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  Theatre in Review: The Merchant of Venice (Arlekin Players at Classic Stage Company)
Often cited as one of William Shakespeare's "problem plays," The Merchant of Venice is in fact a remarkably supple piece. It can absorb a multitude of interpretations, which is perhaps one reason it gets done so often ...
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Theatre in Review: Death Becomes Her (Lunt-Fontanne Theatre)
How do you like your comic divas? Death Becomes Her offers you quite a choice, which I bet you'll be hard-pressed to make. First up is Megan Hilty
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Theatre in Review: Swept Away (Longacre Theatre)
Swept Away is a jukebox musical of a different sort; rather than recycling a clutch of overexposed pop hits and tying them to an airheaded plot, it takes its songs from Mignonette, a concept album by the folk-rock band ...
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Theatre in Review: We Are Your Robots (Theatre for a New Audience/Rattlestick Theater)
Contrary to popular belief, it's not true that every new show is about robots or the climate crisis; it just seems that way. This week, the robots have it: Even as Maybe Happy Ending piles up raves on Broadway, Ethan Lipton ...
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Theatre in Review: Strategic Love Play (Audible Theatre at Minetta Lane Theatre)
The characters in Strategic Love Play consume many drinks over a running time of seventy-five minutes or so and, before very long, I was ready for a couple myself. (I would have preferred a martini or two to their endless ...
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Theatre in Review: 300 Paintings (Vineyard Theatre)
Sam Kissajukian is a sly, understated presence who knows how to land a laugh when you least expect it. Taking the stage at the Vineyard, he marvels at the terra cotta-colored trapezoid painted on the floor just for him. (Like most ...
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Theatre in Review: Sh*T. Meet. Fan. (MCC Theater)
In his latest effort, Robert O'Hara is out to shock -- the title might offer a hint about that - but, despite a predictable premise, it takes some time to figure out what kind of play this is. Clint Ramos' swanky set design - ...
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Theatre in Review: Music City (BEDLAM/West End Theatre)
For so many years, jukebox musicals have merely been a trial that must be borne, leaving one devoutly praying each season that this too might pass. I won't hear a word against Mamma Mia!, although its creators will surely face a ...
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Theatre in Review: Sex Variants of 1941: A Study of Homosexual Patterns (The Civilians/NYU Skirball)
The title of this new entertainment sounds like a Broadway revue series from the between-the-war years, say Earl Caroll Vanities or George White's Scandals. (One instinctively conjures images of Sex Variants of 1942 or ...
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Theatre in Review: Maybe Happy Ending (Belasco Theatre)
It tells you something about this theatre season that possibly the most touching relationship on a Broadway stage just now is between two machines. In Maybe Happy Ending, composers/librettists Will Aronson and Hue ...
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Theatre in Review: Burnout Paradise (St. Ann's Warehouse)
Uncharacteristically, I beg for your pity: There's no rational way to describe the barely controlled chaos of Burnout Paradise, which instantly takes the title of maddest entertainment in town. The five utterly committed, if ...
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Theatre in Review: Mama, I'm a Big Girl Now! (New World Stages)
The Hairspray ladies are receiving guests nightly at New World Stages, and if you have any affection for them or the show that launched their careers, you might want to drop into Mama, I'm a Big Girl Now! ...
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Theatre in Review: King Lear (The Shed)
This may be the most lucid and fast-moving King Lear you will ever see; this sounds like praise, and it is, up to a point. Thanks in part to the adoption of a Dolby Atmos system (a theatre first) by the sound designers Ben< ...
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Theatre in Review: Communion (the cell)
If you follow New York City's local news, you may be familiar with the case of Matthew LaBanca, who was fired from his positions as a music teacher in a Queens Catholic school and choir director at a nearby parish. It got plenty of ...
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Theatre in Review: A Wonderful World: The Louis Armstrong Musical (Studio 54)
A Wonderful World opens with jazz great Louis Armstrong caught in a shaft of stark white light, his horn raised and ready to rip. It's a striking image, a carefully arranged bit of pop idolatry, and it tips us off that the ...
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Theatre in Review: Give Me Carmelita Tropicana (Soho Rep)
Give Me Carmelita Tropicana is both a farce and a requiem and if that sounds like a tall order, I suggest you drop in at Soho Rep's Walker Street venue and see for yourself. It will be your last opportunity to do so, as the ...
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Theatre in Review: The Devil's Disciple (Gingold Theatrical Group/Theatre Row)
David Staller, who directed this revival of George Bernard Shaw's comedy of the American Revolution, is also listed as the production's adaptor but, really, he is being too modest: He is all but the co-author of this version ...
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Theatre in Review: Walden (Second Stage/Tony Kiser Theatre)
The climate crisis has arrived -- witness this awful hurricane season, paired with balmy, seventy-eight-degree weather in New York this November week -- making it the topic of the moment in the New York theatre. It's an enormous issue, not ...
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Theatre in Review: We Live in Cairo (New York Theatre Workshop)
In a season so far starved for ambitious musical theatre, We Live in Cairo is a welcome blast of excitement and intelligence. It showcases The Lazours, the two brothers responsible for the book, music, and lyrics of ...
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Theatre in Review: The Christine Jorgensen Show (HERE)
At a time when transgender issues have become a hot topic on the left and a hot potato on the right, now is surely the time to recall Christine Jorgensen. Born George Jorgensen, an Army veteran, she was, in 1952, an early visitor to ...
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