the nap
Upon entering Pershing Square Signature Center’s Romulus Linney Courtyard Theatre to view a new musical adaptation of Edgar Lee Masters’ 1915 “Spoon River Anthology,” we became a bit leery about the execution of this undertaking (no pun intended) as we walked down a dark hallway past Bertie Hume lying at rest in a casket. Continuing in the dark, we turned…
Soulpepper on 42nd Street, the ambitious month-long presentation by Canada’s highly acclaimed Soulpepper Theatre Company, features original productions of “Spoon River,” “Kim’s Convenience,” “Of Human Bondage,” plus concerts and cabaret performances (and more). “True North: A Concert of Canada” opened the Festival with a diverse cast of performers and musicians that celebrated a distinguished collection of Canadian singers, songwriters, and…
If America – and the global community – has learned anything since January 20, 2017 it is the message that “words matter.” Words – spoken and left unspoken – play the central role in Lauren Yee’s “In a Word” currently playing at the Cherry Lane Theatre’s Studio Theatre. Words – comforting and unacceptable – are stored on a shelf in…
When one visits an art museum and stands in front of a painting – let us say Jeff Koons’s “Woman in Tub” – one reacts in one of perhaps three ways: the visitor “likes, just likes it” and snaps a digital image and moves on to another contemporary artist; the visitor pauses for some time and examines the work, deciding…
At sundown, when objects lose their precise “black-and-white” identity, the yellow moon begins to assume the role of providing “light.” Moonlight is far more forgiving than sunlight – it is the light of all things Eastern, leaving the bright Western light to its own devices of conditional judgement. It is the salvific murkiness of the yellow moon that draws fraternal…
Tony and Grammy Award-Winner Billy Porter’s new studio album, “Billy Porter Presents The Soul of Richard Rodgers,” will be released April 14, 2017 and will be available for pre-order tomorrow (Friday, March 3), it was announced today by Bee & El and Sony Masterworks Broadway. The album, which features new, soulful takes on classic Richard Rodgers songs, includes solos and…
Under the ruse of “receiving consent” from a minor, pedophile Joe (played with a remorseless arrogance by Joe Tippett) plays out an erotic asphyxiation fantasy with fourteen-year-old Jenny (played with a delusional naiveté by Abigale Breslin) in the basement of his suburban South Carolina home after “abducting” her from her home earlier. It does not matter whether Jenny got into…
“Well — in any case, the play hadn’t been terribly well-liked by the public, and it wasn’t a success, but quite a few people had enjoyed it quite a bit, including, interestingly, a certain Mr. Ackerley, who not long afterwards began to take a more and more prominent place in our national life, which, I’d have to admit, was not…
“An Orange Julius. That’s what I want.” – Julius Basil Kreimendahl’s “Orange Julius” is a memory play. Narrated by Nut (Jess Barbagallo), the play defies space and time to tell the complex story of the narrator’s relationship with their estranged father Julius (Stephen Payne) a Vietnam War Veteran dying from cancer caused by exposure on the battlefield to the herbicide…
The New Group proudly presents the world premiere of All the Fine Boys, a new play from writer and director Erica Schmidt, featuring Abigail Breslin, Isabelle Fuhrman, Joe Tippett and Alex Wolff. Previews begin February 14 in advance of Official Opening Night on Wednesday, March 1. A limited Off-Broadway engagement plays through March 26 at The Pershing Square Signature Center (Ford Foundation Studio Theatre, 480 West 42nd Street). Fourteen-year-old best friends Jenny (Abigail Breslin) and Emily…