Sep 19

Pretty to Watch, Messy to Contemplate: FAR FROM HEAVEN

Craig Bailey/Perspective Photo. Look at those costumes!

Craig Bailey/Perspective Photo.

Presented by SpeakEasy Stage Co.
Book by Richard Greenberg
Music by Scott Frankel
Lyrics by Michael Korie
Based on the Focus Features/Vulcan Production Motion Picture, Written & Directed by Todd Haynes

Directed by Scott Edmiston
Musical Direction by Steven Bergman
Choreography by David Connolly

Sept. 12 – Oct. 11, 2014
Stanford Calderwood Pavilion
Boston Center for the Arts
527 Tremont Street in Boston’s South End
SpeakEasy on Facebook

Review by Kitty Drexel

(Boston, MA) In 1957, Betty Friedan conducted a survey of Smith College graduates to celebrate their 15th anniversary. When she discovered that many of her contemporaries were deeply unhappy, she expanded her research to include other US suburban housewives. She continued her research into psychology and other social sciences. Her studies found a “problem that has no name,” a depression among women despite their ensured physical and emotional comforts. A life revolving around marriage and children was deeply unfulfilling.

This study and her corresponding writings were the basis for The Feminine Mystique, a book that sparked the second-wave of feminism. Published in 1963, it has played an influential part in assuring a modern woman’s right to equality. Women who work outside of the home owe a large part of their freedoms to Friedan and the women who worked with her. Friedan began her survey the same year that Far From Heaven begins. Continue reading

Jun 16

Audience Interactive Hilarity: SHEAR MADNESS

Photo from Shear Madness website.

Presented by the Charles Playhouse
Written by Bruce Jordan and Marilyn Abrams
Based off a play Scherenschnitt. Written in 1963 by German writer and psychologist Paul Portner.

Ongoing performances, Tuesday – Sunday into perpetuity
Charles Playhouse Stage II
74 Warrenton Street
Boston, MA
Shear Madness on Facebook

Review by Kitty Drexel

(Boston) Shear Madness is Boston. It has townie jokes, tourist jokes, madcap physical comedy, classic one-liners and a whole lotta sass. It has a New England edge and universal appeal. It is the best show that most natives have never seen and it lives right next to the Blue Man Group. It’s hilarious and, even if you’ve seen it in the last few years, you should go again. Continue reading

Sep 25

Lyndon B. Johnson Goes “All the Way”

Photo: Evgenia Eliseeva

Presented by A.R.T.
By Robert Schenkkan
Directed by Bill Rauch

September 13, 2013 – October 12, 2013
Loeb Drama Center
64 Brattle St.
Cambridge, MA 02138
A.R.T. on Facebook

Review by Gillian Daniels

(Cambridge) Too often, biographies of American presidents are stories wrought with blind patriotism.  Director Bill Rauch, however, has not shaped a play about patriotism but politics. Politics and morality may occupy the same place once in a while, but in Robert Schenkkan’s complex and vividly realized All the Way, ambition dilutes ideals quickly. Continue reading