On Tuesday May 14, the SoHo Playhouse hosted a talkback following the performance of the critically acclaimed “The Drawer Boy” by Michael Healey. The topic of the talkback was “The Making and Fate of Off-Broadway.” Ironically, just two days following the talkback on May 16, The SoHo Playhouse and Artistic Director Darren Lee Cole announced the premature closing of “Drawer…
On the surface, “Basilica” is about choices gone awry: Father Gil (Alfredo Narcisco) chooses to return to his hometown to pastor the Basilica of the National Shrine of Our Lady Of San Juan del Vale in San Juan, Texas; despite the admonition from Lela Garza, his high school sweetheart, the good Father chooses to make a connection with Ray Garza…
Lifeboat Ethics collides with and colludes with evolutionary theory’s “survival of the fittest” and places the audience adrift in a moral sea in Mike Bartlett’s “Bull” currently playing at 59E59 Theater B. On the surface, “Bull” seems to be about office downsizing drama. Tony’s (Adam James) team of two – Isabel (Eleanor Matsuura) and Thomas (Sam Troughton) – are a…
I do not care if that day arrives/That dream need never be, If the ship I sing doesn’t also bring/My own true love to me, If the ship I sing doesn’t also bring my own true love to me. “My Ship” (from “Lady in the Dark”) by Kurt Weill and Ira Gershwin Music has given humankind strength, hope, and courage…
“After the ball is over/After the break of morn After the dancers’ leaving/After the stars are gone Many a heart is aching/If you could read them all Many the hopes that have vanished/After the ball.” “After the Ball,” Charles K. Harris (1892) A group of brave and talented women left hearts aching after their performances: aching men’s hearts; aching women’s…
Oscar Wilde’s belief that “Life imitates art, more than art imitates life” was confirmed during the performance of Jill Campbell’s “Chemistry of Love” currently playing at the La MaMa First Floor Theatre. As the cast struggled on stage to make sense of Ms. Campbell’s script about the meaning of making art and how the making of art counterpoints with the…
Things fall apart (Chinua Achebe) and the center sometimes just does not hold (W. B. Yeats). For Hannah (Hannah Cabell) and David (Elliot Villar) the center fails when the collapse of the I-35W Mississippi River Bridge in 2007 sends David’s car into the river (almost drowning) and the so-called Global Financial Crisis of 2008 threatens Hannah’s position at her law…
“Which of us has known his brother? Which of us has looked into his father’s heart? Which of us has not remained forever prison-pent? Which of us is not forever a stranger and alone?” – Thomas Wolfe, “Look Homeward Angel” Being strangers in a strange land and being forever alone haunt the six intriguing characters in Elisabeth Gray’s “Southern Discomfort”…
“I’ve looked at clouds from both sides now from up and down and still somehow/ It’s cloud’s illusion I recall, I really don’t know clouds at all. I’ve looked at love from both sides now from give and take and still somehow/ It’s love’s illusion I recall I really don’t know love at all. I’ve looked at life from both…
Sometime success comes in simple packages. A successful new musical needs interesting characters; these characters need engaging conflicts; the action of the musical needs to take place in a variety of inviting settings; and, finally, the plot driven by the conflicts must feature important themes. Donna Moore’s “Cougar the Musical,” currently running at St. Luke’s Theatre in Manhattan, addresses all…