Feb 18

You Don’t Have to Apologize for Existing: “John Proctor is the Villain”

Left to right: Brianna Martinez, Jules Talbot, Victoria Omoregie, Haley Wong in John Proctor is the Villain; directed by Margot Bordelon; photo by T. Charles Erickson

Presented by The Huntington
By Kimberly Belflower
Directed by Margot Bordelon
Dramaturgy by Lauren Halvorsen
Choreography by Victoria L Awkward 
Fight and Intimacy Direction by Jessica Scout Malone
Voice and dialect coaching by Christine Hamel

February 8 – March 10, 2024
The Huntington @ Calderwood/BCA
527 Tremont St. 
Boston, MA 02116

Review by Kitty Drexel

BOSTON, Mass. — It’s simple: believe girls. Believe women. Believe femme non-binary persons. Believe gender-expansive people who don’t fit your idea of how a person should look. Believe our stories. We don’t want fame. We want due process.  

The Huntington’s John Proctor is the Villain running through March 10 at the BCA is an age-old story of victim blaming and abuser protection.  Four teen girls (Brianna Martinez, Victoria Omoregie, Jules Talbot, and Haley Wong) are coming of age in post-#MeToo Appalachia. The four best friends and their bro classmates (Maanav Aryan Goyal, Benjamin Izaak) are taught by the school’s coolest homeroom teacher, Mr. Smith (Japhet Balaban), and new counselor Ms. Gallagher (Olivia Hebert).  Continue reading

Jun 30

Breadth without Depth: “The Lehman Trilogy”

Photo by T. Charles Erickson.

Presented by The Huntington
By Stefano Massini
Adapted by Ben Power
Directed by Carey Perloff
Featuring Joshua David Robinson, Steven Skybell, Mayer Lehman
Music performed by Joe LaRocca
Dramaturgy by Julie Felise Dubiner

June 29 – July 23, 2023
264 Huntington Ave.
Boston, MA 02115

Critique by Maegan Bergeron-Clearwood

Update: This article previously credited Carey Perloff as the former artistic director of the incorrect institution. Perloff was the AD of American Conservatory Theater.

BOSTON, Mass. — If the playbill for The Lehman Trilogy is any indication, The Huntington artistic team knows that are dealing with a flawed, if renowned, play. The three-and-a-half-hour epic has a developmental history of international proportions: Italian playwright Stefano Massini’s play about Jewish-American bankers was adapted by British playwright Ben Power, then enjoyed critical acclaim on the West End before transferring to Broadway and winning the 2022 Tony Award for Best Play.

The production was a critical darling, but never without its skeptics. Think-pieces abound have accused the play of a) pandering in antisemitic tropes and b) sidestepping the centrality of slavery in the Lehman brothers’ (and more broadly, capitalism’s) rise to power. Continue reading

Sep 24

Casual Disregard for Our Mutual Humanity: “The Niceties”

Look who’s teaching now. Lisa Banes and Jordan Boatman. Photo: T. Charles Erickson. 

Presented by Huntington Theatre Company
By Eleanor Burgess
Directed by Kimberly Senior
Original music and sound design by Elisheba Ittoop

Aug. 31 – Oct. 6, 2018
Calderwood Pavilion
Boston Center for the Arts
Boston, MA
Huntington on Facebook

Review by Kitty Drexel

(Boston, MA) The Niceties is a play about primary sources. It’s about the writers of white history, and white history’s casualties. It’s about speaking effectively and effective listening. It’s about race and the people who decide what is and isn’t racist behavior. It’s about attempting to be a good person while being good to other people. It’s about an impetuous Black student who’s had enough of excuses from a white professor, and an egotistical white professor who’s forgotten how to teach. There are no winner; there’s only complication. Continue reading

May 07

She Will Cut You: TOP GIRLS

Sophia Ramos, Carmen M. Herlihy, Paula Plum, Kiara Pichardo, and Carmen Zilles; Photo: T. Charles Erickson,

Presented by Huntington Theatre Company
By Caryl Churchill
Directed by Liesl Tommy
Dramaturgy by Phaedra Michelle Scott
Original music & sound design by Broken Chord

April 20 – May, 2018
Huntington Theater
Avenue of the Arts
Boston, MA
Huntington on Facebook

Review by Kitty Drexel

(Boston, MA) Congrats to the Huntington for finally get that permanent ramp set up.

Top Girls is a feminist play by Caryl Churchill. It has a good script. It’s a good play for women. It isn’t Caryl Churchill’s only feminist play. It isn’t the only feminist play for a cast of women. There are others out there waiting to be produced, and yet, the New England theatre community loves this show. So much so that it’s been produced three times in the Boston-area alone in the past four years. The Kilroy’s List was supposed to end the ad nauseum repeats.   Continue reading

May 03

Successful Marriage of Romantic Comedy Eras in “Figaro”

Photo: T. Charles Erickson

Presented by Boston Lyric Opera
Music by Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart
Libretto by Lorenzo da Ponte
Conducted by David Angus
Directed by Rosetta Cucci

April 28th – May 7th, 2017
John Hancock Hall
Back Bay Events Center
180 Berkley Street
Boston, MA 02116
BLO on Facebook

Review by Gillian Daniels

(Boston, MA) A 1950’s-style screwball comedy proves its compatibility with a comic opera from 1786 in this brilliant production. It’s layered, creating the idea of a show-within-a-show as stage hands help along the action, feeling like Kiss Me Kate with Mozart as source material rather than Shakespeare. With the help of charming, self-aware direction from Rosetta Cucchi and conductor David Angus, the story of two servants who outwit the wandering eye of a less-than-noble nobleman feels universal, familiar, and luminescent.  Continue reading