the field
At the beginning of Emily Emerson’s “The Field,” recently finishing its run at the Broadway Bound Theatre Festival at the 14th Street Y Theatre, the cornfields of Avon, Virginia are ready to be turned under by the hardworking farmers and the lives of hundreds of other hardworking women and men in the town have been “turned under” by the closure…
Beartrice Albans (a resolute and Machiavellian Lynda Gravátt) spent her life under the oppressive laws that governed people of color in the colony of Louisiana. Specifically, she was Lazare’s placée a status that allows her as a woman of color to set up common law households with a white man to circumvent legal prohibitions. Beartrice’s mother signed the papers that…
To begin by stating that Chita Rivera is a legend in her own time would be a factual compliment, but it would not do justice to all that the musical theater icon has accomplished in her exuberant career. Her talent and drive have always been evident. At fifteen years of age she auditioned for the School of American Ballet, was…
“All they need now is to find an enemy.” – Senator Walter Crane in “A Blanket of Dust” After her husband Sam was killed (murdered?) when the North Tower of the World Trade Center collapsed on September 11, 2001, Diane Crane (Angela Pierce) becomes appropriately obsessed with finding out who was responsible for the destruction of the Towers. Unconvinced that…
Outer Critics Circle, the organization of writers and commentators covering New York theater for out-of-town newspapers, national publications and other media beyond Broadway, announced today (April 24, 2018) its nominees for the 2017-18 season. Broadway’s “Come From Away” star Jenn Colella along with “The Band’s Visit” sensation Katrina Lenk presided over the (11:00 a.m.) announcement ceremony in the Oak Room…
“The best laid schemes o’ mice an’ men / Gang aft a-gley.” – “To A Mouse” by Robert Burns Despite his claim to be “quite content to keep [his] own counsel, as [he] sees fit, and leave the jibber-jabber to the riff-raff, the riff-raff,” former hangman Harry Wade (played with a menacing panache by Mark Addy) seems quite content to…
“No, Time’s only a kind of dream, Kay. If it wasn’t, it would have to destroy everything—the whole universe—and then remake it again every tenth of a second. But Time doesn’t destroy anything. It merely moves us on—in this life—from one peephole to the next.” – Alan to Kay Rebecca Taichman’s staging of “Time and the Conways,” currently running at…
“I hate that . . . cow. I hate her soft face and her solid head and her dirty yellow tag against your sweaty neck like cheap gold earrings.” – Siobhan There has been a fracas in farmer Jimmy’s shed that brings together three females in an unexpected display of power, principle, and panache. A battle ensues that leaves Siobhan’s…
The new musical “Play Like a Winner” is based on the stage play “It’s All About the Kids” by Caytha Jentis which comically explores the dark side of competitive soccer moms vying for social status in upscale suburbia. The opening musical number “Sacrifice” is sung by the company surrounding the body of the coach lying dead, center stage impaled with…
There are numerous reasons to see “Bastard Jones,” the new musical now playing at the cell, but topping the list is to purely enjoy an evening of raucous fun. Vying for that acclaimed position would be the prodigious cast that provides the farcical, sometimes titillating escapades of Tom Jones based on the irreverent novel by Henry Fielding. Next the book…