The three one-act playlets of Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite have two things in common. They all take place in Suite 719 of New York’s swank Plaza Hotel and they all have a jaundiced view of marriage. OK, two more things. They each run a little too long for their own good and they each feel a little outdated in 2024. Plaza Suite hails from 1968, the fourth play by … [Read more...]
Simon’s ‘Plaza Suite’ not just for laughs, Maltz director says
You might think when the Maltz Jupiter Theatre takes a break from its usual musical menu to produce a comedy like Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite that the task is easier. Not so, says director J. Barry Lewis, the Maltz’s go-to guy when it comes to staging Simon’s plays. “They’re always a challenge, there’s no doubt about it,” he says. “It’s one of the oldest sayings in the … [Read more...]
No weak links in powerful ‘Osage County’ at Dramaworks
How fortunate for playwright Tracy Letts that he grew up in a bitter, vindictive and addiction-prone household. For his relatives became the inspiration for the Westons of Pawhuska, Oklahoma, in his Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning August: Osage County, a darkly dramatic and often quite funny look at his wildly dysfunctional family. The three-and-a-half-hour, … [Read more...]
Dramaworks explores dysfunctional family in ‘August: Osage County’
Often compared to Eugene O’Neill’s Long Day’s Journey into Night, Tracy Letts’s August: Osage County is an exploration of yet another dysfunctional family, an epic play that also was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. It premiered in 2007 at Chicago’s Steppenwolf Theatre, where Letts is a company member and resident playwright. It quickly transferred to Broadway, … [Read more...]
2019’s Top 10 in theater: ‘Streetcar’ stands out
It was an odd year at the theater in South Florida. Try as I might to include them in the year’s best, two of the region’s most reliable companies – Maltz Jupiter Theatre and GableStage – failed to make the cut of the top 10. Nor did Broward Stage Door, but that is less surprising, since the organization folded in March, after 25 years of operation and eight months after … [Read more...]
First-rate performances carry Dramaworks’ stirring ‘Streetcar’
One could argue whether A Streetcar Named Desire is Tennessee Williams’ finest play. After all, there are so many of them to choose among. But there is no denying that fragile Southern belle Blanche DuBois and her brutish brother-in-law Stanley Kowalski are two of his greatest characters. The evidence is very much on view now at Palm Beach Dramaworks, where the lyrical … [Read more...]
Actors ready to ride Williams’ iconic ‘Streetcar’ for Dramaworks
Of the many plays by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Thomas Lanier “Tennessee” Williams, A Streetcar Named Desire is considered his most popular work and, arguably, his best. “I think it’s one of the most brilliantly constructed plays I’ve ever been able to work on,” says Kathy McCafferty, who will be playing Southern belle Blanche DuBois at Palm Beach Dramaworks, … [Read more...]
Dramaworks’s ‘Little Foxes’ a showcase for powerful performances
Is it just me or do most plays produced these days – even those written long ago – seem to echo our current political situation? Neither the family in uneasy economic straits in The Humans nor the tale of a business bully who goes to Washington in Born Yesterday actually mention Donald Trump by name, but it is hard to watch either and not think of The Orange One. The same … [Read more...]