Reviews

Review: ‘Anything Goes’ at Our Gang Players in Manahawkin, NJ

Our Gang Players took on a big undertaking with their production of Anything Goes this past weekend and it was surely an afternoon pleasure cruise. This Cole Porter musical classic with book by P. G....

2016 FringeNYC Review: ‘Humorously Horrendous Haunted Hideaway’

If you’re a fan of the fright genre and nostalgic for classic Saturday morning TV shows for kids, Playlab NYC’s Humorously Horrendous Haunted Hideaway will have you screaming with laughter! Written...

Review: ‘Lost in Yonkers’ at Prince George’s Little Theatre

Lost in Yonkers, by Neil Simon, now playing at Prince George’s Little Theatre, is a dramedy. Director Ken Kienas and Producer Malia Murray offer up a rich character study about family dynamics....

Review: ‘Snow White’ at The Heritage Players

The Heritage Players of Catonsville, MD have created a wonderful production of Snow White, the classic fairytale with a young beauty, an evil Queen, a Magic Mirror, seven dwarves, and a handsome...

Review: ‘Oklahoma!’ at Riverside Center for the Performing Arts

When Riverside Center Dinner Theater opened in 1998, their first show was Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Oklahoma!, known then (and still) as the Great American Musical. As Riverside Center nears its...

2016 FringeNYC Review: ‘The Intriguing Engagements of Frances and Meg Cheatham, Ladies of Society’

As two upper-crust English sisters of marriageable age in the Victorian era, Mia Hutchinson-Shaw and Natalia Dyer bring new meaning to sibling rivalry in the titular roles of Adaire Kamen’s The...

Review: ‘Breathing Under Dirt’ at Lower Shore Performing Arts Company

Cynthia Watros packed a wallop of twisted fears, resentment and despair into a tumultuous whirlwind performance as Patience Malarkey in the world premiere of Breathing Under Dirt. Entering on a roll...

2016 FringeNYC Review: ‘The Theatre Made in Paradise’

What better reason to leave Elizabethan England than to stage a production of Shakespeare’s The Tempest in the New World and to found an indie theater there? That’s the witty premise of playwright...

Review: ‘Max Major’s THINK AGAIN’ at Baltimore Theatre Project

I’ll let you in on a secret. I’ve always wanted to see a mentalist performance. Until now, though, I’d been too scared to ever actually attend one. I’m not the sort of person who yearns for...

Review: ‘Radio Golf’ at Hard Bargain Players

Radio Golf, expertly directed by Terry Spann, and written by the late, esteemed playwright August Wilson, is a powerful study of Black men with two different approaches to progressing in a country...

In the Moment: ‘Jelly’s Last Jam’ at Signature Theatre

What a way to blast open the new theater season. So take your seat at Signature’s bold, daring, muscular production of a tale about race and music, Jelly’s Last Jam. The 1992 musical is a journey into...

Film Review: ‘Anthropoid’

Operation Anthropoid was the code name for a mission planned by Czech government-in-exile with the British SOE to assassinate Reinhard Heydrich, who was the head of the SS and a primary logistical...

2016 FringeNYC Review: ‘Till Birnam Wood’

Philadelphia’s John Schultz brings an immersive sensory experience to FringeNYC with Till Birnam Wood, an original adaptation of Macbeth. Already a hit in the 2014 and 2015 Philly Fringe Festivals,...

An Interview With ‘My Favorite Husbands’ Playwright Andrew Marvel-Playing at GayFest! 2016 in Philadelphia

Just when the US is in a political freefall, with Trump and Clinton battling it out, while Stein and Johnson are waiting in the wings, Playwright Andrew Marvel opens a Pandora’s box with Gay...

Review: Matt Nathanson and Phillip Phillips at Wolf Trap

A few years ago, I asked to review Gavin Degraw at Wolf Trap. I had loved his music for years, and was anxiously awaiting his turn for the stage when his co-headliner, a man named Matt Nathanson – who...

Review: The Silk Road Ensemble with Yo-Yo Ma at Wolf Trap

A high school teacher of mine used to say that there are two universal languages in the world. One is math; the other is music. Simply stated at the time, its message has echoed through my life in...

Review: ‘Jelly’s Last Jam’ at Signature Theatre

The early days of American jazz come fully back to life in Signature Theatre’s Jelly’s Last Jam. But if the notion of spending two hours in the dark watching something historical sounds boring — not...

Review: ‘The Lonesome West’ at The Keegan Theatre

The Keegan Theatre’s current and provocatively darkly comic production of Martin McDonagh’s The Lonesome West, written by the brilliant, raffish and audacious Irish playwright (The Beauty Queen of...

A Preview of ‘Radio Golf’ Which Opens This Friday, August 12th @8PM at Hard Bargain Players

Radio Golf was August Wilson’s last play and was completed in 2005. I came across it about 8 years ago which was right around the time the United States was about to elect its first African American...

Review: The Band Perry at Wolf Trap With Jordan Rager

Pioneers and Comeback Kids – an Evening with The Band Perry The cowboy hats came out to play at Wolf Trap’s Filene Center on August 7, welcoming The Band Perry to Vienna, Va. The trio, comprised of...

Review: ‘Seth MacFarlane and The Great American Songbook’ with NSO at Wolf Trap

Like many people my age, I’ve been a fan of Seth MacFarlane’s work for some time. Creator of hugely successful shows Family Guy and American Dad!, his list of accolades is impressive– and exhaustive!...

Review: ‘Fear’ at Longacre Lea

Let’s say a wealthy patron approaches an ensemble theatre company with a proposition: “Shakespeare? Why so much Shakespeare? Why so revered? Surely, other playwrights deserve having theatre companies...

Review: ‘Tommy and Me’ at Theatre Exile in Philadelphia

About halfway through Ray Didinger’s new play Tommy and Me, one of the characters mentions Joe Kuharich. On the night I attended the play, the audience responded with a round of derisive laughter. So,...

Review: ‘The Wizard of Oz’ at Zemfira Stage

You may ask yourself why anyone would want to see The Wizard of Oz one more time, especially a semi-professional theatrical production at a county rec center, when you can pick up the MGM movie...

Review: ‘Nine’ at Wildwood Summer Theatre

What do you get with a cast of 1 artistic film director plus 10 beautiful ladies? Nope, not eleven, it’s Nine! Presented by Wildwood Summer Theatre, composed by Maury Yeston, written by Arthur Kopit,...

Review: ‘The Turn of the Screw’ at Annapolis Shakespeare Company

This staged reading of Henry James’ story proves that a small, scaled-down production can produce chills and suspense; all it takes is a good script, excellent direction, and two talented actors....

Review: ‘Heathers’ at Red Branch Theatre Company

High school can be rough on anyone, but in Heathers it’s murder. The well-mounted area premiere at Red Branch Theatre Company shows that the 1989 movie, which poked fun at making the grade in grade...

Review: ‘Hoax’ at Maryland Art Place

Hoax is the latest collaboration between playwright Annelise Montone and actor/magician Brian M. Kehoe. Montone and Kehoe also starred in the production, and Deirdre McAllister was the consulting...

Review: ‘Anything Goes’ at Other Voices Theatre

Other Voices Theatre’s production of Anything Goes is nothing short of spectacular. Of course, the marriage of the legendary Cole Porter’s music and lyrics, the book by P.G. Wodehouse and Guy Bolton,...

Review: ‘Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone’ in Concert at The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra at Strathmore

Lights, music, and… magic! Last night the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra brought Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone, the first film of the beloved franchise, to the Strathmore stage in this latest...

Review: ‘Fool for Love’ at Princeton Summer Theater in Princeton, NJ

Fool for Love is a pretty short play, and its plot isn’t especially complex: A couple of longtime lovers with a volatile history meet to battle again in a seedy motel room in the Mojave Desert. They...

Review: ‘The Producers’ at Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre

Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre’s production of The Producers is a delightfully hilarious romp, at once a satire on Broadway musicals and a loving tribute to them. With a book by Mel Brooks and Thomas...

Review: ‘Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat’ at New Millennium Productions in Egg Harbor City, NJ

Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat, with music by Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyrics by Tim Rice, is presented by New Millennium Production Company, a summer theater program of the Greater Egg...

Behind the Scenes of ‘Breathing Under Dirt’ at Lower Shore Performing Arts Company: Part 1: Playwright Michael O’Leary

In Part One of a series of three interviews taking you behind the scenes of Lower Shore Performing Arts Company‘s production of Breathing Under Dirt, meet Playwright Michael O’Leary. Although the...

Review: ‘The Little Mermaid’ at Glyndon Area Players

Look at it all, look how it gleams! Glyndon Area Players’ (GAP) 2016 production of Disney’s The Little Mermaid is certainly somewhere beyond my wildest dreams! Playing through this Sunday, August 7th...

Review: ‘The Trump Card’ at Woolly Mammoth Theatre Company

Mike Daisey knew full well why we came out to see The Trump Card. We were out for “red meat.” We wanted to hear Mike Daisey tear Donald Trump to shreds. We wanted to see Mike kick his ass! And he did....

Interviews With The Playwrights of the Philadelphia Women’s Theatre Festival 2016-Opening Tonight 8/3/16 and Playing Through Sunday 8/7/16

The Philadelphia Women’s Theatre Festival 2016 (PWTF) opens tonight, August 3rd and runs through this Sunday, August 7, 2016. It offers the following Staged Readings, introducing Philadelphia to...

Review: ‘The Gold’ at the New York Musical Festival in NYC

For Houston plastic surgeon Dr. Philip Yosowitz, the story he weaves in The Gold, a fictional history of the impact the Holocaust had on one extended family of German Jews, is very personal. His own...

Review: ‘Twelfth Night’ at Prince George’s Shakespeare in the Parks

In his program notes, Director Christopher Dwyer states there are good reasons why Shakespeare’s play have stood the test of time, and “one is that the stories are so rich and accessible,” and such is...

Review: ‘Oliver!’ at the Sterling Playmakers

The Sterling Playmakers have put their unique twist on the musical Oliver!, based on Charles Dickens’ Oliver Twist. Oliver! has music, lyrics, and a book by Lionel Bart. Co-Directors Ashley Kinney and...

Ray Didinger and Joe Canuso Kick Off ‘Tommy and Me’ at Theatre Exile in Philadelphia

When award-winning sportswriter and radio-show host Ray Didinger was a kid, he never could have imagined that he’d end up helping his boyhood hero, wide receiver Tommy McDonald, be inducted into the...

Review: ‘BSO: The Music of David Bowie’ at the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall

The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra (BSO) honored the remarkable career and personality of glam rock icon David Bowie with a spectacular tribute production: The Music of David Bowie, featuring the late...

Review: ‘Love’s Labour’s Lost’ at Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival in Center Valley, PA

The new production of Love’s Labour’s Lost at Pennsylvania Shakespeare Festival continues a tradition the festival began several summers ago of creating a production in a fashion similar to the way...

Review: ‘Tick, Tick…BOOM!’ at Spotlighters

Tick, Tick…BOOM!, as directed and choreographed by Jillian Locklear Bauersfeld, and with Book, Music and Lyrics by the late Jonathan Larson, was an insightful semi-autobiographical and musical...

Review: ‘On the Road Again’ at Act II Playhouse in Ambler, PA

“Why, oh, why do the wrong people travel When the right people stay at home.” From Sail Away by Noel Coward This opening lyric sets the tone for On the Road Again, a cabaret show written and performed...

Review: ‘A Class Act’ at New World Stages in NYC

As a practicing trial and class-action lawyer for 46 years, playwright Norman Shabel has seen the American legal system from the inside, and it isn’t pretty. He draws on that first-hand experience for...

Review: A Fully Staged Reading of ‘My Fair Lady’ at Annapolis Shakespeare Company

It is not easy to reinvent the wheel let alone attempt it, but that is exactly what the ambitious Annapolis Shakespeare Company has done, with generally fine results, in its fully staged reading of...

Nibbles and Sips Around Town: Ashlar at the Morrison House ~ The Return of The Majestic ~ True Food in the Mosaic District ~ Author Luncheons at the Hay Adams ~ Edible Flowers Decorate the Plate

Swank Modern Interior and New Chef Dazzle at the Morrison House At long last the Morrison House the elegant boutique hotel in Old Town, Alexandria has shed its dowdy decor to feature a snazzy redo by...

Review: ‘Unforgettable Hits’ at Steel River Playhouse, in Pottstown, PA.

Atlantic City came to the Philadelphia area last night and it was a rare treat. Those who primarily know Rebecca Shoemaker and Michael McGeehan from their videos from Caesar’s Palace or their CDs or...

Review: ‘A Few Good Men’ at Off the Quill

Fresh off their DCMTA “Best of Capital Fringe 2016” production Timon 2016, Off the Quill (OTQ) brings a faithful adaptation of Aaron Sorkin’s 1992 film to the Greenbelt Arts Center that stands on its...