee. It's clear why this play appealed to Next Act, a company that often delves into issues of gender, race and family relationships. In Bee-Luther-Hatchee, Shelita Burns, a young African-American woman, publishes the memoirs of Libby Price, a 72-year-old first-time author. The book, "Bee-Luther-Hatchee," tells of Libby's life in the South.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
September 2001
Being Beautiful
Bailiwick Arts Center

That it's a history play based in documented fact would be enough to distinguish McKinley Johnson's account of female impersonators working in Chicago's Depression-era cabarets. But a serviceable roster of songs composed by Johnson and collaborator Stephanie Newsom, in addition to a variety of dances choreographed by the legendary Joel Hall, lend an air of cheerful fantasy, even as the hard decisions faced by Afton Cousins in pursuit of his destiny keep us firmly grounded in social responsibility.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
February 2002
Belle Of Amherst, The
Playhouse Theater

The Belle Of Amherst is worth seeing under any circumstance, and especially so when we attended on the 75th birthday of its star, Julie Harris.  Miss Harris won a Tony Award for this portrayal 24 years ago -- her unprecedented fifth Tony as Best Actress -- and she told us yesterday that this tour will be the last times she'll do the role.

Steve Cohen
Date Reviewed:
December 2000
Belle Of Amherst, The
Victoria Theater at Newark Performing Arts Center

What a joy it is that Julie Harris has been touring with The Belle of Amherst. Younger readers may not know that Ms. Harris portrays Emily Dickinson in William Luce's one-woman play, which incorporates her poems into the monologue.  This partnering of actress, director and playwright is a classic and distinctly American landmark.  It gave new life both to the legend of the poetess and to the solo form when it opened in 1977, directed -- as it is now -- by Charles Nelson Reilly.

Steve Capra
Date Reviewed:
April 2001
Bells Are Ringing
Golden Apple Dinner Theater

In the 1950s, instead of voice mail, there were answering services. Callers gave messages to real people who conveyed them to subscribers. Comden and Green, inspired by such a woman handling their messages from a dingy brownstone basement, replicated her fictionally as Ella working for Susanswerphone. They tailored Ella to fit the talents of old friend Judy Holliday. Both star and situation rang true in the NYC of their day, accounting for a long Broadway success and subsequent transfer to film.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
March 2004
Below The Belt
Steep Theater

Who really associates Ionesco and his kin with a social context? Isn't it easier -- and safer -- to nowadays look upon those mid-century protests simply as showcases for imaginative technique? But neo-absurdist Richard Dresser's social context is not so comfortably ignored: three "company men" stranded in a foreign country, employed in the manufacture of something they know only by its toxic effect on the local environs, their lives circumscribed by the prison-like bureaucracy their employers impose on them.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
August 2003
Ben Franklin: Unplugged
Saint Cecilla's Playhouse

Do not miss Josh Kornbluth's Red Diaper Trilogy! Kornbluth writes with wit, delivers with gusto. His monologues demand your constant attention. The delivery moves from rapid fire to deliberate, well-placed pauses that allow the audience time to absorb this huge talent's output. The trilogy includes Red Diaper Baby, The Mathematics of Change and Ben Franklin: Unplugged. Red Diaper Baby is a coming-of-age tale of Josh's experiences growing up as a child of Communist parents in New York City.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
September 2002
Beneath The Necessity Of Talking
National Black Theater Festival

After intermission at Divas of Performance, the high priestess of the choreopoem came with fresh gifts for her true believers -- and with a ceremonial pretension worthy of her high ministry.  Two divine dancers, Mickey Davidson and Imaniye Payne, added sublime movement to her words.  With scant new poetic material, the ethereal choreography was needed to stretch Shange's latest to a full 30 minutes.  Large patches of Spanish, French, and lists of historical figures deepened the mystery but not the meaning of all we saw in Beneath The Necessity of Talking.  Ntozake Shange receives and

Perry Tannenbaum
Date Reviewed:
August 1999
Berzerkergang
Sledgehammer Theater at Cecilia's Playhouse

Sledgehammer artistic director Kirsten Brandt takes pen in hand again, this time to create Berzerkergang. Known for her directorial accomplishments, Brandt turned the direction of her latest work over to Michael Severance and Jessa Watson.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
February 2003
Betrayal
Yale Repertory Theater

Under the discerning direction of Liz Diamond, the Yale Repertory Theater is presenting a meticulous production of Harold Pinter's Betrayal, which proves that the pen can be more cutting than the sword in this lethally-surgical examination of adultery.  Over the past 40 years, this English playwright, whose name is synonymous with modern theater literature, has written 16 plays, all of which are noted for their spare style, intense pauses and somewhat ambiguous plots.

Rosalind Friedman
Date Reviewed:
October 1999
Bets and Blue Notes

See review in Criticopia Regional under Fritz Blitz 2008: http://www.totaltheater.com/?q=node/1947

Beyond Dorothy Parker
Actors Theater of Louisville - Victor Jory Theater

As Dorothy Parker once said to her boyfriend, 'fare the well,' Ella Fitzgerald croons on the recording played just before the lights come up on the world premiere of Beyond Dorothy Parker, a one-woman play written and directed by Barbara H.

Charles Whaley
Date Reviewed:
October 1999
Beyond Therapy
Poway Performing Arts Company

Christopher Durang creates very strange, often incisive, plays, but they can also be obscure, with dialogue stylized and motivations fuzzy. Beyond Therapy, currently on the boards at PowPAC Theater under the direction of Marjorie Mae Treger, is a baffler. It's the story of a couple who met through an ad, and now both are going through therapy. Durang further obscures their relationship by the fact that he is bisexual, with a jealous boy friend, and she has gone to bed with her therapist. The author doesn't seem to have much regard for therapists.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
October 2006
Bible, The
Poway Performing Arts Company

Some subjects are believed to be sacrosanct. To the historian it could be the history of the United States, to the scholar, probably the great works of literature; to the thespian it would be Shakespeare, and to the fervent Christian, it is The Bible. Thus, all these subjects are fodder for the writing and performing skills of The Reduced Shakespeare Company.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
October 2002
Bible, The
Cabot Theater

One of the creators of The Bible: The Complete Word of God (Abridged) once stated that the purpose of the play was to put the "fun in fundamentalism." What they have achieved is a giddy, sophomoric send-up of the Great Book. Some of the "shtick" in Bible is as lame as a Jack Benny joke, while other moments are more inspired and indeed funny. It is not likely that audiences will leave the theater without finding at least something to tickle their funny bone.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
August 2003
Bicycle Country, A
Marilyn Monroe Theater - Strasberg Institute

The son of a political dissident jailed for a time by Castro, Nilo Cruz left Cuba with his parents when he was 10 years old and emigrated to the United States, where he eventually built a reputation as an outstanding young playwright (among his previous works are Graffiti, Dancing On Her Knees and The Museum of Dreams).  Cruz returns to his homeland in A Bicycle Country, which is set in the "Special Period," the years following the rupturing of relations between Cuba and the former Soviet Union in 1991.  Cut off from its subsidies, Cuba went into a severe economic and s

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
April 2001
Biedermann and the Firebugs
Cygnet Theater

Biedermann's physical world is a cartoon house replete with an asymmetrical dining table, a canted second floor, and unparallel everything. Near his house is a hilled, crystalline city rising several feet from the stage. Biedermann also lives in a world of denial, but he is about to be visited by two strangers. The city has been plagued with arsonists. Their MO is to plead homelessness, stay with their victim, and then burn the house to the ground, often causing collateral damage.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
January 2006
Big
Golden Apple Dinner Theater

If you think this is a resurrection of the perhaps too "Big" musical that failed on Broadway in 1996, you're in for a pleasant surprise. You'll find this a satisfactorily simplified theatrical version of the movie that should bring out the fun-loving child in you.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
May 2006
Big
Ritz Theater

This is a smaller Big and a delightful one.  It's a new production, using a script that's been adapted by director Art McKenzie.  The story of a kid whose wish to be grown-up is granted, for a while, was a wonderful film with Tom Hanks in 1988.  Then a lavish and costly musical version ran six months on Broadway in 1996.  FAO Schwartz put big bucks into the show, and director Mike Ockrent made it into a virtual commercial for the toy store.  After Big, The Musical closed, author John Weidman, songwriters David Shire and Richard Maltby, Jr.

Steve Cohen
Date Reviewed:
July 2000
Ten Minute Madness
North Park Vaudeville

Ten Minute Madness is an extension of the very popular short-play festival held at North Park Vaudeville and Candy Shoppe. The major difference is that the proprietors, under GB Productions, selected and directed all of the plays. The result is a higher degree of professionalism, very good casting, and a more accomplished cast.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
February 2008
Big Bang, The
Florida Studio Theater - Keating Mainstage

You're invited to a borrowed Manhattan apartment to a prospective backers' preview of the world's most expensive musical: a history of the universe. So get there early and up-front for the cheese and crackers. Soon all the food -- as well as utensils, lampshades, drapes, clock, dishes, plants, pillows, ottoman, chairs -- will become props and costumes for frantic Gary Marachek and smooth Wayne LeGette to act and sing out scenes from "The Big Bang" (in darkness) to a not too enlightened "Twentieth Century."

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
June 2006
Big Bang, The
Theater Three

Put down the paper and read this review later -- after you've called Theater Three to reserve a seat for the funniest frenetic frivolity you're likely to see for a long time. The Big Bang, by Boyd Graham and Jed Feuer, opened in the intimate downstairs space Monday night for a limited run.
 

Rita Faye Smith
Date Reviewed:
April 2007
Big Love
Long Wharf Theater

Is it pretentious or is it fun?  This is the question I must ask about provocative and puzzling Big Love, written by Charles Mee, which was the hit of the 2000 Humana Festival of New American Plays, now on the Main Stage of the Long Wharf Theater.  The playwright, also an historian, has used for the basis of his wildly inventive-Millennium piece, the classic Greek fable, The Suppliant Women; by Aeschylus.  In this drama, thought to be the world's oldest, fifty sisters murder 50 brothers, in actuality, their cousins, rather than marry these young men with whom their families ha

Rosalind Friedman
Date Reviewed:
March 2001
Big Love
Actors Theater of Louisville

In an isolated villa on the coast of Italy, a most unusual story is developing.  Fifty sisters have fled their native Greece to escape marriage to 50 American brothers.  All they want, the sisterly leaders tell the perplexed residents of the villa, is safety.  But their suitors quickly follow.  That's the set up to Charles Mee's Big Love, which recently had an athletic and entertaining production at the Humana Festival of New American Plays.  Big Love -- from an opening nude scene to an end with bodies strewn on the stage -- pushes plenty of buttons, dealing with gender, relat

Ed Huyck
Date Reviewed:
April 2000
Big Love
Actors Theater of Louisville

During a critics weekend at the Humana Festival of New American Plays,Big Love was a clear favorite among the offerings.  It's a cleverly designed twist on an ancient Greek tragedy, in which 50 brides conspire to murder their fiances on their wedding night.  In this updated version, playwright Charles Mee uses the framework to wage a modern-day battle of the sexes.  Traces of "Men Are From Mars, Women are from Venus," are evident in the banter between the brides, led by Lydia (Carolyn Baeumler), and the grooms, including Constantine (Mark Zeisler), who is pledged to one of the sister

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
April 2000
Big Love
Actors Theater of Louisville

Seven brides for seven brothers, as in the old MGM musical, is an idea one has little trouble handling.  Raise the number to 50 brides (all sisters!) for 50 brothers, as Charles L.

Charles Whaley
Date Reviewed:
April 2000
Big River
Marriott's Lincolnshire Theater

At best, Big River bears the same relationship to Mark Twain as Oliver! to Charles Dickens, but Apple Tree's recent production emphasized the story -- as much out of despair at staging big song-and-dance numbers in a tiny mallfront space as out of literary reverence (though the density of both Roger Miller's score and William Hauptman's text tend to discourage extended spectacles that could stretch the running time to Wagnerian lengths.) Marriott's audiences want Musicals, however; so its staging is focused on showcasing vocal talent, often compromising plot, period and plausi

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
February 2001
Big River
Media Theater

The 1985 Tony Award-winning musical, Big River, is rarely revived. This limited-tour mounting by Rockwell Productions shows that it's a viable work and a crowd pleaser for family audiences. The story is the classic Mark Twain tale of Huckleberry Finn, with music and lyrics by the late Roger Miller. Huck narrates his adventures, starting in the Missouri home where he is being raised by his aunts because his mother has died and his alcoholic father has abandoned him.

Steve Cohen
Date Reviewed:
July 1999
Biloxi Blues
Sunshine Brooks Theater

New Vision Theater at the Sunshine Brooks Theater in Oceanside opened Biloxi Blues. Part of a semi-autobiographical trilogy, which also included Brighton Beach Memoirs and Broadway Bound, Biloxi Blues covers the first eight weeks in boot camp circa 1943.

Robert Hitchcox
Date Reviewed:
September 2007

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