Director Bevin O’Gara Speaks About Play With No Talking For a play in which the characters aren’t allowed to speak, Small Mouth Sounds says a lot. The play, by Bess Wohl, follows its characters on a comedic and poignant journey in self-reflection and mutual understanding at a spiritual retreat. Director Bevin O’Gara, a […]
IT’S A SMALL WORLD AFTER ALL
Winter People at the Boston Playwrights’ Theater ★★☆☆☆ It’s a particularly East Coast feeling—the eeriness of a summer resort in winter, when February winds blow through the dormant wooden roller coaster at the amusement park or an empty plastic bag blows across the frozen, barren beaches of New Jersey. Laura Neill’s new […]
LAND HO, SO-SO: TWELFTH NIGHT AND SHIPWRECKED! IN REP AT MOONBOX PRODUCTIONS
★★☆☆☆ If Duke Orsino in Shakespeare’s beloved comedy Twelfth Night has picked up his (sometimes misbegotten) ideas of love from hearing enchanting strains of music, Louis de Rougemont, the self-proclaimed narrator/protagonist/hero/villain of Donald Margulies’ Shipwrecked! An Entertainment has gotten his ideas about adventure from books. The Odyssey, Robinson Caruso, Ten Thousand Leagues Under […]
FRONT PORCH PUSHES THEATRICAL DIVERSITY
A new black-led Boston theater company prepares its inaugural season The hard truth about Boston is that it’s a fairly racist city. It’s evident in its social dynamics and made painfully (in)visible in its cultural scene. At least Dawn M. Simmons, the artistic director of the city’s first black-led professional theater company in […]
A.R.T. CHEERS ‘EXTRAORDINARY’ DECADE
★★★★☆ It seems the folks over at the American Repertory Theater have racked up a lot to be thankful for in the decade since Diane Paulus became the company’s artistic director. ExtraOrdinary, a collection of songs and talents from the 30-some musicals produced during her tenure, revels in a contagious self-satisfaction that’s hard […]
ALL BARK, NO BITE IN AKA THEATRE’S IN THE FOREST, SHE GREW FANGS
★★☆☆☆ Once upon a time, there was a play. And in this play, presented by Also Known As Theatre, there was a girl. And a forest. And a grandmother. And a wolf. Stephen Spotswood’s In the Forest, She Grew Fangs, directed by Kelly Smith, tries to play off this classic scenario. A girl […]
THE RIGHT WAY TO DO SLAPSTICK COMEDY IN THE PLAY THAT GOES WRONG
★★★★☆ After drinking and spitting out scotch (read: paint thinner) for the fourth time, Thomas Colleymoore (Robert Grove) shouts—for the fourth time—“Good God! I needed that.” It seems that The Play That Goes Wrong is just what the audience needed. A chance to laugh, even guffaw, at a show that’s equal parts smart […]
THE SALONNIÈRES AIMS FOR BITING CRITIQUE, HITS DATED COMMENTARY
★★☆☆☆ It’s easy to see what the set of The Salonnières is trying to do. It’s an opulent room filled with ornate couches and chairs—Renaissance paintings hung on the walls. But the most striking aspect of this set, designed by Katy Monthei, is its boundaries. The room is set on a raised stage […]
ALL THINGS TO ALL MEN: EQUIVOCATION BY THE ACTORS’ SHAKESPEARE PROJECT
★★★★☆ Beneath the cavernous gothic arches of a church nave, two men sit hunched over a wooden table. “Your works will last,” Prime Minister Robert Cecil tells Master Shagspeare in the opening scene of Equivocation. “I believe your plays will still be being done … 50 years from now,” he guesses, to the […]
MICHAEL GREIF, IN THE RING
The A-list director readies Man in the Ring at Huntington Theatre Company For Michael Greif, it’s all about context. The four-time Tony Award-nominated director behind shows like Rent and Dear Evan Hansen is no stranger to creating works that define generations, both onstage and off. In town working on Man in the Ring […]
