Photo credit: Stratton McCrady
Presented by the Suffolk University Theatre Department
Book, Music & Lyrics by Jonathan Larson
Directed by Paul Melone
Musical Direction by Scott Nicholas
April 7-10, 2016
C. Walsh Theatre
55 Temple Street, Boston, MA
C. Walsh Theater on Facebook
Review by Travis Manni
(Boston, MA) So here we are again. Same play, another day, and another production. This time, the cherished show made its way to the Suffolk University Theatre Department. Continue reading
Presented by Theatre on Fire
By Liz Duffy Adams
Directed by Diego Arciniegas
April 1 – 23, 2016
Charlestown Working Theater
ToF on Facebook
Review by Gillian Daniels
(Charlestown, MA) Stories about the end of the world are often concerned with the survival of the individual against structures that have filled the void since the fabled downfall of society. This includes reality television death match enthusiasts (Suzanne Collin’s The Hunger Games), patriarchal cults with private harems (Mad Max: Fury Road), fight dome fans lead by Tina Turner (Mad Max: Beyond Thunderdome), and foul-mouthed, fur-wearing, belligerent tribes of wanderers. Dog Act looks not just at the individual, but the survival of art in a new North American wasteland. Continue reading
Created by the Manhattan Theatre Project
Based on the novel by Lewis Carroll
Presented by Imaginary Beasts
Directed by Matthew Woods
April 1 – 23, 2016
Boston Center for the Arts
539 Tremont Street, Boston
Imaginary Beasts on Facebook
Review by Danielle Rosvally
(Boston, MA) It is no small challenge to take on a piece with so much cultural baggage as Alice in Wonderland. Audiences have seen, heard, and read this story over and over again from our childhoods unto the present day. Alice is everywhere in so many forms that adding something new to the tale is a Herculean task. Unfortunately, I don’t think that artistic director Matthew Woods quite had a handle on it. Continue reading
Photo from the 2012 production at Oberon.
Presented by ImprovBoston
Music and Lyrics by Melissa Carubia
Directed by John Michael Manship
Musical Direction by Shannon Jacob
February 26-May 20, 2016
Cambridge, MA
ImprovBoston on Facebook
Review by Travis Manni
(Cambridge, MA) When I found out that the MBTA was going to cut Friday and Saturday extended hours, I wept for at least 5.5 seconds. My displeasure quickly morphed into absolute fury with the board members for making such a rash decision that effects hundreds of workers, students, and other Bostonians. I was revved up to come see the performance of ImprovBoston’s T-shaming show, T: An MBTA Musical and it was the perfect slap-in-the-face comeback to Boston’s poor excuse for public transit that I could’ve received. Continue reading
Photo credit: Glenn Perry Photography
Presented by Speak Easy Stage Company
Written by Robert O’Hara
Directed by Summer L. William
March 12-April 9, 2016
Stanford Calderwood Pavilion
Boston Center for the Arts
Speak Easy on Facebook
Review by Travis Manni
(Boston, MA) Growing up gay and black is a very specific experience, and not one with which I will ever be able to identify. But Robert O’Hara’s hilarious and honest show gives the closest to an authentic experience anybody could possibly get. Continue reading
Photo credit: Jake Scaltreto
Presented by Flat Earth Theatre
Written by Gina Young
Directed by Mariagrazia LaFauci
March 11-26, 2016
Arsenal Center for the Arts
Flat Earth Theatre on Facebook
Review by Travis Manni
(Watertown, MA) This play is super gay. I mean, yeah it’s really funny, and mega 90s, but it is super gay. And that is why it was pretty damn amazing. Continue reading
Photo by Richard Hall/Silverline Images, contestants and their cakes
Presented by Zeitgeist Stage Company
Written by Colleen Curran
Directed by David J. Miller
Feb. 26 – March 19, 2016
Plaza Back Box
Boston Center for the Arts
Boston, MA
Zeitgeist on Facebook
Review by Kitty Drexel
(Boston, MA) It is Independence Day 1984. The ladies of a small town in Vermont have won a place in the annual cakewalk competition and are patiently awaiting the critique of guest judge, Julia Child. First prize is a glamorous trip for two to Paris, France. Among the other prizes are a lifetime supply of flour and accolades from the citizenship for an entire year. Most of the gang looks forward to the friendly competition. Ruby Abel (Kelley Estes) is out for blood. Ready to slow down her paranoid manipulations are fellow contestants Martha (Aina Adler), Augusta (Maureen Adduci) and Leigh (Victoria George). Taylor (Matt Fagerberg) just wants to find the registration room. Each has their own secrets to keep and insecurities to air. A seemingly safe summer fair turns into a conundrum of colliding small town politics.
Continue reading
ASP Richard II (l to r) Northumberland (Marya Lowry), King Richard II (Doug Lockwood), Bishop of Carlisle (Malcolm Ingram), Bolingbroke (Michael Forden Walker), and Henry Percy (Lewis D. Wheeler). Photo by Stratton McCrady
Presented by Actors’ Shakespeare Project
Written by William Shakespeare
Directed by Allyn Burrows
Feb. 17-March 13, 2016
Cambridge YMCA
Cambridge, MA
ASP on Facebook
Review by Gillian Daniels
(Cambridge, MA) Richard II is not about a Danish prince languishing over a ghost’s warnings or an elderly king like Lear, mad with grief due to age and family strife. No, this is a story about the abuses of power and a complex man who both understands why he must give up his throne but is honest enough to admit to himself that he just really, really doesn’t want to. Continue reading
Image care of Google
Presented by The Hasty Pudding Club
Written by Daniel S. Milaschewski,, Jacob D. Rienstra, and A.J. Unitas
Music composed by Dylan MarcAurele
Feb. 6 – March 6, 2016
Farkas Hall
12 Holyoke Street
Harvard Square
Cambridge, MA
Review by Kitty Drexel
(Cambridge, MA) HPT168: That 1770’s Show is like a Ru Paul’s Drag Race production of “A Day in the Life on Plimouth Plantation” if the budget were slashed and the performers given a strict diet of cafeteria food. It’s good ole’ drag satire in which Massachusetts institutions are the butt of the jokes. It’s hilarious if that’s your thing. If it’s not: the show’s still funny but you won’t enjoy yourself as much as everyone else. Continue reading
Presented by WholeTone Opera
Opera by Jillian Flexner
Based on the opera by Giuseppe Verdi and Francesco Maria Piave.
Stage Director: J. Deschene
Music Director: Ian Garvie
February 12 – 14, 2016
Davis Square Theater
Somerville, MA
WholeTone Opera on Facebook
Review by Craig Idlebrook
(Somerville, MA) The few times I’ve been to an opera, I noted that if you took out a lot of the notes people sang, you would end up with a bloody, sexy tale. Being that I’m generally inclined for a bloody, sexy tale over a lot of notes, I daydreamed of a streamlined opera that didn’t take itself so seriously. (Have you gathered I don’t usually like opera?) Continue reading
