photo credit: Evan Witek
Totem, Cirque du Soleil, Marine Industrial Park, 6/10/12-7/15/12, http://www.cirquedusoleil.com/en/shows/totem/default.aspx.
(Boston, MA) It’s not logical or, frankly, believable that a circus featuring so many acrobats in body stockings could be capable of such grace. In performance, style, and message, though, Cirque du Soleil’s Totem is enthralling. I found the show unique and lovely among Boston’s other attractions this month. Continue reading
Allison Russell as Maggie, Aimee Doherty as Sheila and Hannah Shihdanian as Bebe in A CHORUS LINE at Reagle Music Theatre June 15-24, photo credit Herb Philpott.
A Chorus Line, music by Marvin Hamlisch, lyrics by Edward Kleban, book by James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante, Reagle Music Theatre, 6/15/12-6/24/12, http://www.reagleplayers.com/current.html.
Reviewed by Gillian Daniels
(Waltham, MA) The Reagle Music Theatre is a supportive, intimate venue I remember with pleasure from when I visited it to review Christmas Time. Reagle puts on the same high quality production in A Chorus Line, too, despite some difficulty with the microphones halfway through the play I sat through.
A Chorus Line fits for the Reagle even if the original material hasn’t aged well. Continue reading
photo credit: Ministry of Theater
Roller Disco: The Musical, book by Sam Forman and Jen Wineman, lyrics by Sam Forman, music by Eli Bolin, Ministry of Theater and Club Oberon, 5/30/12-8/30/12, http://www.rollerdiscothemusical.com/Home.html.
Reviewed by Craig Idlebrook
(Cambridge, MA) Sometimes, you come across a play that works so effortlessly on so many levels that it skates circles around your standard theatrical fare. Club Oberon’s Roller Disco, glittery, vacant, hyper and hysterical, draws the audience into a disco-soaked world from the theme song’s opening strands. We have no choice but to harken back to striped tube socks, gritty skating rinks and cheesy eighties movies. Heck, we never even put up a fight. Continue reading
“Hello, Dolly!” Jacquelyn Piro Donovan (Dolly Gallagher Levi) and the ensemble of North Shore Music Theatre’s production of HELLO, DOLLY! Photo by Paul Lyden
Hello Dolly!, book by Michael Stewart, music by Jerry Herman, North Shore Music Theatre, 6/12/12-6/24/12, http://www.nsmt.org/index.php?option=com_content&task=view&id=969.
Reviewed by Craig Idlebrook
Since Elizabethan times, some plays have been built around the concept of a character as a force of nature. As a playwright, it’s often a good strategy that allows a great actor to cover plotline foibles with a powerful performance. But such a strategy also can backfire, because when your lead can’t will the play to life, a weak plot is exposed all the more. Continue reading
photo by Jeremy Daniel from Playbill
Godspell, music and lyrics by Stephen Schwartz, book by John-Michael Tebelak, Circle In The Square Theatre (Broadway), 10/13/11-6/24/12, http://www.godspell.com/. DON’T MISS THIS BRILLIANT & EXCITING SHOW!! (Directed by Huntington’s God of Carnage director, Daniel Goldstein)
(source: http://www.godspellblog.com/the-godspell-update-we-built-a-beautiful-city)
Ken Davenport, the lead producer of Godspell, wrote this note on his blog:
“I just left the Circle in the Square Theatre moments ago, where with a very heavy heart I told the cast and crew that Godspell will play its final performance on Sunday, June 24th. While we certainly had hoped our show would run for years and years, we’re all very proud of the beautiful city we built.
Over the last nine months, our sensational cast has spread the joy of Godspell to over 153,000 people (and blasted them with over 1,000 pounds of confetti). And while this production of Godspell may not be at Circle in the Square past the 24th of June, it will be in our hearts and the hearts of everyone who saw it forever.
ROCK CENTER WITH BRIAN WILLIAMS interview airs on Thursday, June 14th at 10pm/9c on MSNBC.
The Best Man by Gore Vidal, Gerald Schoenfeld Theatre (Broadway), 3/6/12-9/9/12, http://thebestmanonbroadway.com/.
“Candice Bergen is one of the great beauties – and most famous and versatile actresses – of her time. She speaks candidly with Harry Smith about how she has dealt with aging and the mild stroke she had six years ago. She looks back on her breakout role as Murphy Brown, and remembers growing up with her internationally-famous ‘puppet brother,’ Charlie McCarthy, who was given voice by her father, the ventriloquist and comedian Edgar Bergen. She is now appearing in a Broadway play, ‘The Best Man,’ and she shares the stage with such bold-face names as John Larroquette, James Earl Jones, Eric McCormack and Angela Lansbury.”–Copy by Brian Gross
The American Plan by Richard Greenberg, Happy Medium Theatre Company, Factory Theatre, 6/8/12-6/16/12, http://www.happymediumtheatre.com/.
Feature by Gillian Daniels
Happy Medium Theatre’s The American Plan starts off light.
Set during an early-1960’s summer, a young couple meet cute and begin a hesitant courtship near a resort in the Catskill Mountains. The first act sets up initially simple obstacles, mysterious pasts and disapproving parents. By the second act, the play finally bears its teeth, revealing far more bile for the age than its nostalgic exterior would suggest. Continue reading
Your Wildest Dreams by Joey C. Pelletier, Heart & Dagger Productions, Boston Playwrights’ Theatre, 5/18/12-6/2/12, http://heartanddagger.weebly.com/.
Reviewed by Craig Idlebrook
So you want to be a playwright. Great. From painful personal experience, let me offer one suggestion: limit your characters. I know you will be tempted by the prospect of adding a zany waiter with a secret past or a crazy aunt with who steals the scene at dinner, but don’t. Playwriting is hard. Making a fully dimensional character is hard. Keeping the audience’s attention is much harder than you think, and there is no worse sinking feeling than watching your friends make excuses halfway through your stage-reading, believe me. Continue reading
Bianca Amato and James Waterston in Noël Coward’s PRIVATE LIVES. May 25 – June 24, 2012 at the BU Theatre. huntingtontheatre.org. Photo: Paul Marotta
Private Lives by Noel Coward, Huntington Theatre, Boston University Theatre, 5/25/12-6/24/12, http://www.huntingtontheatre.org/season/2011-2012/private-lives/.
Reviewed by Craig Idlebrook
Sometimes, the mark of a good play is how close it comes to the bone. If you are secure in your romantic relationship, you will laugh heartily at Noel Coward’s Private Lives, playing at the Huntington. If you aren’t secure, you will laugh nervously. If you are single, you will laugh derisively. Either way, you will laugh at this mashup of the foibles of all passionate lovers everywhere. Continue reading
McCaela Donovan and Ryan Overberg, Photo: Craig Bailey/Perspective Photo
Xanadu, book by Douglas Carter Beane, music and lyrics by Jeff Lynne and John Farrar, Speakeasy Stage Company, Roberts Studio Theatre at the Boston Center for the Arts, 5/11/12-6/9/12, http://www.speakeasystage.com/doc.php?section=showpage&page=xanadu.
Reviewed by Gillian Daniels
Xanadu, the 1980 film featuring Olivia Newton John and music by the Electric Light Orchestra, is well known for being a critical flop. The chief crime of this cinematic musical, however, is in creating entertainment that doesn’t connect with its audience. After all, it’s a movie about disco released a year after the genre died a largely un-mourned death. I’m hard pressed to find a better image of disconnection than that.
In being brought to the stage, Xanadu has finally found its correct medium. The show not only finds its audience but winks at it furiously throughout the course of the story. Continue reading
