Yearly Archives: 2012

May 23

Trojan Women: An Atmospheric View of the Devastation of War

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photo credit: Whistler in the Dark

Trojan Women by Euripides,
Whistler in the Dark,
The Factory Theatre,
5/18/12-6/2/12, http://www.whistlerinthedark.com/productions/trojanwomenprod.html.

Reviewed by Anthony Geehan

(Boston, MA) The end of war is something that is looked on as a celebratory event. Images of servicemen returning home, country’s flags being raised, and a collective sigh of relief from the population are the usual symbols that are associated with victory. There is however always a losing side in a war who must deal with a devastated homeland, a shamed or exterminated army, and the loss of everything their civilization was or could ever be. Continue reading →

May 20

Geeks Nerds and Artists Episode 7: Danny Bryck

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Episode 7: Geeks, Nerds & Artists Podcast: Danny Bryck, local actor and dialect coach

http://dannybryck.com/

No Room For Wishing–one man documentary play by Danny Bryck
READING: May 27 @ 2pm at Wall Street to Main Street Festival, BRIK Gallery, 473 Main St, Catskill, NY
http://www.facebook.com/events/311862005560920/
READING (Excerpts): June 20 @ 7pm at Hall Space, 950 Dorchester Avenue, Boston, MA
MORE TO COME IN THE SUMMER & FALL, http://dannybryck.com/noroomforwishing/

Danny Bryck is an actor, writer and theatre artist hailing from Amherst, Massachusetts.

Continue reading →

May 19

Just Shy of Hilarious: AVENUE Q

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John Ambrosino & Phil Tayler; photo credit: Mark S. Howard

Avenue Q, music and lyrics by Robert Lopez and Jeff Marx, book by Jeff Whitty, Lyric Stage Company of Boston, 5/11/12- 6/24/12,  EXTENDED to 7/1/12, https://lyricstage.com/main_stage/avenue_q/.

Reviewed by Craig Idlebrook

(Boston, MA) Comedy is a game of milliseconds.  The difference between a good laugh and a belly laugh is all in the timing.  If you don’t land the gag just right, the joke can fall flat.  Lyric Stage’s production of Avenue Q is very funny, but it could have been crack-a-rib hilarious.

The script and song are the closest you can come to a guaranteed crowd-pleaser.  Take the earnestness of Sesame Street, mash it with the slacker sensibilities of Friends and the crowd can’t help but laugh.  Continue reading →

May 13

Tickets On Sale Now For T: An MBTA Musical

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The cast of T: An MBTA Musical (last year) Photo by Jeffrey Mosser.

Only June 8th & June 15th at Club Oberon:  http://www.cluboberon.com/events/t-mbta-musical

I hear they’re going fast!  They sold out last year with many more shows.  I’d get tickets now!

To read our articles go here:  Interview with composer Melissa Carubia, Last Year’s Review

May 10

Keeping the Bard on His Toes: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING

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Much Ado About Nothing…With A Twist adapted by Daniel Morris, Bad Habit Productions, Deane Hall at Boston Center for the Arts, 4/28/12-5/13/12, http://www.badhabitproductions.org/shows/season/MuchAdo.html.

Review by Craig Idlebrook

(Boston, MA) There’s a funny story the actor Charles Grodin shares about famed acting teacher Uta Hagen, where Hagen was dissecting the terribleness of a scene Grodin had just done.  She hated everything except for one moment when Grodin’s scene partner was slow to hand the actor a prop.  Because there was a delay, Grodin looked genuinely concerned, and that, Hagen announced, was true acting.

I’m not a big fan of the Method myself, but I’m starting to see her point, especially when it comes to Shakespeare.  Acting involves a weird combo of memorization and playful improvisation.  But when it comes to the Bard’s work, too many productions are populated with actors who know they are saying weighty words and making weighty gestures; every move is preordained and dripping with importance.  Such a style robs the lyrical and impish qualities of plays that once were performed for bawdy Elizabethans.

Luckily, there are productions like Bad Habit’s staging of Much Ado About Nothing to inject life into scripts that we have too long sanctified.   Continue reading →

May 10

Geeks Nerds and Artists Episode 6: Spiro Veloudos

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photo credit: Lyric Stage of Boston

Episode 6: Geeks, Nerds & Artists Podcast: Spiro Veloudos, Artistic Director of Lyric Stage Company of Boston and director of current production of Avenue Q

http://www.lyricstage.com/

Avenue Q: May 11-June 24, 2012 (it is selling out presently)

Spiro Veloudos is the Producing Artistic Director of The Lyric Stage Company. and has been honored with numerous awards and honors including The Elliot Norton Award and The Independent Reviews of New England (IRNE) Award. He has been personally honored with the 2006 Elliot Norton Prize for Sustained Excellence, Stage Source’s 2002 Theatre Hero Award and was cited as the city’s Best Artistic Director by Boston Magazine’s Best of Boston program in 1999. Continue reading →

May 08

Small Theatre Alliance of Boston: A Force for Good Theatre

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IN THE DARKNESS

OF A SMALL THEATRE

CREATING NEW, CHALLENGING, AND EXCITING

PRODUCTIONS, WHERE RESOURCES AND INFORMATION WERE SCATTERED

A GROUP OF ARTISTS JOINED TOGETHER TO INCREASE COMMUNICATION BY FORMING

THE SMALL THEATRE ALLIANCE OF BOSTON

Interview with John Geoffrion by Becca Kidwell

Between 2009 and 2010, Meg Taintor, Daniel Morris, Nora Long, and other small theatre leaders joined together to form the Small Theatre Alliance of Boston share resources, information, ideas, and support each other. Continue reading →

May 07

Horrific Comfort Food: LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS

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l. to r. Bill Mootos, Ceit McCaleb Zweil, Lovely Hoffman, and Jennifer Fogarty in Little Shop of Horrors. Photo by Andrew Brilliant / Brilliant Pictures.

Little Shop of Horrors, book and lyrics by Howard Ashman, music by Alan Menken, New Repertory Theatre, Charles Mosesian Theater at the Arsenal Center for the Arts, 4/29/12-5/27/12, http://www.newrep.org/little_shop.php.

Reviewed by Kate Lonberg-Lew

(Watertown, MA) Sometimes you are having a bad day. Sometimes you are in such a bad mood that escapism is the only way to manage.  It was in such a state that I entered the New Rep’s production of Little Shop of Horrors at the Arsenal Center for the Arts. I tell you this so that you will know exactly how steep a hill the cast had to climb in order for me to emerge smiling; which I did. Continue reading →

May 07

Lunatics Running the Asylum: ASSASSINS

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As the culminating event in the College's year-long examination of the theme of violence, Assassins brims with a particularly urgent energy. Photo by Kalman Zabarsky for Boston University Photography © 2012 Boston University all rights reserved

Assassins, music and lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, book by John Weidman, Boston University Colllege of Fine Arts School of Theatre, Boston University Theatre, 4/4/12-4/10/12, http://www.bu.edu/cfa/2012/04/20/assassins/.

Reviewed by Craig Idlebrook

(Boston, MA) It’s nice for Stephen Sondheim and his partner John Weidman to clear up a few things for us about theater in their mishmash of a play, Assassins, playing at the Boston University Theatre.

They have proven a fundamental truth: You can populate your play with profoundly interesting characters, give them things to do that impact every theatergoer’s psyche and bestow wonderful music for them to sing as they do it, but if the script doesn’t allow them to interact in a meaningful way, it’s just an exercise in futility.  The playwrights prove this point despite the best efforts of a talented cast, who creates full-fledged and compelling characters. In fact, the cast and stellar set give us such high expectations that it makes the mind want to rebel at this idle script all the more.    Continue reading →