a new york-based theater blog
In All the Way, playwright Robert Schenkkan followed LBJ through his first year in office: the accidental presidency, the landslide victory against Goldwater, and the passage of the Civil Rights Act of 1964. In its sequel, The Great Society, he picks up right where he left off: battling with Martin Luther King (Grantham Coleman) and […]
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Once again, Edmond Rostand’s enduring comic tragedy Cyrano de Bergerac has been adapted into a musical. Writer and director Erica Schmidt—who was responsible for last season’s stellar, thrilling adaptation of Mac Beth—has rid the famous wit of his elongated nose. Instead, Cyrano (Peter Dinklage) is simply less attractive that his fellow cadet, Christian (Blake Jenner), […]
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The brash and unapologetic Bella Abzug has a personality primed for cultural reproduction. As yet, however, the congresswoman from New York has not secured the kind of legacy enjoyed by her fellow National Women’s Political Caucus co-founders Fannie Lou Hamer, Betty Friedan, Shirley Chisholm, and Gloria Steinem. The actor and playwright Harvey Fierstein attempts to […]
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The stage is in the round, with some audience members sitting right up next to the performers. When one of the cast speaks, the remaining six sit and watch, rapt. Each of their dresses (created by Toni-Leslie James) is printed with the face of a female relative, blurring the distinction between their lives and their […]
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Soft Power, the new musical by David Henry Hwang, is about sixteen different shows stuffed into one, so bear with me here. It begins with the playwright himself (Francis Jue), who is approached by Xūe Xíng (Conrad Ricamora), the President for North America of Dragon Entertainment Group, to adapt the Chinese comedy Jiāng Cuò Jiù […]
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Wheeler (a terrific Ian Barford) is a fifty-year-old divorcée with a new apartment and old problems. Caustic and snobby, he is the kind of character that male writers have been fashioning for centuries: a failed artist and a hopeless womanizer whose self-hatred works to defuse any outside criticism. Additionally, Wheeler loathes Trump and reads Michelle […]
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On the night she conceives, Serafina Delle Rose (Marisa Tomei) wakes up with a burning sensation on her breast. It was a “pain like a needle,” she tells a friend, “quick, quick, hot little stitches.” When she undresses, Serafina sees her husband’s rose tattoo on her own chest: a sign that they are going to […]
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