David Roberts

Off-Broadway Short Review: “Grangeville” at the Pershing Square Signature Center’s Alice Griffen Jewel Box Theatre (Closed Sunday, March 23, 2025)

Two half-brothers half a world apart face the decline of their mother in Samuel D. Hunter’s “Grangeville” currently on at The Pershing Square Signature Center’s Alice Griffen Jewel Box Theatre. The mood of the conversations between forty-something Arnold (Brian J. Smith) who lives in Rotterdam and his older half-brother Jerry (Paul Sparks) who still lives in Grangeville, Idaho range from…

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Off-Broadway Review: “Liberation” Misses the Mark at the Laura Pels Theatre in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre (Closed Sunday, March 30, 2025)

There is nothing about liberation, nor is there anything liberating in Bess Wohl’s “Liberation” currently running at the Laura Pels Theatre in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre. There is gratuitous and unnecessary nudity on stage that requires patrons to relinquish their phones before entering the theater. That nudity is completely unnecessary: the questions raised about the characters’…

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Off-Broadway Review: “Curse of the Starving Class” at The Pershing Square Signature Center’s Romulus Linney Courtyard Theater (Closed Sunday, April 6, 2025)

Sam Shephard’s iconic 1977 “Curse of the Starving Class” is enjoying its second revival production at The Pershing Square Signature Center. The 2019 Terry Kinney revival (also at Pershing Square Signature Center) starred Maggie Siff and David Warshofsky as Ella and Weston. The current revival, directed by Scott Elliott and starring Calista Flockhart as Ella and Christian Slater as Weston,…

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Off-Broadway Review: “The Antiquities” at Playwrights Horizons (Closed Sunday, March 2, 2025)

February 21, 2025 | Dance, mcneal, News, Off-Broadway, Previews, purpose > | "The Antiquities", Amelia Workman, Andrew Garman, Ann James (Intimacy Coordinator and Sensitivity Specialist), Aria Shahghasemi, Brenda Abbandandolo (Costume Designer), Caitlin Sullivan, Christopher Darbassie (Sound Designer), Cindy Cheung, David Roberts, Erin Gioia Albrecht (Production Stage Manager), Goodman Theatre, Jeremy Chernick (SFX Consultant), Jordan Harrison, Julius Rinzel, Kayla Uribe (Assistant Stage Manager), Kristen Sieh, Layan Elwazani, Leah Loukas (Wig and Hair Designer), Marchánt Davis, New York Theatre Reviews, Paul Steinberg (Scenic Designer), Playwrights Horizons, Ryan Spahn, Sarah Lunnie (Dramaturg), Theatre Reviews, Theatre Reviews Limited, Tyler Micoleau (Lighting Designer), Vineyard Theatre

The full title of “The Antiquities” currently running at Playwrights Horizons is “A Tour of the Permanent Collection in the Museum of the Late Human Antiquities.” The title contains two important pairs of words: “Permanent Collection” and “Late Human.” The play begins at some point in the far distant future with two museum docents W1 (Aria Shahghasemi) and W2 (Amelia…

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Broadway Review: “Cult of Love” at the Helen Hayes (Closed Sunday, February 2, 2025)

The title of Leslye Headland’s “Cult of Love” at the Helen Hayes demands attention. The Dahl family cult began in childhood: Diana (Shailene Woodley), Evie (Rebecca Henderson), Johnny (Christopher Sears), and Mark (Zachary Quinto) attended church faithfully with conservative Christian parents Ginny (Mare Cunningham) and Bill (David Rasche), vacationed annually at Big Meadows Lodge in Shenandoah National Park, never slept…

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Broadway Review: “Eureka Day” at Manhattan Theatre Club’s Samuel J. Friedman Theatre (Closed Sunday, February 16, 2025)

What could go wrong at a private school whose five-member board of directors makes all decisions based on consensus and has what benefitted the community at heart as their guiding principle. A board so committed to inclusion that The Eureka Day School in Berkeley, California’s cultural identity drop-down menu for prospective parents offers eleven choices. And if Eli (an oblivious…

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Off-Broadway Review: The New Group’s “Babe” at The Pershing Square Signature Center’s Alice Griffin Jewel Box Theater (Closed Sunday, December 22, 2024)

Abby (Marisa Tomei) has co-produced records with Gus (Arliss Howard) for thirty-two years. She had been his right hand, but her name never appears on the album as co-producer. She finds talent. Gus takes the credit. Recognition is not the only problem. Gus is a misogynist and a prime example of toxic masculinity in the workplace and elsewhere. Abby colludes…

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Off-Broadway Review: “The Blood Quilt” at Lincoln Center Theater’s Mitze E. Newhouse Theater (Closed on Sunday, December 29, 2024)

Families of any number, age, or culture often meet for special occasions, some more special than others. Depending on the mix of those above descriptors, these get-togethers result in quite different outcomes ranging from collegial to catastrophic. These gatherings can be around any number of holidays or around some specific tradition. Those celebrating a specific tradition are often annual events….

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Broadway Review: “Sunset Blvd.” at the St. James Theatre (Closed on Sunday, July 20, 2025)

December 11, 2024 | Broadway, Music, sunset > | "Sunset Blvd.", Adam Fisher (sound design), Alan Williams (music supervisor and music director), Andrew Lloyd Webber, Ann James (intimacy coordinator), Brandon Mel Borkowsky, Caroline Bowman, Cheryl Thomas (hair and makeup design), Christopher Hampton, Cydney Clark, David Roberts, David Thaxton, Diego Andres Rodriguez, Don Black, Drew Redington, E.J. Hamilton, Emma Lloyd, Fabian Aloise (choreography), Grace Hodgett Young, Hannah Yun Chamberlain, Jack Knowles (lighting design), Jamie Lloyd, Jim Carnahan CSA and Jason Thinger CSA (U.S. casting director), Jimin Moon, Johnny Milani (production stage manager), Justice Moore, Mandy Gonzalez, Marc Brenner, Nathan Amzi and Joe Ransom (video design and cinematography), New York Theatre Reviews, Nicole Scherzinger, Olivia Lacie Andrews, Pierre Marais, Raúl Contreras, Shavey Brown, Shayna McPherson, Soutra Gilmour (set and costume design), St. James Theatre, Stuart Burt CDG (U.K. casting director), Sydney Jones, Theatre Reviews, Theatre Reviews Limited, Tom Francis, Tyler Davis

Gone are the turban, the grand staircase, the jewels, the chandeliers, the drapes, and the viewing of Norma Desmond’s monkey in the reimagining of “Sunset Blvd.” currently running at the St. James Theatre. Norma Desmond (an incandescent Nicole Scherzinger), Max Von Mayerling (a devoted and doting David Thaxton), Joe Gillis (a failed and still failing Tom Francis), and Betty Schafer…

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Broadway Review: “Swept Away” at the Longacre Theatre (Closed Sunday, December 29, 2025)

December 3, 2024 | Broadway, ghosts, Music > | "Swept Away", Adrian Blake, Alexandre Bleau, Brandon Kalm, Cameron Johnson, Chase Peacock, costume designer Susan Hilferty, David Neumann, David Roberts, David Rowen, Hunter Brown, Jillian Cimini, Jim Carnahan, John Gallagher Jr., John Logan, John Michael Finley, John Sygar, Josh Breckenridge, lighting designer Kevin Adams, Matt DeAngelis, Michael J. Mainwaring, Michael Mayer, music arranger and orchestrator Chris Miller, music arranger and orchestrator/music supervisor Brian Usifer, music director Will Van Dyke, New York Theatre Reviews, Orville Mendoza, Rico LeBron, Robert Pendilla, set designer Rachel Hauck, sound designer John Shivers, Stark Sands, The Avett Brothers, The Longacre Theatre, Theatre Reviews, Theatre Reviews Limited, Tyrone L. Robinson, Wayne Duvall

“Swept Away,” currently on at the Longacre Theatre, was inspired by the 2004 album “Mignonette” by the American folk-rock band The Avett Brothers. Although the album was suggested by the shipwreck and survival story of the British yacht Mignonette, which sank in 1884, the narrative of the musical transcends time and space with its timeless themes of confession, forgiveness, redemption, transfiguration,…

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