Romance in wartime is a familiar topic of musicals, but few are as emotionally wrenching or politically charged as Miss Saigon. Controversial when it first arrived on Broadway in 1991 – more for its casting choices than its themes – the show has gotten beyond that cultural authenticity issue and beyond a fixation with its onstage helicopter to demonstrate its lasting … [Read more...]
Maltz cast shines in Simon’s ‘Brighton Beach Memoirs’
There has never been, and in all likelihood will never be, an American playwright as commercially successful as the late Neil Simon. From his Broadway debut in 1961 with Come Blow Your Horn, he has convulsed audiences in laughter season after season. But it wasn’t until 22 years later, with Brighton Beach Memoirs, that he eased up on his joke reflex, explored his own … [Read more...]
Lead performances lift iffy ‘Funny Thing’ at Primal Forces
When you grow up the daughter of cartoonist-playwright Jules Feiffer, the purveyor of comic urban neuroses, some of that has to rub off on you. So it has for Halley Feiffer, who juggled humor and anger in I’m Gonna Pray for You So Hard (seen two seasons back at GableStage) and, to a lesser extent in A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Gynecologic Oncology Unit at … [Read more...]
At Theatre Lab, quirky ‘Glass Piano’ intrigues
Legend has it that a Princess Alexandra of Bavaria once ingested – or believed she ingested – a grand piano made of glass. Intrigued by the notion, playwright Alix Sobler has turned it into a fairy tale for adults, The Glass Piano, now receiving its U.S. premiere at Florida Atlantic University’s Theatre Lab. There is much to like about the play and its production, even if, … [Read more...]
Delray Playhouse takes loving look at Rodgers and Hammerstein
By Dale King Some Enchanted Evening is a celebration honoring one of the most noted and notable duos in the history of the American musical — Richard Rodgers and Oscar Hammerstein II. Delray Beach Playhouse has dusted off the show conceived 37 years ago by Jeffrey Moss. The assortment of tunes from Rodgers & Hammerstein’s best shows – and a few of their duds – was first … [Read more...]
Cerebral ‘Skylight’ rewarding at Dramaworks
With British playwright David Hare, we are rarely far removed from political debate. But with his justifiably acclaimed 1995 play Skylight, the political merges deftly with the personal, a head trip grafted onto an emotional tug-of-war, as two former lovers attempt to rekindle what they once had together from the ashes of an affair gone cold. Tom and Kyra are a study in … [Read more...]
‘Diego and Drew’: An amusing dinner party at Broward Center
In 1988, a small interactive stage show, Tony ‘n’ Tina’s Wedding, a send-up of Italian nuptial rituals, opened in New York and grew into an international phenomenon. Building on the theater-as-party notion, two area theater pros, Matt May and Jennifer Sierra-Grobbelaar, have added a couple of topical twists to the formula – same-sex marriage and cross-cultural clashes – … [Read more...]
Slow Burn manages to sell second-rate, tuneless ‘Groundhog Day’
You have to admire the dedication of Slow Burn Theatre to revive musicals that got insufficient love on Broadway. (Yes, we’re looking at you Big Fish, Side Show and Parade.) Still, you have to also accept, no matter how well the company performs them, some of these shows are simply subpar. Which brings us to Groundhog Day, the stage adaptation of the 1993 Bill Murray … [Read more...]
Playwright’s ‘Glass Piano,’ at FAU Theatre Lab, offers a fairy tale of anxiety
Theatergoers will have to take a leap of faith with playwright Alix Sobler and her play The Glass Piano, about to have its U.S. premiere at FAU Theatre Lab in Boca Raton. It concerns a Princess Alexandra, who either did, or believes she did, ingest a glass piano when she was a child. Ever since, she has lived a cautious life knowing the piano could break into tiny shards … [Read more...]
Hare’s ‘Skylight’: When politics polarizes passion
David Hare, one of Great Britain’s most acclaimed playwrights, is known for juggling the personal and the political in his works. That balancing act is particularly evident in his 1995 drama Skylight, a reunion of two former lovers from opposite sides of the political spectrum, being revived by Palm Beach Dramaworks beginning Friday. Although set in the days … [Read more...]