Tim Dunleavy

Review: ‘The Massive Tragedy of Madame Bovary’ at Curio Theatre Company

How do you turn one of literature’s greatest tragedies into a raucous comedy? Very carefully. I read Madame Bovary in high school, and while it’s been (ahem) a few decades since I’ve thought of it in...

Review: ‘The Taming of the Shrew’ at Exclamation Theater

The Taming of the Shrew is one of Shakespeare’s most controversial plays, one that has spurred argument and discord for over 400 years. Is the play as misogynistic as it often appears, or is its theme...

Review: ‘Hetty Feather’ at Delaware Theatre Company

Nothing can keep Hetty Feather down. An orphan’s life is a hard one, especially in Victorian England – and Hetty has it harder than most orphans, spending years enduring cruel treatment in London’s...

Review: ‘Love and Information’ at Temple Theaters

“I did tell you” “You didn’t” “I did I said Wednesday we’re going to dinner with” “But you didn’t” “Yes because I remember because you said” “All right I must have forgotten I’m sorry” “Yes you did”...

Review: ‘Jerry’s Girls’ at Walnut Street Theatre Independence Studio on 3

There’s just no tune As exciting As a showtune In two-four… For Jerry Herman, the lyrics of this early composition, “Showtune,” represent a kind of mission statement. In song after song, in Broadway...

Review: ‘The Prisoner of Zenda’ at Hedgerow Theatre

There are few adventure stories as durable as The Prisoner of Zenda. Anthony Hope’s 1894 novel – the story of a well-meaning Englishman who looks exactly like a European king, and who poses as the...

Review: ‘You for Me for You’ at InterAct Theatre Company

Is there any place on Earth more mysterious than North Korea? Aside from the grand ambitions of the brutal dictator (known to his subjects as “Our Dear Leader”) who runs the country without any...

Review: ‘The King and I’ at the Academy of Music

More than sixty years after its debut, The King and I remains one of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s most popular and enduring musicals. The handsome national touring company of the recent Broadway revival...

Review: ‘The Importance of Being Earnest’ at the Walnut Street Theatre

The Walnut Street Theatre is doing The Importance of Being Earnest in high style. The Victorian era was noted for its excesses in decoration and costume, and Robert Koharchik’s set design for this...

Review: ‘Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express’ at McCarter Theatre Center

One afternoon in 1979 or 1980, I saw Orson Welles on The Merv Griffin Show discussing his love of mystery stories. One of his favorites, he said, was Murder on the Orient Express. I was young, and I...

Review: ‘Coriolanus’ at Lantern Theater Company

Coriolanus is one of Shakespeare’s least-performed plays – probably because it doesn’t fit easily into any of the standard Shakespearean categories. It’s a tragedy, but one without the epic sweep of...

Review: ‘John & Jen’ at The Eagle Theatre

Welcome to the world It’s such a funny place The people who you love the most Are also the ones Who make you cry I’m not sure why A girl sings these lines to her newborn brother in the opening moments...

Review: ‘The Miss Firecracker Contest’ at South Camden Theatre Company

Beth Henley stocks her plays with characters that are distinctive and outlandish, right down to their names. The Miss Firecracker Contest, her wily and witty comedy now being revived at South Camden...

Review: ‘Sh*theads’ at Azuka Theatre

The characters in Sh*theads don’t mind being called shitheads. True, that may not be a word you’d use in polite company… but these people aren’t polite company. They’re the employees of Bert’s Bikes,...

Review: ‘Lost Girls’ at Theatre Exile

For Maggie, life has been, ever since childhood, one crisis after another. Now, as a winter storm is blanketing her New Hampshire hometown, several more crises have struck at once: her car has been...

Review: ‘Mary Martello: Songs My Mother Taught Me’ at the Arden Theatre Cabaret Series

I’ve seen Mary Martello onstage more times than I can count. The 5-time Barrymore Award winner has played everyone from Mrs. Lovett in Sweeney Todd to Queen Gertrude in Hamlet, from Abby Brewster in...

Review: ‘Waiting for Godot’ at Curio Theatre Company

Waiting for Godot is generally considered a comedy. Samuel Beckett himself called this, his most famous play, a “tragicomedy.” But its reputation as an important, monumental piece of art can have a...

Review: ‘Grand Concourse’ at Theatre Horizon

Heidi Schreck’s fascinating play Grand Concourse is set in a church soup kitchen, among people who need a hand and those who help them. The play deals with poverty, but its biggest concern is the...

Review: ‘The Seagull’ at EgoPo Classic Theater

Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull is one of the most durable of all 19th century plays. But it’s a play that producers, directors, and playwrights love to tinker with. In the last few years, audiences in...

Review: ‘Having Our Say: The Delany Sisters’ First 100 Years’ at Philadelphia Theatre Company

Sadie and Bessie Delany were one of a kind. Well, two of a kind. When we meet these two sisters, it’s 1993; Sadie is 103 years old, and Bessie is 101. (They both lived a few more years, with Sadie...

Review: ‘Marcus/Emma’ at InterAct Theatre Company

Marcus Garvey and Emma Goldman were known for their stirring, provocative speeches. But I doubt that, in any of her speeches, Goldman ever said anything as provocative as “Solidarity is sexy! Yeah!”...

Review: Bedlam: ‘Hamlet’ and ‘Saint Joan’ at McCarter Theatre Center

There’s nothing extravagant about the two shows playing at the McCarter Theatre. Both are presented on a stage stripped to its bare essentials: we can see all the way back to the building’s rear wall....

Review: ‘Constellations’ at The Wilma Theater

In Constellations, what happens is just as important as what might have happened. Nick Payne’s play concerns two young people who meet, fall in love, quarrel, break up, reunite, get engaged, and deal...

Review: ‘Informed Consent’ at Lantern Theater Company

Jillian, the main character of Deborah Zoe Laufer’s play Informed Consent, is a genetic anthropologist – a scientist who has studied DNA for years and is still amazed at what she learns from it. She...

Review: ‘The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy Part 2’ at Hedgerow Theatre

By combining Isaac Asimov-style science fiction with Monty Python-style silliness, Douglas Adams created a whole new genre. It paid off very handsomely for Adams: His most famous work, The...

Review: ‘Every Christmas Story Ever Told (And Then Some)’ at Casabeuna Cultural Productions

Who doesn’t love a good Christmas story? In fact, who doesn’t love every good Christmas story? A quartet of rambunctious performers tries to cover all bases, and lovingly satirize all – well, most –...

Review: The Twelve Dancing Princesses’ at Camden Repertory Theatre

The Twelve Dancing Princesses, an original musical being presented by Camden Rep, teaches its young audience lessons about love, strength, forgiveness, and family ties. It also has a peppy score and a...

Review: ‘Murder for Two: Holiday Edition’ at Bucks County Playhouse

When I found out that the creators of the musical comedy Murder for Two were premiering a special Christmas-themed version at Bucks County Playhouse, I was intrigued. After all, the show has been a...

Review: The Arden Cabaret Series: ‘Tell Me A Story: ’Tis the Season’ at the Arden Theatre

Since its introduction last season, the Arden Theatre’s cabaret season has provided a dependable stream of the city’s best performers providing old songs, new songs, and comedy. But the latest entry...

Review: ‘School of Rock’ at Cherry Hill High School West

Back when I was in high school, we didn’t do musicals where the songs had titles like “Stick It to the Man.” (I don’t think our principal would have allowed it!) But now Cherry Hill High School West...

Review: ‘Mary Poppins’ at the Players Club of Swarthmore

The Players Club of Swarthmore’s new production of Mary Poppins may surprise some devoted fans of the movie. This stage adaptation, which had a successful run on Broadway a decade ago, isn’t a slavish...

Review: ‘Seuls’ at The Wilma Theater

In the opening moments of Seuls, Wajdi Mouawad takes to the stage wearing only black briefs and eyeglasses. The purpose of the show we’re about to see, he informs the audience, is to examine “our...

‘Found’ at Philadelphia Theatre Company

They say people don’t write letters anymore, but I don’t think that’s true. So says the leading character in the opening moments of Found, an offbeat comic musical that puts as much emphasis on the...

Review: ‘A Christmas Story: The Musical’ at The Media Theatre

A Christmas Story: The Musical was a breath of fresh air when it debuted on Broadway four seasons ago. Based on the 1983 movie that’s become a television perennial, it retained a great deal of the...

Review: ‘Dublin by Lamplight’ at Inis Nua Theatre Company

The founding of The Abbey Theatre in 1904 was one of the pivotal events in Irish history. The Abbey championed the perspective of Irish playwrights and actors, and its founding was the moment that the...

Review: ‘Buyer & Cellar’ at Bucks County Playhouse

Say what you will about Barbra Streisand – whether you love her massive talent or ego, or not, you have to admit there’s no one else like her. And few people can say that with as much authority as...

Review: ‘Working: a Musical’ at Bristol Riverside Theatre

Working isn’t a typical musical. There’s no plot, no resolution, no love story. Yet the tale it tells is an absorbing one. By using words and music to examine the relationship of people to their jobs,...

Review: ‘Out of the City’ at Passage Theatre

Leslie Ayvazian’s comedy Out of the City opens in the lobby of a Bed and Breakfast in the Poconos. Carol and her husband Matt are there for the weekend to celebrate Carol’s sixtieth birthday. Carol’s...

Review: ‘Breathe Smoke’ at Orbiter 3

Douglas Williams’ Breathe Smoke, a world premiere being presented by the Orbiter 3 Collective, tells the story of four people whose public lives and private lives are markedly different. It’s a...

Review: ‘Promises, Promises’ at the Ritz Theatre Company

Promises, Promises opened on Broadway in 1968, and while the world it depicts seemed relevant back then, today that world has largely vanished. It’s set in the Manhattan skyscraper home of...

Review: ‘The Rocky Horror Show’ at Bucks County Playhouse

When you take your seat at Bucks County Playhouse and find a paper bag on your seat filled with props – including a baggie full of rice to throw at the stage during a wedding scene – you may realize...

Review: Rosanne Cash at The Merriam Theater

Rosanne Cash admitted on Thursday night that she looks at the world through a “peculiar prism.” In one of the songs she performed that night, “Modern Blue,” she sang of visiting Barcelona and Paris...

Review: ‘Mother Courage and Her Children’ at Quintessence Theatre

Janis Dardaris is a force to be reckoned with. As Mother Courage, standing firm with her hands on her hips and wearing a white, shapeless frock covered by a blue sweater, she is a tower of strength...

Review: ‘The Birds’ at Curio Theatre Company, in Philadelphia

When you think of The Birds, you probably think of Tippi Hedren running for her life through the streets of a California town – a town inexplicably under attack by every winged creature within miles....

‘The Other Place’ at Walnut Street Theatre Independence Studio on 3 in Philadelphia

The Other Place seems at first like a straightforward drama: Juliana, a brilliant and highly esteemed 59-year-old scientist, is beginning to suffer from memory loss. This brings her into conflict with...

Review: ‘The Mountaintop’ at People’s Light & Theatre Company

The Mountaintop is a fantasia rooted in one of the most tragic events of the twentieth century. Set on the final night in the life of Rev. Martin Luther King Jr., Katori Hall’s play takes King into an...

Review: ‘A Closer Walk with Patsy Cline’ at Bristol Riverside Theatre in Bristol, PA

A Closer Walk with Patsy Cline marks the second time in two years that Bristol Riverside Theatre has staged a show about the life of Cline, one of country music’s greatest stars. (Always… Patsy Cline,...

2016 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘King John’ at Revolution Shakespeare

King John, one of Shakespeare’s lesser-known history plays, is filled with intrigue, betrayal, and a pair of kings who are constantly threatening to go to war. In other words, it’s perfect for this...

Review: ‘Stupid Fucking Bird’ at the Arden Theatre in Philadelphia

It was just two and a half years ago that the Arden Theatre presented a version of Anton Chekhov’s Three Sisters that used a fresh, slangy translation. It took a musty classic and made it feel up to...

2016 Philadelphia Fringe Festival Review: ‘The Elementary Spacetime Show’

The Elementary Spacetime Show is an unusual musical about a subject you don’t often see onstage: teenage suicide. With music, book and lyrics by César Alvarez, the show treads the line between...