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  Theatre in Review: Oslo (Lincoln Center Theater at the Mitzi E. Newhouse)
At the exact moment when this country -- or the world, for that matter -- seems hopelessly polarized, comes J.T. Rogers' Oslo, a stunning account -- both intimate and panoramic -- of what can happen when deadly enemies ...
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Theatre in Review: Good (Potomac Theatre Project/Atlantic Theater Stage II)
Let's give the good folks at Potomac Theatre Project points for timeliness. Watching John Halder, the protagonist of Good, twist his soul into a monstrous pretzel in order to accommodate the dictates of the Nazi Party, I couldn't ...
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Theatre in Review: Liberty: A Monumental New Musical (42 West)
No matter what Donald Trump says, musical theatre writers love immigrants. And why not? The story of the great wave of Europeans who came to America before, say, 1920 is inherently stirring, filled with the stuff that makes great theatre. ( ...
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Theatre in Review: A Midsummer Night's Dream (New York Classical Theatre)
If the Public Theater produces Shakespeare in the Park, New York Classical Theatre specializes in Shakespeare al fresco. This intrepid troupe commandeers a slice of a public park and, without benefit of stage, scenery, or sound design -- ...
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Theatre in Review: Phoenix Rising: Girls and the Secrets We Keep (Theatre Row)
The title of Laura Gosheff's new play sounds like an Eve Ensler-style all-girl confessional, and at times Phoenix Rising is reminiscent of Emotional Creature, Ensler's look at the struggles of adolescents. ...
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Theatre in Review: The Paper Hat Game (3-Legged Dog/The Tank)
How to explain the hallucinatory effect of The Paper Hat Game? Working inside a tiny toy theatre, the puppet artist Torry Bend and her creative team tell their story, conjuring up a parade of indelible Chicago city ...
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Theatre in Review: Stet (Abingdon Theatre Company/June Havoc Theatre)
Stet begins with a video clip from MSNBC; Erika, a reporter for a national magazine, is being interviewed about her blockbuster article documenting a brutal gang rape at an unnamed American university. The interviewer asks, "D ...
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Theatre in Review: The Healing (Theater Breaking Through Barriers/Theatre Row)
I've begun to think of Samuel D. Hunter as the stealth missile of playwrights; he works so quietly and seamlessly that when the dramatic explosion comes, it is always a surprise. This is certainly what happens with The Healing< ...
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Theatre in Review: The Taming of the Shrew (Delacorte Theater)
In the program notes for the new production at the Delacorte Public Theater, artistic director Oskar Eustis says that he has never before produced The Taming of the Shrew because "I have never been able to get behind the ...
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Theatre in Review: Out of the Mouths of Babes (Cherry Lane Theatre)
Practically speaking, it would be almost impossible to cast Judith Ivey and Estelle Parsons as frenemies with a complex shared past involving the same man and not get some laughs -- although playwright Israel Horovitz ...
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Theatre in Review: Confusions (Brits Off Broadway/59E59)
In "Gosforth's Fête," the funniest of Alan Ayckbourn's quintet of one-acts, a village parish event -- a sedate little do consisting of games, tea and cakes, and a speech by a local dignitary -- collapses into anarchy, thanks to news ...
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Theatre in Review: I'll Say She Is (Connelly Theatre)
Let us pause to consider the persistence of Groucho Marx. Only yesterday, I read a piece by the Chicago Tribune columnist Heidi Stevens, in which she noted that her kids considered some of her favorite films from the '80s and ...
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Theatre in Review: Hello Dillie! (Brits Off Broadway/59E59)
If you're looking for a cabaret entertainment with the fizz and bittersweet kick of a gin and tonic, consider Dillie Keane's intimate get-together at 59E59. A member of the music/comedy trio Fascinating Aida, she seems to be a ...
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Theatre in Review: You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown (York Theatre Company)
Can we invite the adults back into the room? The good people at the York Theatre Company have come up with the idea of doing the beloved musical You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown with a cast of kids -- and, I am sorry to say, ...
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Theatre in Review: Himself and Nora (Minetta Lane Theatre)
A musical about James Joyce and Nora Barnacle? As the great man himself might say, Oh, Jaysus. Not that there isn't rich material in the story of the man who wrote Ulysses and his feisty life partner. You can fairly say it is loaded ...
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Theatre in Review: The Block (Working Theater)
Working Theater has come up with an intriguing plan, assigning dedicated creative teams to come up with plays about each of New York's five boroughs. First up is Dan Hoyle's The Block, and, in many ways, it is a thing ...
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Theatre in Review: Incognito (Manhattan Theatre Club/City Center Stage I)
Incognito teems with so many people and plotlines that one's brain sometimes struggles to take them all in: For example, there's the real-life character Thomas Harvey, the pathologist who performed the autopsy on Albert ...
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Theatre in Review: Shining City (Irish Repertory Theatre)
Conor McPherson's plays are fragile things -- hothouse blooms, really -- and when it comes to their care and feeding, the Irish Rep really has the knack. I didn't see the company's acclaimed revival of The Weir, but it did ...
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Theatre in Review: Indian Summer (Playwrights Horizons)
In Indian Summer, playwright Gregory S. Moss imagines a sunny, sandy beach in Rhode Island and populates it with four characters, each in his or her own way a kind of displaced person. He organizes three of them into a ...
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Theatre in Review: A Funny Thing Happened.... (MCC Theater/Lucille Lortel Theatre)
The playwright Halley Feiffer operates under a strict policy: No prisoners will be taken. Even her titles can scald: How to Make Friends and Kill Them was a sadistic, skin-crawling exercise in mean-girl tactics. I'm Gonna ...
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