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  Theatre in Review: Side Effects (MCC/Lucille Lortel Theatre)
Marital meltdowns are a dime a dozen in the modern drama, which is one reason I approached Side Effects with something less than enthusiasm. Another reason is that Michael Weller's last effort for MCC, Fifty Words< ...
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Theatre in Review: All's Well That Ends Well (Shakespeare in the Park)
So many times, when writing about productions of Shakespeare, we fault the director, saying, in effect, that he or she isn't worthy of our greatest playwright. In the case of the current revival of All's Well That Ends Well ...
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Theatre in Review: Unnatural Acts (Classic Stage Company)
In 2002, Amit Paley, a student reporter at Harvard, discovered in the university's archive a set of suppressed documents that proved to be a treasure trove of scandal; they related to the history of a "secret court" convened in 1920 to ...
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Theatre in Review: Lysistrata Jones (Transport Group/The Gym at Judson)
Every once in a while, a show comes along that reminds us there are no new ideas in the world - no good ones, anyway. A good example is Lysistrata Jones. On the surface, it's a fast, funny, fizzy entertainment, populated by ...
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Theatre in Review: The Illusion (Signature Theatre)
A great deal of effort has been expended -- successfully so -- to create an aura of magic around The Illusion, Tony Kushner's adaptation of a Pierre Corneille comic fantasy. Christine Jones' set is a box ...
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Theatre in Review: One Arm (The New Group/Theatre Row)
So far, the Tennessee Williams centennial year has yielded little more than a series of curios and oddities -- among them a very low-budget version of the early-'70s barroom confessional Small Craft Warnings and The Wooster ...
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Theatre in Review: The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World (Playwrights Horizons)
A parent bent on show business glory at any price. Talentless young girls who are made to perform against their wills. And, when fame arrives, it does so in a wholly unexpected, not entirely welcome form. What -- another revival of Gyp ...
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Theatre in Review: A Little Journey (Mint Theatre)
Whenever the Mint Theatre has a success, we congratulate the company's artistic director, Jonathan Bank, for discovering another lost gem from some remote corner of the theatrical bookshelf. But maybe it's time to start ...
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Theatre in Review: Cradle and All (Manhattan Theatre Club/New York City Center Stage I)
Kids -- can't live with them, can't live without them. That's the message of Cradle and All, which examines the contrasting discontents of childlessness and parenthood, with mixed success. The playwright, Daniel Goldfarb< ...
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Theatre in Review: I Married Wyatt Earp< (Prospect Theatre Company and New York Theatre Barn/59E59)
Walter Kerr once described a certain misbegotten musical as "a bad idea gone wrong." It's the perfect description for I Married Wyatt Earp, in which some talented people have made some very strange decisions, resulting in ...
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Theatre in Review: How and Why I Robbed My First Cheese Store (The Forty Hour Club/La MaMa E.T.C.)
How and Why I Robbed My First Cheese Store is the title of Mike Gorman's new play, but it's also the title of a play in Mike Gorman's new play. The first 15 minutes or so introduces us to the artistic director ...
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Theatre in Review: The Best is Yet to Come: The Music of Cy Coleman (59E59)
Cy Coleman was Broadway's jazzman. Yes, he wrote all sorts of music for his dozen or so Broadway shows -- country ballads, torch songs, even a mock operetta -- but what he is most likely to be remembered for is how, working of ...
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Theatre in Review: Knickerbocker (The Public Theater)
"Are you ready?" These are the first words spoken in Knickerbocker, and not for the last time. They are spoken by Jerry, the protagonist, who, in six months or so, will become a father. "Well, if you don't feel ready, how ...
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Theatre in Review: Lucky Guy (Little Shubert Theatre)
In a recent interview, Leslie Jordan, one of the stars of Lucky Guy, reported that the show was, in fact, written 30 years ago. This is really surprising -- after all, most of the jokes in Lucky Guy are two ...
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Theatre in Review: A Minister's Wife (Lincoln Center Theatre/Mitzi E. Newhouse Theatre)
I hate to have to point out the obvious, but not every play must be made into a musical. This goes double for the plays of George Bernard Shaw. Consider the case of A Minister's Wife, adapted from Shaw's Candida, and ...
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Theatre in Review: Baby, It's You! (Broadhurst Theatre)
I am not one of those musical theatre fans who reflexively hate the jukebox musical. I don't love the format, mind you, but I accept that time marches on and, in certain circumstances, such as Mamma Mia! and Jersey Boys , ...
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Theatre in Review: Carson McCullers Talks About Love (Rattlestick Theatre)
Carson McCullers Talks About Love isn't the worst thing I've seen this season, but it is surely one of the oddest. Basically a cabaret act served up without the cocktails, it features the singer Suzanne Vega ...
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Theatre in Review: Future Anxiety (The Flea Theatre)
Things aren't looking good in Future Anxiety. Set in the not-too-distant future, it depicts a world that has basically gone to hell in a hand basket. The US economy has collapsed, removing all social services; dead bodies ...
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Theatre in Review: The Normal Heart (Golden Theatre)
There are, I am sure, more finely written or elegantly constructed plays in town than The Normal Heart, but if a single production comes near to matching its sheer pile-driver force, I don't know about it. Larry Kramer
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Theatre in Review: Born Yesterday (Cort Theatre)
If you haven't made the acquaintance of Nina Arianda, what are you waiting for?
Having made a stunning, out-of-left-field Off Broadway debut last season in Venus in Furs, she now makes an equally impressive Broadway bow ...
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