Nine years after he made his Broadway debut with the wisecracking Come Blow Your Horn, long after he was proclaimed the commercial theater’s reigning king of comedy, Neil Simon made a drastic tonal shift with the darkly dramatic The Gingerbread Lady. This tale of an alcoholic nymphomaniac and her emotionally needy friends did have glimmers of the serious Simon of his later … [Read more...]
Appreciation: The enduring wit of Neil Simon
The first time I met and interviewed Neil Simon he was not in any mood to be funny. It was January 1991, in Washington, D.C., where he was for the out-of-town premiere of Lost in Yonkers, a dark comedy about two brothers forced to live with their crotchety grandmother while their salesman father went on the road to make a living. The play went on to great acclaim … [Read more...]
Broward Stage Door’s ‘Sunshine Boys’ a late-summer gem
By Dale King Broward Stage Door Theater has plucked a gem from the Neil Simon vault – the playwright’s paean to vaudeville, The Sunshine Boys – and presents it like a shiny, late-summer gift to welcoming audiences at the Margate performance venue. Director Michael Leeds, who has helmed an arm’s length list of shows at the theater on Sample Road, taps a couple of veteran … [Read more...]
Community theater: ‘Odd Couple’ still works at Delray Playhouse
By Dale King Just Google “The Odd Couple” and you’ll find that Neil Simon’s 1965 comedy is still being produced for television. It’s the seventh screen incarnation for Simon’s 52-year-old Broadway baby, an assemblage that includes a 1968 movie, a cartoon adaption and a reunion film — not to mention a female-version stage play. The current CBS sitcom stars Matthew Perry … [Read more...]