The title of Eric Pfeffinger’s SOME OTHER KIND OF PERSON, now in production by Interact Theatre Company, refers to a purposefully misquoted line of Aristotle,…
View More SOME OTHER KIND OF PERSON (InterAct)Category: Reviews
GLASS: SHATTERED (Renegade): 60-second review
Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie is described as a “memory play”: its plot an extended flashback, its theatrical pretense laid bare. GLASS: SHATTERED, Michael Durkin’s…
View More GLASS: SHATTERED (Renegade): 60-second reviewUNCLE TOM’S CABIN: AN UNFORTUNATE HISTORY (EgoPo): An unfortunate production
Rooted like wooden figurines in a nineteenth-century music box, the cast of EgoPo Classic Theater’s adaptation of Harriet Beecher Stowe’s UNCLE TOM’s CABIN stand in…
View More UNCLE TOM’S CABIN: AN UNFORTUNATE HISTORY (EgoPo): An unfortunate productionAMERICAN SLIGO (New City): Wrestling with dysfunction
The American dysfunctional family was the theme of New City Stage Company’s successful 2012/13 season, and it would be hard to find a play which…
View More AMERICAN SLIGO (New City): Wrestling with dysfunctionBARCELONA (People’s Light): Transatlantic tension, transatlantic truth
She’s an American tourist on a girls’ holiday, seeking out a romantic, exotic fantasy of Spain. He’s a dashing, seductive Spaniard who takes her to…
View More BARCELONA (People’s Light): Transatlantic tension, transatlantic truthThe Arden Hits a High Note with A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC
Stephen Sondheim’s transcendent musical exposé of love, liaisons, and life in 1900 Sweden.
View More The Arden Hits a High Note with A LITTLE NIGHT MUSICVENUS IN FUR (PTC): 60-second review
Leopold von Sacher-Masoch is known today primarily for the word derived from his name: masochism, and for his scandalous 1870 novel VENUS IN FUR, the…
View More VENUS IN FUR (PTC): 60-second reviewHEROES (Lantern): Quieter guns of August
It’s 1959. Two veterans of the Great War sit in silence. HENRI: I love the month of August GUSTAVE: I knew it couldn’t last, the…
View More HEROES (Lantern): Quieter guns of AugustBOOTYCANDY (Wilma): Bringing genitalia to the stage
There is a certain brand of comedy that bases its entire aesthetic on the idea that genitalia, in and of itself, is hilarious. A lot…
View More BOOTYCANDY (Wilma): Bringing genitalia to the stageTHE LYSISTRATA PROJECT (Simpatico): A momentary delight
Ancient Greek historian Thucydides introduced his majestic History of the Peloponnesian War by claiming it was “not a piece of writing designed to meet the…
View More THE LYSISTRATA PROJECT (Simpatico): A momentary delightTHE GAMBLING ROOM (Hella Fresh Theater): An ambitious conundrum
Hella Fresh is staging THE GAMBLING ROOM at Papermill Theater in Kensington. One of several little companies working in small neighborhood venues, Hella Fresh is…
View More THE GAMBLING ROOM (Hella Fresh Theater): An ambitious conundrumAzuka Charms with FAILURE: A LOVE STORY
In 1900 the city of Chicago reversed the flow of the Chicago River so that it discharged into the Mississippi River instead of Lake Michigan.…
View More Azuka Charms with FAILURE: A LOVE STORYTHE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (Curio): 60-second review
“Rare moths, wives pretending to be sisters,” deadly moors, escaped killers, and a legendary hellhound: the plot points of Arthur Conan Doyle’s THE HOUND OF…
View More THE HOUND OF THE BASKERVILLES (Curio): 60-second reviewTHE MISANTHROPE (Quintessence): What’s not to like?
I hope one day to see (and understand) a Moliere play in the original French, though as I’m not doing anything about that desire except…
View More THE MISANTHROPE (Quintessence): What’s not to like?JAPANAMERICA WONDERWAVE (Team Sunshine): Post-tsunami, pre-understanding
I came to theater through literature: words brought to life onstage. But seeing any small amount of theater, you quickly realize that that much is…
View More JAPANAMERICA WONDERWAVE (Team Sunshine): Post-tsunami, pre-understandingNORTH OF THE BOULEVARD (Theatre Exile): If the Boss wrote plays he’d write this one
A few years ago I was at that good used bookstore on 20th Street by the Free Library and saw a crowd gathering on the…
View More NORTH OF THE BOULEVARD (Theatre Exile): If the Boss wrote plays he’d write this oneKARMA 101 (GoCar Productions): 60-second review
It’s a pretty safe bet that you didn’t have a high school teacher as cool as Aaron “Gobanna” Pleasant. By turns musician, radio DJ, and teacher at Philadelphia Mennonite High School, Pleasant wrote KARMA 101 to teach high schoolers about the realities of growing up, making decisions, and higher education.
View More KARMA 101 (GoCar Productions): 60-second reviewARMS AND THE MAN (Quintessence) plays up the farce
Two main threads run through George Bernard Shaw’s plays: social critique (he was an early member of the socialist Fabian society) and sharp observant humor.…
View More ARMS AND THE MAN (Quintessence) plays up the farce60-second review: FUTURE FEST (Luna)
“One generation’s Orwellian dystopia is the next generation’s comfort-inducing lifestyle.” J. Ferron Hiatt, FUKUSHIMA DAIICHI TOY AND NOVELTY. The six short plays in Luna Theater’s…
View More 60-second review: FUTURE FEST (Luna)Still Devastating: RUINED at The Stagecrafters
The outskirts of Philadelphia are blessed with several high quality community theaters, and visits to them are a welcome treat for theatergoers accustomed to the cadence of…
View More Still Devastating: RUINED at The Stagecrafters