Westchester/Rockland
Westchester Broadway Theatre is drawing the younger set with Dean Pitchford, Tom Snow, and Walter Bobbie's Footloose (adapted from Pitchford's 1984 film) through May 1. Under director-choreographer Barry McNabb's stylish touch, even the older set rolls with such pop songs as "Holding Out for a Hero," "Let's Hear It for the Boy," "Almost Paradise," and, of course, the title song. WBT favorite Shonn Wiley brings plenty of magnetism to the lead role of Ren McCormack, the rebellious Chicago transplant who moves with his mom, Ethel (Ann VanCleave), to a Texas town under the religious stranglehold of Rev. Shaw Moore (Joseph Dellger). Allison Spratt, as the reverend's naughty daughter, Ariel, has a nifty chemistry with Wiley. Joy Franz proves a casting coup as Ariel's tacitly wise mother, Vi, and Toby Foster's charming performance as Ren's rough-around-the-edges buddy Rusty is welcome relief to those who find the musical's credibility a bit sketchy, as the youngsters like to say.
Musical director Joel Gelpe makes the songs sound fresh and Peter Barbieri's smart set design allows for lickety-split scene transitions on WBT's thrust stage.
Nyack audiences were crazy over Sally Struthers and Christa Jackson in Ted Swindley's Always…Patsy Cline at the Helen Hayes Theatre Company (closed March 28). Though both Struthers (as Cline's pal Louise Seger) and Jackson (as Cline) are stalwart stage veterans, they were new to the HHTC, who delighted in seeing Struthers outside of her Gloria Stivic and Save the Children contexts.
HHTC moves from the 1960s world of country music to Trenton, N.J., during the swingin' '70s with Cy Coleman and Michael Stewart's I Love My Wife, running through April 25.
Under the heading of "Don't Let the Snow Fool You," Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival at Boscobel Restoration can't wait to usher in warmer temperatures with Macbeth (June 16-Aug. 7) and The Merry Wives of Windsor (July 21-Sept. 5). Co-Founder and Artistic Director Terrence O'Brien helms the Scottish play, while Melissa Stern Lourie, the other co-founder, returns after too long an absence to direct the cuckolding of Sir Jack Falstaff.
E. Kyle Minor
Virginia
Every week in Abingdon, a resident company of actors does it all on the stages of Barter Theatre. As proof, versatile actor John Hardy plays a CEO in Death of a Salesman on Friday and Saturday nights, a quirky minister and a cop in Arsenic and Old Lace in weekend matinees, and directs Fully Committed on Sunday nights. While company members juggle multiple roles at a seemingly frenetic pace, their productions are solid and top-notch.
Under the direction of Richard Rose, his cast delivers a powerful performance of Arthur Miller's classic Death of a Salesman (through May 22). Eugene Wolf's characterization of the timeworn salesman Willy Loman is brilliant, leaving us spellbound by his portrayal of hopefulness and inevitable hopelessness. Mary Lucy Bivins, Nicholas Piper, and Peter Yonka are equally stirring in their roles as the anxious wife and sons torn apart over Willy's dream. Karen Sabo, Seana Hollingsworth, John Hedges, and Michael Poisson are strong in supporting roles. Rose interweaves scenes on Daniel Ettinger's resourceful set, a masterful technique that offers no respite from the clenching tension, the result of which is an unforgettable drama.
The following afternoon, the same cast slips into comedic roles for a romp in Arsenic and Old Lace, directed by Katy Brown (through May 22). The once serious Bivins teams up with Evalyn Baron to portray the delightful but deadly sisters who put elderly men out of their misery. Their comical expressions and timing make the play. Piper is again a fretful young man, but this time hilarious in his desperate attempt to control his aunts. Hedges as the goofy Teddy, Wolf as the slimy brother, and Yonka as the strange doctor all contribute to the wackiness of a thoroughly entertaining show.
In his directorial debut at Richmond's Theatre Gym, Scott Wichmann tackled the Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Topdog/Underdog by Suzan-Lori Parks (closed March 14) and the outcome was stunning. Rodney J. Hobbs and Foster Solomon were compelling as troubled brothers scrambling to survive in an unfair world. Solomon as the stoic brother, and Hobbs, fidgety with desperation, made a formidable team. Their impressive performances lent a new understanding of the tragic underdog.
Wendy Mathis Parker
Florida
Following the runaway success of Eric L. Wilson's Strands this past February, South Florida's oldest black theatre organization, the M Ensemble Company, is presenting Atlanta playwright Pearl Cleage's Flyin' West (through May 9). The production, a Florida premiere, features some of the area's top African-American talent and illuminates the lives of black women who headed west to new lives at the close of the Civil War.
Miami's ever-innovative Mad Cat Theatre Company has opened the world premiere of Trembling Hands (April 9-May 1). Written by the company's resident and Carbonell Award-winning playwright, Ivonne Azurdia, the work tells the engaging tale of three female medical students and their friends who take desperate measures in an effort to keep one of their own in school.
In Boca Raton, Caldwell Theatre Company has opened A.R. Gurney's The Dining Room (April 11-May 23). The theatre has a long history of presenting Gurney's work and the playwright's insights into upper-middle-class WASP family life have been a favorite with Caldwell audiences.
In Manalapan, Florida Stage continues its mandate of presenting new plays with its production of Philadelphia playwright Thomas Gibbons' Permanent Collection (through April 25). As in many of Gibbons' efforts, the work explores racial conflict and how race can determine what is culturally acceptable. Florida Stage has also announced its annual summer musical. This season it will be the world premiere of Heaven Help Us! The Swingin' New Rat Pack Musical, written by James Hindman and Ray Roderick (July 2-Sept. 5).
Actors' Playhouse in Coral Gables has announced its upcoming season. The lineup includes the theatre's own production of Beauty and the Beast as its Christmas holiday offering and a March-April 2005 presentation of the Elton John-Tim Rice Aida. Perhaps the most ambitious work in the season will be the Florida premiere of Alan Ayckbourn's intricate comedies House and Garden, which have been scheduled for dates in May and June of 2005.
George Capewell
North Carolina
PlayMakers Repertory Company in Chapel Hill has just closed its run of Frank D. Gilroy's 1964 Pulitzer Prize drama, The Subject Was Roses. Whatever its strength back then, the play today seemed dated and bloodless. Perhaps we are surfeited with dysfunctional families, but this father, mother, and returned-from-the-war son struck little fire as they bickered. The cast was certainly competent, and J. R. Horne as the father gave an extremely strong performance, but when all was said and done, who cared?
Sanford's Temple Theatre offered Picasso at the Lapin Agile by Steve Martin (closed March 28). They did pretty well by this account of an imaginary encounter between the artist and a youthful Albert Einstein at a Paris bar in 1902. Director Jerry Sipp handled the broad comedy (of which there is a lot) with skill, but he tended to lose the more subtle insights (also plentiful) with his constant "face front, play it hard" approach. Ed Pilkington as Gaston and Paul Wilson as Sagot stood out.
In Asheville, North Carolina Stage Company produced Most Valuable Player: The Jackie Robinson Story (closed April 4). The drama about baseball, race, and personal courage was directed by Pat Snoyer and featured Edgar Davis as the first player to break the color line in major league baseball.
Triad Stage of Greensboro recently presented David Auburn's Pulitzer Prize-winning Proof (closed April 4). Cast included Robert J. Canzano as Hal, Elizabeth Kapplow as Catherine, Martin Rader as Robert, and Kim Stauffer as Claire. Coming up for the Triad company is Hedda Gabler, which will play April 25-May 16.
William Hardy
Atlanta
After an abysmal beginning last fall, Actor's Express Artistic Director Jasson Minadakis recoups to emerge as Atlanta's hottest new director. Staging an absorbing Blue/Orange this winter, Minadakis detonated Atlanta's complacency via a tender and torrid bestiality tryst in Edward Albee's The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? (closed April 10).
One key to Minadakis' command was casting. Tess Malis Kincaid possessed volatile banks of reserve, but obliterated them as she became a modern Medea. Likewise, Clifton Guterman flashed his chameleon talent as a raw preppie, while Chicago actor John Alcott embodied the neighborliest animal lover imaginable. Coupled with Minadakis crucifying his actors on bookcases or making them stampede over couches, The Goat delivered theatre gold: catharsis.
Some of Albee's vintage vinegar was also on kick-ass display at the Alliance Theatre (closed April 18). Chicago's Steppenwolf director Amy Morton helmed Who's Afraid of Virginia Woolf? through harrowing (and sometimes hilarious) work from Steppenwolf's Tracy Letts as George and the legendary Margo Skinner as Martha, ably supported by Atlantans Joe Knezevich and Courtney Patterson as their hapless foils.
Just announced, it's only right that Georgia's Alice Walker should see the musical adaptation of her novel The Color Purple originate onstage here at the Alliance in September. Meanwhile, acclaimed playwright Jim Grimsley premiered his company-developed Leap at the Alliance's Hertz Stage (closed April 11), inventively directed by Alliance Artistic Director Susan V. Booth. Grappling with spirituality and mortality too cerebrally, Leap resonates most in three monologues, by local luminaries Bill Nigut, Rosemary Newcott, and Tom Key, revealing crises in Judaic, Catholic, and Southern Baptist faiths.
Alliance Associate Artistic Director Kent Gash crossed over to the new True Colors troupe at 14th Street Playhouse to mount a ribald biracial staging of Robert Harling's mediocre Steel Magnolias (closed April 11), elevated by consummate comediennes Elizabeth Omilami and Jill Jane Clements. At Seven Stages, Artistic Director Del Hamilton also made Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot (closed April 4) resonate beautifully as he played Vladimir under Walter Asmus' direction, emulating a perfect foil for Don Finney's explosive Estragon in an affecting duet.
Dave Hayward
Colorado
Boulder's Dinner Theatre made a good choice on Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat (through June 20) when it took the camp out (well, most of it) and put the kids back in.
Broadway veteran Michael Duran returned to his hometown to take over as artistic director of the theatre. In his first show since taking the theatre's artistic reins, he assembles a group of old and new designers who give the piece a professional polish.
As choreographer, Duran brings lively, playful choreography to the first act, as when he turns Jacob's sons into a chorus line for the narrator. But the act closer, "Go, Go, Go Joseph," is strangely subdued, and the dancers seem to be winded by what should be a far wilder dance number.
The LIDA Project spent the better part of a year researching and developing Bingo Boyz: Columbine (through May 1), an original episodic play in which the company attempts to reimagine the lives and motives behind Eric Harris and Dylan Klebold. A beautifully designed, impeccably rehearsed, and well-performed play, it nonetheless adds little to understanding the 1999 shootings or their perpetrators.
Scenes play like a television docudrama. The creators—director Robin Davies and dramaturg Tami Canaday—may have been bogged down in copious research, because they painstakingly replay the lives of the killers, the scene in the school, and the ensuing investigation. References to JonBenet Ramsey and the media circus are not exactly revelatory; neither is the idea that wealth could not protect these children.
At Theatre on Broadway, Nicholas Sugar sinks his teeth into Bat Boy, darling and absurd, lisping through fangs and making the most prosaic lines into high comedy.
He's not alone in a terrific bit of silliness directed by Steven Tangedal and choreographed by Sugar. Musical director Donna Kolpan Debreceni has shaped up a company that sings in fine voice chorally, although individually uneven. But Debreceni also guides such gorgeous throats as Alex Ryer as Mrs. Parker, Chris Whyde as Dr. Parker, Jenny Hecht as Shelley, and Shelley McMillion Burl as a traveling preacher.
Lisa Bornstein
Cleveland
Peter Hackett, retiring artistic director of the Cleveland Play House, departs in a blaze of glory with an unforgettable production of Far Away, Caryl Churchill's apocalyptic vision of a world gone totally mad, at the Play House through April 25.
Scenic designer Pavel Dobrusky breathes visual life into the absurdist, minimalist piece with an idyllic storybook setting that is in turn childlike and threatening. An inspired cast, spearheaded by Derdriu Ring as the aunt, a mixture of cloying sweetness and menace, does the rest.
In times of economic constraints, Far Away is both leap and risk for the theatre and a stretch for the majority of Cleveland audiences, more accustomed to being entertained than to being entertained and challenged. This important production does both.
Five-year-old Actors' Summit in Hudson, Ohio, takes a leap of a different sort with Shakespeare's The Merry Wives of Windsor, a congenial comedy in which the wives get the upper hand and Falstaff his comeuppance, through April 25. The delights are many, including veteran actors Reuben Silver as the larger-than-life rapscallion Sir John Falstaff, and his offstage wife, Dorothy Silver, as the equally crafty Mistress Quickly.
Terrence Spivey, the visionary new artistic director at Karamu Performing Arts Theatre, continues to raise the ante on production quality and professionalism with Bee-Luther-Hatchee, Thomas Gibbons' thought-provoking play about a successful young black editor with a bestseller by an author she has never met (closed April 4).
Director Seth Gordon and a trinity of great actors do ample justice to Agnes of God, John Pielmeier's popular 1982 drama about a nun accused of killing her baby, at the Beck Center for the Arts through May 2. Elizabeth Ann Townsend owns the stage as the chain-smoking, combative psychiatrist. Sharing the spotlight are Sherri Britton as the protective Mother Superior and an angelic, childlike Alicia Kahn as the accused Agnes.
The musical Five Guys Named Moe, featuring the songs of Louis Jordan and written and compiled by Clarke Peters, has a weak book, but a terrific quintet gave it their all under the creative wings of director-choreographer Martin Cespedes and musical director David Anthony Williams (closed at the Beck, April 10).
Fran Heller
Washington, D.C.
The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts is on the verge of another must-see series, creating a buzz similar to the one that accompanied its stellar Sondheim festival of two years ago. Beginning April 21 and running through the beginning of August, serious theatregoers from around the globe will once again descend on Washington.
Through an entire spring and summer under the billing "Tennessee Williams Explored," a combination of plays and discussions will indeed explore the canon of one of America's greatest playwrights. The initial production will be titled Five by Tenn. This evening of theatre by Williams consists of five short plays, four of which have never before been published or produced. The five are "These Are the Stairs You Got to Watch," "Escape," "And Tell Sad Stories of the Death of Queens…," "The Municipal Abattoir," and the previously produced "I Can't Imagine Tomorrow."
Five by Tenn is under the direction of Michael Kahn of the Shakespeare Theatre, who directed the now famous 1974 Broadway revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and has collected a number of previously unpublished Williams works. His casts for the five plays will include Joan van Ark and Kathleen Chalfant. This initial presentation of the series opens April 21 and continues through May 9.
Following the run of Five by Tenn, the center will be producing other Williams plays throughout the summer: A Streetcar Named Desire, directed by Garry Hynes; Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, directed by Mark Lamos; and The Glass Menagerie, directed by Gregory Mosher. In addition, interspersed among these classics, Steve Lawson's one-man show based on Williams' letters, A Distant Country Called Youth, will also be presented. Guest artists for these plays will include Patricia Clarkson, Dana Ivey, Sally Field, George Grizzard, and Richard Thomas.
For specific information on dates, curtain times, and the activities surrounding this incredible undertaking, go to the Kennedy Center website at www.kennedy-center.org.
And now for something completely different, and certainly not as sacred, the Landless Theatre Company is presenting the world premiere of Monty Python's Life of Brian. Stop by the District of Columbia Arts Center Theater before April 24.
Michael Willis
A sensitive mounting of the McNally-Flaherty-Ahrens musical A Man of No Importance, presented by Theater Latté Da at the Loring Playhouse, is a highlight of recent Twin Cities theatrical offerings. The show itself has its flaws, both musical and dramatic, but insightful direction by Peter Rothstein and a strong, vocally gifted cast, led by the unsentimentalized performance of Tod Petersen as bus conductor Alfie Byrne, combine to make it the moving experience the authors intended. Ann Michels, Dieter Bierbrauer, Zoe Pappas, and George Muellner provide strong support, and Denise Prosek's musical direction is a particular asset.
Another impressive production is the Jungle Theater's The Drawer Boy, Michael Healey's widely produced drama about farmhouse secrets and discoveries. Another notable local director, Casey Stangl, guides Wayne Evenson, Kurt Schweickhardt, and Tony Clarno in an artful portrait that never veers into melodrama. Jungle artistic director Bain Boehlke's set design maintains his usual high, dramatically responsive standard.
At the Guthrie, director Ethan McSweeny hauls Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet into an ill-fitting 21st-century world of Vespas, steel scaffolding, and leather suits (set and costumes by Mark Wendland). Guthrie veterans Stephen Pelinski, Richard S. Iglewski, and Stephen Yoakam offer vibrant performances in supporting roles, but there is an unfortunate hollow where the title characters should live. There's something seriously amiss with an R&J in which the most impressive turn is Pelinski's Lord Capulet.
On the touring front, Hairspray, at the Orpheum, is a delightful rendering of the Broadway hit. Not having seen the show previously, I can only note that Bruce Vilanch is deftly amusing and overwhelmingly womanly as Edna Turnblad, and the vibrant Carly Jibson (reportedly soon to step into the Broadway original) is a vocal and choreographic delight as her daughter Tracy. The dancers do the lion's share of the work in this high-spirited show, and Jerry Mitchell's choreography gets its full due. And at the State, the somber The Exonerated makes a strong argument for a re-examination of the criminal-justice system. At the head of the cast, Lynn Redgrave is emotionally powerful, but Brian Dennehy is so low-key as to almost disappear.
Michael Sander
A trio of delightful productions recently opened: tick, tick… BOOM!, a state premiere under the able direction of David Saint at George Street Playhouse; Miss Julie, shifted to an 1865 Louisiana plantation during Mardi Gras in a Two River Theatre Company production helmed by Jane Page, who cast black actors in the servants' roles; and Candida at McCarter Theatre, with another trio—Kate Forbes (Candida), Michael Siberry (Morell), and Jeffrey Carlson (Marchbanks)—directed by Lisa Peterson and offering a master class in stage acting.
Carlson, resembling a blond Johnny Depp, brought such emotion to his 18-year-old, love-besotted poet that we could feel his pain. Well, at least we could when not laughing at his over-the-top-but-somehow-it-worked performance. He threw himself on the floor when in despair, ran around Neil Patel's fine set, arms extended, when elated, and sank into a child's chair, head in hands, upon discovering Morell had not one drop of poetic blood and never would love his wife as she was meant to be loved.
Siberry's Morell was a patient parson without a worry in the world eagerly awaiting his wife's return from a three-week holiday. That changes when she appears with Marchbanks, forcing Morell to question aspects of his life. As Morell's composure decomposes, Siberry's meticulous enunciation and deliberate timing dissolved as fear crept into his marriage.
On the other hand, Candida seemed to be having the time of her life. Forbes brought intelligence and understanding to her character, who serves as a mother figure to both of her "boys."
Heather Lea Anderson's Miss Julie had none of Candida's self-esteem or poise. Julie denigrates herself in the bed of her slave, Jean. Ed Onipede Blunt as Jean is just as determined to rise above his station. It is the cook Kristine (Nedrah Banks) who is the voice of reason, although it makes no difference in the end.
The great thing about tick, tick… BOOM! on a recent Friday night was that the audience, ranging from teens to seniors, raved about the musical featuring Colin Hanlon (Jonathan), Stephen Bienskie (Michael), and Sarah Litzsinger (Susan). All three turned in first-rate performances. But did I miss the memo about playwright Jonathan Larson morphing into a deity? Not only does the program have nine photos of Larson on the cover (five inside), the show closes with a spotlight on his portrait, noting he lived from 1960-1996.
Can't this show stand on its own two feet?
Gretchen C. Van Benthuysen
The current offering at Oregon Cabaret Theatre in Ashland is out of this world—literally. They Came From Way Out There is a musical that spoofs science fiction, folk myths, popular attitudes, and things that go bump in the night. The musical takes us to the second star on the right, just past Roswell, and to points in between but no less fabulous.
With book by Jahnna Beecham and Michael J. Hume, music by Malcolm Hillgartner, lyrics by all three, and additional music and lyrics by Jon Newton, the performance is the annual meeting of the Paranormal Society, who gather for the annual election of officers from among four candidates and to share accounts of their extranormal experiences. The audience members also serve as members of the society and join in singing the society's anthem.
Musical direction by Darcy Danielson and percussion by Jim Malachi are augmented by use of a theremin, adding to the music's unreal effect. This is Danielson's 40th production as musical director for Oregon Cabaret.
Five actors people the stage with such persons as Dr. Fleets (Will Churchill), Frank Morgan (Chip Duford), Virginia Trotter (Suzanne Seiber), Gaia Goldenseal (Katherine Strohmaier), and Ronald "Zeff" Zephyr (Jonathan D. Visser).
Numbers range from dancing Easter Island statues to the poignant "Out of Your Body (and Into My Heart)," sung by Frank and Virginia, to the whimsical Human Antenna performed by Zeff. One song describes an affair with Bigfoot in "Mr. Big." Another, "HMS Lifeboat," parodies Gilbert and Sullivan. By the time you realize the parody, you're already caught up in it.
This show has everything. Catch it if you can, if you have to come from another galaxy, or even from New York.
It moves out on May 30 to make way for OCT's first Hispanic show, 4 Guys Named José… and una mujer named Maria, June 11-Sept. 5.
At the north end of Oregon, in Portland, Artists Repertory Theatre presents Michael Healey's The Drawer Boy through May 2, starring the Oscar-winning actor William Hurt opposite Allen Nause, artistic director of ART. The two became friends when they were together at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival in Ashland over 20 years ago. The Portland performance is reportedly sold out.
Alvin Reiss