Actress-singer Renée Elise Goldsberry prepares to work-work with the Pops One might think that the woman who originated the role of Angelica Schuyler in the pop cultural phenomenon Hamilton (for which she received both a Tony and Grammy Award), played the titular role opposite Oprah Winfrey in HBO’s The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks, […]
TWO CLASSIC MUSICALS IN CONCERT, ONE WEEKEND
On the Town at the Boston Pops Something very special was in the air last week as the Boston Pops continued its centennial celebration of Leonard Bernstein with an all-star, solid gold concert of On the Town, Bernstein’s 1944 masterwork about a trio of sailors with 24 hours to kill in New York […]
A TERRIFIC LOVE! VALOUR! COMPASSION! AT ZEITGEIST STAGE
★★★★☆ There’s no getting around the fact that Love! Valour! Compassion! Terrence McNally’s 1994 Tony-winning dramedy, is beginning to show its age. It was the talk of the town 24 years ago when it opened at the Manhattan Theater Club and promptly made the leap to Broadway. Although Angels in America had […]
ALLEGIANCE AND NINJAS AND PORNSTARS, OH MY!
A candid take with George Takei As an actor, director, author, and activist, George Takei has led more lives than the coolest of cool cats. While he is perhaps most well-known for playing USS Enterprise helmsman Mr. Sulu from the legendary Star Trek series, Takei himself has become a pop cultural icon in […]
A BLEAK AND BRILLIANT CABARET AT MOONBOX
★★★★★ Taking on iconic material is always a risky thing, particularly something as well known and oft revived as Cabaret. But if there’s anything the 1966 masterwork has demonstrated over the years, it’s that it is not a musical resistant to reinvention. (Bob Fosse proved this with his 1972 film adaptation, as did […]
THEATER REVIEW: THREEPENNY OPERA
Reviewing Threepenny Opera is about deciding where to raise the curtain. For a lot of people this work, written in 1928 by Bertolt Brecht and Kurt Weill, is as familiar an opera as exists. To many others, it rings no bells, except, perhaps, via the song “Mack the Knife.” I’ll compromise and start in […]
MIDDLE CLASS DREAD: THE HUMANS AT THE SHUBERT
★★★★★ Before there’s any spoken dialogue in The Humans, Stephen Karam’s 2015 Tony Award-winning Best Play, there are those eerie sounds. Those ominous, startling sounds will persist long after the dialogue stops, too. But what’s clear from the start is that this will be a story about anxieties, the kind that regularly […]
A BEAUTIFULLY ACTED LONELY PLANET AT NEW REP
★★★★☆ New Repertory Theatre continues its compelling Statements of Survival series with a 25th anniversary production of Steven Dietz’s 1993 AIDS drama Lonely Planet, which will run through March 4 in New Rep’s intimate black box theater. Co-produced by the Boston Center for American Performance and beautifully directed by New Rep artistic […]
A PARTIALLY ILLUMINATED RAINBOW AT PRAXIS STAGE
★★★☆☆ The young Praxis Stage was formed just over a year ago in the days following the 2016 election as a form of theatrical resistance, aiming to present Boston audiences with stories and ideas that act as statements of opposition. Praxis thus far has selected a wide variety of titles that have […]
A RIVETING RICHARD III AT ACTORS’ SHAKESPEARE PROJECT
★★★★☆ Richard III is the third production of Actors’ Shakespeare Project’s current season, themed “The Downfall of Despots.” It follows Exit the King, an absurdist comedy about an incompetent king who has run his country into the ground, and Julius Caesar, a look at the perils of rhetoric-loving, narcissistic politicians. The parallels […]
