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  Theatre in Review: Wars of the Roses: Henry VI and Richard III (124 Bank Street Theater)
This unusual mash-up, taken from Shakespeare's history plays, takes two major risks -- one textual and one having to do with interpretation. Neither pays off, although the production gives one a glimpse of why, in addition to Ric ...
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Theatre in Review: Head Over Heels (Hudson Theatre)
A heartfelt question for our musical theatre makers: Doesn't anyone write characters anymore? Seemingly not; the only shows to open in the last several weeks featuring actual, recognizable human behavior have been Twelfth Night and ...
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Theatre in Review: The New One (Cherry Lane Theatre)
The New One, the latest chapter of Mike Birbiglia's life inventory, begins with a couch and ends with another couch; these two moments of repose bookend a series of events that will thoroughly upend his life. The ...
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Theatre in Review: Brecht on Brecht (Potomac Theatre Project/Atlantic Theater Stage II)
Seeing this roundup of the German playwright's greatest hits in prose, dialogue, and lyrics, I had the oddest double sensation: In some ways, Bertolt Brecht speaks directly, powerfully to this moment; in others, he couldn't seem ...
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Theatre in Review: Twelfth Night (The Public Theater at the Delacorte Theater)
Nobody sings "Hey, ho, the wind and the rain" in this Twelfth Night, although on Friday night, when I attended, the words would have been all too appropriate. The first half of the production was marked by on-and-off drizzle ...
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Theatre in Review: This Ain't No Disco (Atlantic Theater Company)
This new musical wants to take us back to those glamorous nights at Studio 54 in its Liza-Halston-Andy heyday, but the version of the legendary pleasure palace conjured here is a haunted house inhabited by the most insubstantial of shades ...
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Theatre in Review: The Pattern at Pendarvis (New Dog Theatre Company/HERE)
The Pattern at Pendarvis opens a window on an obscure and fascinating bit of twentieth-century American gay history -- and, by extension, poses a probing question about how such history is recorded. So much research has been ...
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Theatre in Review: Straight White Men (Second Stage/Helen Hayes Theater)
The poster for Straight White Men is an interesting case of truth in advertising; arguably, it gives away too much information about playwright Young Jean Lee's dramatic method. It features several of the principals ...
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Theatre in Review: Smokey Joe's Cafe (Stage 42)
There's a kind of unspoken battle of the sexes unfolding at Stage 42 these nights, and the game is handicapped in favor of the guys. The songwriters Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, whose extensive pop catalogue provides Smo ...
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Theatre in Review: My Life on a Diet (Theatre at St. Clement's)
If you're wondering whether you might enjoy Renee Taylor's at-home evening at Theatre at St. Clement's, let me give you a couple of acid-test examples.
Taylor discusses many weight-loss protocols -- a lifelong subject of ...
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Theatre in Review: The Originalist (Arena Stage/59E59)
Theatre companies can be tripped up by the exigencies of scheduling, especially when topical works are involved: Some months ago, the idea of presenting a cuddly comedy about the rabidly conservative Supreme Court justice Antonin ...
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Theatre in Review: The Possibilities/The After-Dinner Joke (PTP/NYC)
The people behind PTP/NYC, also known as the Potomac Theatre Project, are not afraid to rush in where other theatre companies fear to tread. Now in its thirty-second season, the troupe is known for its brave -- almost foolhardy -- hot ...
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Theatre in Review: The Damned (Comedie-Francaise/Park Avenue Armory)
One auteur trumps another in Ivan van Hove's adaptation of Luchino Visconti's notorious 1969 film. Although best known in this country for his inventive -- and, to my eyes, frequently willful -- interpretations of classic ...
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Theatre in Review: The Peculiar Patriot (National Black Theatre/Hi-Arts)
If you need a reason to see The Peculiar Patriot -- and I can give you several -- it is a golden opportunity to experience the work of actress/playwright/activist Liza Jessie Peterson. You may not recognize the name, ...
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Theatre in Review: Fire in Dreamland (The Public Theater)
About halfway through Rinne Groff's new play, the heroine, Kate, who has recently become besotted with filmmaking, describes her version of a cinematic sequence depicting the Dreamland fire at Coney Island. Dreamland, you should ...
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Theatre in Review: Antigone (Classical Theatre of Harlem)
For its summertime offering in Marcus Garvey Park, The Classical Theatre of Harlem presents a vividly contemporary twist on a Sophoclean tragedy. The stunning set design by Christopher Swader and Justin Swader depicts the ...
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Theatre in Review: Fiddler on the Roof (National Yiddish Theatre Folksbiene)
It is fascinating how much the context of a production can affect its impact. Joel Grey's revival of Fiddler on the Roof has its ups and downs -- more of the former than the latter, I hasten to add -- but experiencing ...
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Theatre in Review: On a Clear Day You Can See Forever (Irish Repertory Theatre)
Ever since On a Clear Day You Can See Forever, a musical about ESP and past-life regression, opened on Broadway in 1965, it has undergone more reincarnations than Shirley MacLaine. Time and again, creative teams have been ...
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Theatre in Review: Mary Page Marlowe (Second Stage Theater/Tony Kiser Theater)
Even as an addition to Tracy Letts' resume -- which, besides August: Osage County and Man from Nebraska, includes the paranoid arachnid freak-out, Bug, and the trailer-trash melodrama, Killer Joe -- ...
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Theatre in Review: Sugar in Our Wounds (Manhattan Theatre Club/City Center Stage II)
Donja R. Love, a self-described Afro-Queer playwright, may be something of a new face on the New York theatre scene, but he has big ambitions. His Love Trilogy is intended to examine queer black life at different historical moments, ...
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