Cabaret
Florida State University for the Performing Arts - Mertz Theater

If you “come to the ”Cabaret” at Asolo Rep, you won’t find it the seedy spot usually depicted in stagings of the musical.  You will be in the full-theater cabaret that extends from a two-level main mid-stage down to dining tables and seating in what’s usually the orchestra pit. Further out to a main center and side seats with aisles, performers will sometimes pass you from or en route up to the main stage. You will be in Berlin in 1931 with thriving new arts and culture trying to lead Germans out of post-WWI depression. 

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
November 2022
Penelopiad, The
City Garage

Margaret (“The Handmaid’s Tale”) Atwood turns Homer’s “The Iliad” inside out in The Penelopiad, now on tap at at City Garage, directed by Frederique Michel and designed by Charles A. Duncombe.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
November 2022
Place in the Sun, A
Florida Studio Theater - Goldstein Cabaret

One-of-a-kind musician and composer Stevie Wonder gets a bio-musical cabaret treatment that’s become typical at Florida Studio Theater. A narrative of Wonder’s life punctuates a revue of his prodigious achievements in creating and performing modern music. All lead to his meriting “A Place in the Sun” of undeniable artistry. 

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
November 2022
Beehive
Milwaukee Repertory Theater - Stackner Cabaret

The Milwaukee Repertory Theater takes its audience for a nostalgic spin into the past with Beehive: The 60s Musical. As its light-hearted title suggests, this show is much more about teen romance than it is about the decade’s more tumultuous aspects. The show is being staged in the theater complex’s intimate cabaret, which enhances this bill of fare.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
November 2022
Something Rotten
Florida Studio Theater - Gompertz

From the moment we get a musical “Welcome to the Renaissance” to danced “Bows” at the end, we know we’re seeing and hearing a modern take on a different theatrical era.  At Florida Studio Theater, it’s going to be Something Rotten in reverse of what that title usually designates. On a smaller stage in a more intimate theater than the one that housed a big Broadway hit, director Ellie Mooney gives us a really tasty treat.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
November 2022
Sense and Sensibility
Florida State University Center for the Performing Arts - Cook Theater

Underneath a wealth of cross-gendering, social ritual-ribbing, exploring of mixtures of realism, non-realism, and theatrical performance “isms,” Sense and Sensibility has a basic story. Two sisters in a family being displaced from their home by their father’s death must cope with a society stratified through wealth, status, and sexual/gender roles.  This story keeps FSU/Asolo Conservatory’s production in the realm of Jane Austen’s novel, even though audiences may find unlikeable distractions from the narrative basics.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
November 2022
Jeweler's Shop, The
St. Christopher's Episcopal Church

Acacia Theater, Milwaukee’s Christian faith-based theater company, explores the different phases of love in The Jeweler’s Shop, written by Pope John Paul II. In this romantic story, three different couples discover different ways to express the timeless nature of love. The show begins and ends with monologues by a narrator, who also appears at various times in different roles. The show’s departure from traditional linear storytelling may be confusing at times for the audience.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Eisenhower: This Piece of Ground
Theater West

It’s more of a history lesson than a play (there’s nothing at stake, no issue demanding resolution), but it is still a pleasure to sit through Eisenhower: This Piece of Ground. A history lesson, after all, can be not only edifying but satisfying.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Kite Runner, The
Hayes Theater

Sometimes, a gripping story with universal relevance sells big. Such was the case of “The Kite Runner,” Khaled Hossein’s 2003 semi-autobiographical novel which was turned into a movie, a graphic novel, an audio tape, and a new Broadway play. Topping the New York Times Bestseller list for over two years - thanks to countless book clubs across the country - it took the reading public by storm.

Written in first person, “The Kite Runner” was translated into 42 languages and published in 38 countries, selling more than 12 million copies worldwide.

Edward Rubin
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Arthur and Friends Make a Musical
Marcus Center - Todd Wehr Theater

First Stage, Milwaukee’s theater for children and young adults, opens its season with the world premiere of Arthur & Friends Make a Musical! After a two-year delay due to Covid precautions, the theater company is back to staging shows in its traditional venue, the Marcus Center’s Todd Wehr Theater.

The new musical tells the story of Arthur the Aardvark, his family, classmates and his community of Elwood City. Everyone comes together at the show’s end to witness a performance in which Arthur and his classmates share what they love about their small town.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Guys and Dolls
Westcoast Black Theater Troupe - Donnelly Theater

African-American cast and director bring a favorite Broadway musical classic a touch of more typically Harlem inspiration. Result: at Westcoast Black Theater Troupe’s Sarasota digs, the beat is definitely on!  So are romantic jibes between two main couples: Sky  Masterson, big gambler, with Salvation Army Sister Sarah are one. Professional gambling-game arranger Nathan Detroit with and musical star Miss Adelaide are the other.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Where Did We Sit on the Bus?
Broadway Theater Center - Studio Theater

Sometimes, it’s easier to experience a show than to try and describe it to someone else. Such is the case with Milwaukee Chamber Theater’s production, Where Did We Sit On the Bus? , which is playing in a small black-box theater in Milwaukee’s Third Ward.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Seventies, The: More than a Decade
Florida Studio Theater - Goldstein Cabaret

A treat as much for the eyes as for the ears, The ’70s: More than a Decade does do more than previous revues at Florida Studio Theater’s Court Cabaret.  Musical performances, movement, projections, scenic background, technical work hit a new high. All underscore how ‘70s music incorporated previous decades’

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe, The
Mark Taper Forum

The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe returns to L.A. 36 years after it first played here. The revised version stars “SNL’”s Cecily Strong in the Lily Tomlin role. It has also been cut from two acts to one and has been updated as well, with such comic targets as EST and geodesic domes being replaced by more modern references.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
October 2022
Titanic

It seems that the most pressing issue with Titanic: The Musical is getting the damn boat to stay afloat. The show, originally scheduled by the Milwaukee Repertory Theater in 2020, had its initial launch delayed due to the Covid-19 pandemic.

Undaunted, the large, indefatigable cast and technical crew were able to finally launch the doomed ocean liner during the 2021-22 season. The show – the largest ever staged by the Milwaukee Rep – received some of the best reviews of the season.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
September 2022
Mamma Mia!
Broadway Theater Center - Cabot Theater

For the first time since the start of the Covid-19 pandemic, many Milwaukee theaters are starting to play to (almost) full houses. Certainly, a sense of joy and anticipation was in the air on the opening night of Skylight Music Theater’s opening production, Mamma Mia!. The show, one of many pandemic-delayed performances from 2020, was finally getting its chance to shine.

And shine it did, under the adept direction of Monica Kapoor. Although this is her first project with Skylight, Kapoor performed in the Broadway production for seven years.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
September 2022
Ghosts
Odyssey Theater

Henrik Ibsen’s Ghosts was a cause célèbre in 1882 when it was first performed.  Not only did the Norwegian establishment find its attack on the bourgeois and religious constraints of the age outrageous, it was shocked by the notion that venereal disease–-specifically syphilis--could be mentioned in polite society.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
September 2022
Hamlet
Park Avenue Armory - Drill Hall

Shakespeare’s Hamlet is usually conceded to be the greatest play in world literature, because its essential conflict of the individual with him or herself can be applied to any culture, time period, or setting. The most famous line of the text, “To be or not to be,” echoes man’s eternal search for meaning in a seemingly meaningless universe.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
August 2022
Kite Runner, The
Hayes Theater

Novels don’t always work well on stage, especially when there’s a first-person narrator. Plays rely on action rather than narration (“Show, don’t tell” is the rule of thumb) and contained plots over sprawling stories. Fortunately, Matthew Spangler’s adaptation of The Kite Runner, Khaled Hosseini’s 2003 best-seller about a young man’s harrowing experiences of growing up in Afghanistan and immigrating to the US after the Russian invasion, is sharply focused, conveying an epic and engaging plot without wandering or diffusing.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
August 2022
Oresteia, The
Park Avenue Armory - Drill Hall

There are some stunning images and moving moments in Robert Icke’s massive modern adaptation of Aeschylus’s Oresteia, paying in repertory with Hamlet at the Park Avenue Armory. But this nearly four-hour marathon indulges in too much extraneous dialogue and lacks the relentless, gripping action of the companion Shakespearean production.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
August 2022
New York State of Mind
Florida Studio Theater - Court Cabaret

A rambunctious rendering of songs by all-time favorite-in-every-genre composer and performer Billy Joel finds The Uptown Boys in sync with the Master’s rhythms, rimes, recitals at Florida Studio Theater’s Court Cabaret.  They may be rooted in New York experience and psychology, but Sarasota audiences don’t hesitate to clap and hum along as if every song also “belongs” to them.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
August 2022
Beach People
City Garage at Bergamot Station

Beach People, the new play by Charles A. Duncombe at City Garage, turns cliches of beach life on their head. The main characters, Anna and Paul (Angela Beyer and Henry Thompson), lie sprawled out in bathing suits on their deck chairs under a hot sun (decor by Duncombe himself, a master designer). Behind them is a video screen showing clouds sailing by in a beautiful sky. He’s reading a book, but is it a traditional beach read, yet another hack thriller by James Patterson? Not in this play, it’s not.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
August 2022
Smoke and Mirrors
Florida Studio Theater - Gompertz

Smoke and Mirrors was a hit for Florida Studio Theater’s 2000 summer season, but over two decades later one of its two authors has died and so has the play’s former novelty. Neither remaining writer Will Osborne nor FST director Catherine Randazzo with her excellent cast have been able to make the play work as successfully with a change of time frame and of character development. Everything takes too long to get even close to as funny as it was, and much about the staging just puzzles.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
August 2022
Old Man and the Pool, The
Mark Taper Forum

The Old Man and the Pool is more stand-up comedy than theatrical performance but, hey, it was produced by a major theater company and was performed in the Mark Taper Forum, so respect must be paid. Also, this solo turn by Mike Birbiglia was consistently funny and engaging, making it a pleasure to write about.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
August 2022
If I Forget
Fountain Theater

If I Forget, the provocative drama now in a West Coast premiere at the Fountain Theater, suffers from a split personality. The first act centers on Michael Fischer (Leo Marks), a professor of Jewish Studies who has written a book claiming that by continually harping on the Holocaust, the Jewish people have lost their values and identity.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Into the Woods
St. James Theater

When a show is absolutely perfect, reviewing it becomes more of a challenge than if it were flawed. It’s not difficult to list a production’s shortcomings and how they detract from the experience, but enumerating superlatives makes your writing sound like a gushy, repetitive love letter. Well, here goes.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Sense and Sensibility
Concordia University - Todd Wehr Auditorium

Few books have achieved the staying power of those by Jane Austen. Over time, “Pride and Prejudice’ and “Sense and Sensibility” have basically become an industry unto themselves. According to expert sources, the book of “Sense and Sensibility,” first published in 1811, has never been out of print. There have been too many film and TV treatments to list them all.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Remembering the Future
Odyssey Theater

Remembering the Future, the new play by Peter Lefcourt now in a world premiere at the Odyssey Theater, mixes comedy with pinches of the paranormal to prepare a savory theatrical dish.

Lefcourt introduces us to a middle-aged couple, Greg (Michael Corbett) and Melissa (Tarina Pouncy), who were teenaged lovers forty years ago. An inter-racial twosome, they dreamed of fleeing racist Minneapolis for Paris, where he would become the white Charlie Parker and she would live a free and glamorous Left Bank life.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
King Liz
Geffen Playhouse

King Liz rips the lid off the world of professional basketball to reveal just how ugly and messy it is.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Jersey Tenors, The: Part Two
Florida Studio Theater - Goldstein Cabaret

A Florida Studio Theater ad announcing a return of The Jersey Tenors after their successful 2017 debut mentions my TotalTheater review of their performance as “Terrific!”  There’s no reason to alter that assessment because it also applies to “The Jersey Tenors— Part II.” They simply wowed their opening night audience with their blend of operatic and mod, rock, and pop classics. 

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Orchard, The
Baryshnikov Arts Center

I seem to remember reading, in all of the hoopla surrounding the Baryshnikov Art Center’s Production of Chekhov’s The Cherry Orchard, somebody saying “Unlike anything that you ever saw before.” This talking head could also have said, as audiences were soon to find out, that this production, adapted, created, reimagined, and directed by Kiev born Igor Golyak, and starring Mikhail Baryshnikov, is a work of genius. Obviously, the great Chekhov is embedded deeply in their bones.

Edward Rubin
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Richard III
Delacorte Theater

There have been female Hamlets (most notably Sarah Bernhardt, Diane Venora, and Ruth Negga), female King Lears (Glenda Jackson on Broadway and the West End), and even a female Richard II (Fiona Shaw). But the new Free Shakespeare in the Park production of Richard III is probably the first to feature an actress in the lead role of the most vile of the Bard’s villains.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Beautiful People, The
Matrix Theater

The Beautiful People is an ironic title for a play about two ugly, dumb, dangerous teenagers. They are the only characters in Tim Venable’s powerful drama which is now in a world-premiere run at Rogue Machine, directed by Guillermo Cienfuegos.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
July 2022
Maytag Virgin
Florida Studio Theater - Keating Mainstage

As a romantic melodrama involving two middle-aged. widowed high school teachers, Maytag Virgin certainly departs from a usual boy-meets-girl routine.  Using a clothes dryer and a statue of Mary, Mother of Jesus, to launch into the couple’s differences upon meeting is novel. So is how the question is posed as to whether or not they’ll adapt to living next to each other. Author Audrey Cefaly does, though, give them a readily understood affinity:  both are Southerners.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
June 2022
Two and a Half Breaths
Chain Theater

“What is it to become a word? To become or even create an emotion that doesn’t exist…at least not yet? How much power does the artist have to convince and make one believe? How much potential does movement theater actually have? In this world? Now. These questions have been the driving force in writing this piece.” – Playwright Bridgette Loriaux

Edward Rubin
Date Reviewed:
June 2022
Corsicana
Playwrights Horizons

At a recent Off-Broadway production, the gentleman behind me was complaining vociferously during intermission and occasionally during the show itself that he enjoyed “fun” shows like Company or Funny Girl, not the depressing dreck he was forced to sit through that particular evening. My first impulse was to turn around and tell him if he was so unhappy, he could just leave. But then I realized that plays like Corsicana can be challenging, but if one is patient and takes these plays on their own terms, their rewards are great.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
June 2022
Birthday Party, The
City Garage at Bergamot Station

Harold Pinter came to fame in 1958 with the production of his debut play, The Birthday Party. He went on to become one of the stalwarts of the modern theater, up there with Beckett, Ionesco, Osborne, and Albee. Now City Garage has revisited The Birthday Party in a splendid production that captures Pinter’s specialty as a playwright: grotesque naturalism wrapped around a core of menace and depravity.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
June 2022
Tanner, The
The Broadwater

The Tanner dramatizes what the movie “Braveheart” left out in its depiction of the battle between Scotland and England back in medieval times. “Braveheart,” in typical Hollywood fashion, was all about a swashbuckling hero (Mel Gibson as William Wallace) leading the Scots to glorious victory over the bad Brits. The Tanner deals with the same battle but in a non-glamorous, more truthful way.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
June 2022
Thom Pain (Based on Nothing)
The Broadwater

Thom Pain (based on nothing) is exactly the kind of play one hopes to see at a fringe festival. It’s offbeat, strange, unsettling, yet brilliantly original and compelling.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
June 2022
What the End Will Be
Roundabout - Laura Pels Theater

Late in …what the end will be (sic), Mansa Ra’s combination sitcom and soap opera about three generations of gay black men, Keith Randolph Smith as the patriarch Bart Kennedy delivers an impassioned plea to his stubborn son Max to allow him to take the drastic step of assisted suicide to end his misery from Stage 4 bone cancer. The details are excruciating in their exactness, down to the feeling of pain and ache in every part of his body, even the fingernails. Smith does not overplay the horror but gives the speech with directness and simplicity.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
June 2022

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