By Dale King Dirty Rotten Scoundrels, the 2004 comedy musical based on the 1988 film of the same name that featured Michael Caine and Steve Martin as a couple of swindlers trolling the Riviera looking to fleece rich women, has a wonderful musical score. But for the sake of the pun, the creators of the show should have included one more tune – one called “Send in the … [Read more...]
Actor Colombel preps cabaret show, ‘Pardon My French!’, for LW Playhouse
Remember Tangi Colombel, the puckish, bald French performer whose American debut at Palm Beach Dramaworks 14 years ago in the Carbonell Award-winning musical, Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris, that also earned him a Curtain Up Award as Outstanding New Performer? It turns out he is alive and well and living in Palm Beach Gardens, having forged a … [Read more...]
‘Indecent’ opens Dramaworks season in powerful style
“Indecent” is both the title of Paula Vogel’s impressionistic chronicle of a 1907 melodrama by novice playwright Sholem Asch, as well as the critical and legal opinion of the work once it arrived on Broadway in the early 1920s. While Vogel’s play serves as a production history of Asch’s God of Vengeance, it is also much more – a portrait of survival of a piece of … [Read more...]
Community theater: DB Playhouse opens with sharp Christie whodunit
By Dale King Soon after summer departed South Florida, a strange sensation of mystery enveloped the area of Delray Beach at the far end of Lake Ida, in the vicinity of the Delray Beach Playhouse. It doesn’t take a Miss Marple, a Hercule Poirot or even a Sherlock Holmes to realize this sensation must be emanating from the showplace itself, where the 2018-2019 season opened … [Read more...]
Season Preview 2018-19: Community theater
By Dale King Autumn has officially arrived in South Florida, a sure sign that community theaters throughout Palm Beach County are readying their performance schedules for a new slate of programs. Most open this month. Delray Beach Playhouse has launched its 72nd season, said executive director Kevin Barrett, who’s entering his second year at the helm of the showplace … [Read more...]
Season Preview 2018-19: Theater
If you don’t watch carefully, South Florida theater companies will move around on you. Celebrating its 25th season, Stage Door Theatre has relocated from Margate to Lauderhill, a move westward and a little south, but also a move up in the world to the gorgeous new $11.6 million, 1,100-seat Lauderhill Performing Arts Center. And the nomadic Primal Forces troupe has moved … [Read more...]
McTeer does remarkable star turn in ‘Bernhardt/Hamlet’
It is a given of Theresa Rebeck’s new, thought-provoking, though overstuffed new play, Bernhardt/Hamlet, that 19th-century stage diva Sarah Bernhardt was one of the greatest actresses who ever lived. To cement that point, she is played in the Roundabout Theatre’s premiere production by the stunning Janet McTeer (A Doll’s House on Broadway, Tumbleweeds on the silver screen), … [Read more...]
Theatre Lab’s ‘Ronia’ overlong, but captivates young and old
The Holy Grail of family theater is a play that speaks to both youngsters and adults. That is apparently also the quest of The Heckscher Foundation for Children, which is funding an annual production at FAU Theatre Lab. The program kicks off with the U.S. premiere of Allison Gregory’s whimsical Ronia, the Robber’s Daughter, based on the kid lit book by Astrid Lindgren … [Read more...]
Stage Door’s new venue outshines uneven ‘La Cage’
You want the good news first? The 26-year-old Stage Door Theatre has moved from Margate, across Broward County, to a gorgeous new $11.6 million playhouse, the 1,100-seat Lauderhill Performing Arts Center. With ample wings and fly space, plus all the bells, whistles and amenities that its former home lacked, the complex should be the envy of every other resident company in South … [Read more...]
Appreciation: Burt Reynolds, a great star who could have been an even greater actor
When I get asked about the difference between a film actor and a movie star, I usually bring up Burt Reynolds, who was the latter. By his own choice. As he demonstrated in 1972’s Deliverance, in which he gave the performance of his career as macho outdoorsman Lewis, Reynolds could have been a major actor. Instead, he steered in a more commercial direction, preferring to make … [Read more...]