It is definitely a modern play: soliloquies – or rather parts of a lecture, directed at the audience – transition between scenes, this breaking of the fourth wall not offering, as in Shakespeare, a furthering of the plot, but rather is used as metaphor and history lesson. It is a play about Chicago, and yet not; it is a story about those stories that populate the city’s metallic, maternal pastiche.
Read MoreThere are few playwrights more enjoyable than Neil Simon, and few comedies as delicious as Plaza Suite. Time has not dulled the biting wit of the dialogue, the humor of the situation, and the perceptive peek into the foibles of romance, love, and marriage. Here in room 719 of the Plaza Hotel in New York, we watch the tale of three couples as a marriage dissolves, a seduction occurs, and a bride is persuaded to begin wedded bliss.
Read MoreItalian Noble Laureate playwright Dario Fo’s 1970 play satirized the topsy-turvy tale of an actual “accidental” death, ruled a suicide by the Milan police detectives. Fo’s farce combines a political agenda with pure, in-your-face slap-stick comedy. When a mental patient, aka, the Madman (Joseph Stearns in a tour de force performance) adopts the persona of the Chief Judge, mayhem erupts.
Read MoreThe story is in many ways a typical Knight of the Swan tale from the Middle Ages: a mysterious stranger (Lohengrin, in this production excellently portrayed by the South African tenor Johan Botha) appears, on a boat pulled by a swan, to save a troubled damsel (Elsa, the soprano Emily Magee); he then leaves, once a promise is broken, often that of not requesting the name and lineage of the hero
Read MoreBradshaw never offers any type of resolution in this work. It seems that he only wants to stir up the gray areas between such reprehensible behavior. Racism and homophobia sure can upset an audience as evidence by several loud grunts and the sound of people storming out of the theatre. Mary offends Blacks, religion, gays, white Southerners, victims of prostate cancer as it demonstrates that education is no cure for bigotry.
Read MoreUnder the smart, fast-paced direction by Paul S. Holmquest, Kauzlaric’s adaptation captures the mysterious allure of the ancient myth and curse of the large diamond know as the “moonstone.” This gem has been guarded by Hindu holy men for centuries and it has been stolen by conquering armies. In the late 18th Century, a rogue British officer brought the gem to England despite the curses attached to the stone. A trio of Hindu Brahmins have dedicated their lives to recovering the moonstone and returning it to India.
Read MoreAt the heart of the play are four indelibly interesting characters: Dan (Ray Kasper) is an obituary columnist and an eventually failed writer who voraciously pursues truth; and yet he is the least true amongst the group. He is a polyandrous romantic who writes passionately but totally derivatively.
Read MoreWilliam Nicholson’s Shadowlands, is a powerful tear-jerker. It is a romantic love story that finds famous British author and scholar, C. S. Lewis, a committed bachelor, Christian, and Oxford professor, with outspoken American poet, Joy Gresham. In Shadowlands, their unlikely romance poses the basic questions about God and love, life and death, pain and suffering.
Read MoreI had mixed feelings about this drama. I found the fast pace that tried to give snippets of each generation too thin to be more than a glimpse into each. I was impressed at how much family life playwright LeFranc and director Dexter Bullard were able present. Too bad they couldn’t develop each more completely. The work begs a second act.
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