Playwright Suzan-Lori Parks has more important things on her mind, but one takeaway from her 2002 Pulitzer Prize winner, Topdog/Underdog, is surely to be careful when you name your children. For their father, as a perverse joke, named his two African-American sons Lincoln and Booth. As a result, they have been pitted against each other throughout their lives and … [Read more...]
Delightful ‘Disenchanted!’ at MNM gives us straight talk, song from the princesses
As if Disney didn’t have enough trouble from the attacks by Ron DeSantis, now the various princesses from its animated feature film corral are rebelling against the Mouse Factory for the sexist stereotypes given to them. At least that is the premise of Disenchanted!, a sly satirical revue now receiving its South Florida premiere at the Kravis Center’s Rinker … [Read more...]
‘Ain’t Too Proud’: Vocally stunning bio of Temptations offers overstuffed menu
By Dale King If thoughts of Detroit are rattling around in your mind, it probably means you’re pondering one of two things --- cars or music. And if you’re hankering for some of the best rhythm and blues tunes on the planet, your destination should be the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts in West Palm Beach, where the jukebox musical, Ain’t Too Proud --- the … [Read more...]
Lake Worth Playhouse season ends with smart, energetic ‘Newsies’
By Dale King Newsies takes a high-energy, somersault-flipping, song-filled dip into a generally factual, historic event — a work stoppage involving newspaper delivery boys, called “newsies” — at the end of the 19th century. The show, a thought-provoking, entertaining and entrancing tale about industrious street kids with a genuine interest in righting wrongs — … [Read more...]
At FAU, ‘Refuge’ mines familiar migrant-tale territory, with skill, compassion and puppets
By Sharon Geltner Refuge, a new play running this month at FAU Theatre Lab, is reminiscent of Gregory Nava’s 1983 film El Norte, maybe because when it comes to immigration, little has changed. Refuge is about a girl who gets separated from her group of Mexican, Honduran and perhaps other Latin American immigrants, attempting the harrowing trek across the Texan desert. … [Read more...]
FAU Theatre Lab’s ‘Refuge’ investigates human side of immigration
This nation was built by immigrants, but you would never know it from the political brouhaha that has arisen from the current border crisis over the issue of immigration. Refuge, the saga of a young Honduran girl’s harrowing journey crossing our southern border into the inhospitable, barren land of Texas, completes Florida Atlantic University Theatre Lab’s season of … [Read more...]
Entertainer Cumming’s love of life, theater keeps his career soaring
Although he grew up in Scotland speaking the King’s English, when actor, singer, dancer, emcee, author, reality show host and all-around performer Alan Cumming first came to the United States at the age of 30, the two most foreign words for him were Tucson and Boca Raton. “I had never heard that name before,” he says. “I thought it was a Mexican dish.” Since then, he’s … [Read more...]
Intense central performances give Zoetic’s ‘Next to Normal’ profound impact
Lyricist-book writer Brian Yorkey and his composer partner Tom Kitt researched well bipolar disorder to write the Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning musical Next to Normal, about one woman’s battle with the mental affliction and its effect on her family. And in his program note, Zoetic Stage artistic director Stuart Meltzer is very candid about his own history with … [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...]
Reviews from a promising Broadway season
Because of my travel plans, I had to schedule my spring Broadway splurge earlier than usual. So I was too early to see Bob Fosse’s Dancin’, Bad Cinderella, Shucked and others. But as you will see below, there were plenty of worthy shows that I caught in what is turning out to be a better-than-expected Broadway season. & Juliet (Stephen Sondheim Theatre, 124 W. 43rd St.) — … [Read more...]