Nancy Grossman - Page 22

Merrimack Repertory Theatre cranks up the way back machine to transport the audience to Lebanon, Missouri, on July 4, 1944, in Lanford Wilson's Pulitzer Prize-winner TALLEY'S FOLLY, but the play chugs along on fumes, despite the best efforts of all parties.

Kate Burton, accomplished Chekhovian actress, plays onstage mother to her son Morgan Ritchie in the Huntington Theatre Company's production of THE SEAGULL, featuring an ensemble of local favorites and Broadway veterans. Director Maria Aitken leads a stellar team of designers to create magic at the BU Theatre.

Leave your inhibitions at the door and fasten your seat belt for a musical theater experience that simmers, smolders, and titillates. Bridge Rep gets up close and personal with Michael John LaChiusa's HELLO AGAIN in an immersive, cabaret-style production. Emerson College alum Michael Bello directs an ensemble of six exciting, young actors and actresses.

Ellen Mclaughlin's TONGUE OF A BIRD is the first show in New Repertory Theatre's inaugural Next Rep Black Box Festival. No one can dispute the intimacy of the venue, or the up-close-and-personal flavor of the production, directed by Emily Ranii and featuring an all-female cast. This band of sisters bares the souls of their characters and supports each other like birds in chevron flight, but the play lacks sufficient lift to let them soar beyond the blue horizon, or over the peaks of the Adirondack Mountains where the story takes place.

FLASHDANCE - THE MUSICAL delivers on its promise of electrifying dance, but its story is forgettable and fails to inspire.

Playwright David Valdes Greenwood offers a requiem to explore the randomness of violence, the collateral damage suffered by the community, and the road to reclaiming one's humanity. BULLY DANCE illuminates its unpleasant theme with thoughtful writing, respectful performances, and unexpected beauty.

An homage to Agatha Christie, SOMETHING'S AFOOT rolls along merrily in the hands of a cast of Stoneham Theatre favorites.

Annie Baker takes live theater to the movies in THE FLICK, set in a rundown, second-run Worcester movie house. The audience gets to be like a fly on the wall as the ushers sweep up the detritus and muddle through their existential struggles between shows. Not much happens, but everything changes over the course of three hours.

Fusing theater, dance, music, and video, ArtsEmerson's MAN IN A CASE is an unusual entertainment, something that has to be seen to be appreciated. At the least, it is an example of thinking outside of the box and an opportunity to see one of the world's greatest dancers onstage; at best, it is an opportunity to see that one of the world's greatest dancers has many more tricks up his tights and that his fluid movements have not abandoned him. You can take the dancer out of the ballet, but you cannot take the ballet out of the dancer. Even in a straight play, the man still has all the right moves.

Actors' Shakespeare Project mounts a lighter, accessible version of Anton Chekhov's final play in Founder's Hall at The Dane Estate at Pine Manor College in Brookline. Performing in the round in this stately, dramatic setting, the actors inhabit space and time in a way that allows their characters to emerge naturally, enhanced by the proximity of their audience

Arthur Miller's DEATH OF A SALESMAN is sixty-five years old, but unlikely to face the same fate as its tragic protagonist Willy Loman. With Janie E. Howland's marvelously evocative set, Gail Astrid Buckley's period-appropriate costumes, Karen Perlow's lighting effects, and Dewey Dellay's brilliant original compositions, Artistic Director Spiro Veloudos guides us across the bridge to the era of the play. Strong performances abound, but Paula Plum and Kelby T. Akin excel as Loman's wife and prodigal son.

WITNESS UGANDA explores the American impulse to change the world. It is an electrifying production that combines stellar design elements, breathtaking choreography, and an ensemble of energetic young artists committed to telling their story. Artistic Director Diane Paulus again shows her flair for guiding a complex production and getting the best from her performers.

Moonbox Productions moves upstairs to the Roberts Studio Theatre at the Boston Center for the Arts for a large scale musical with Stephen Sondheim's COMPANY. Exploring friendship, love, commitment, and marriage through the eyes of a 35-year old bachelor, the vignettes resonate, but the songs really make the show worth seeing.

Boston Playwrights' Theatre season concludes with Peter M. Floyd's ABSENCE, a witty and poignant exploration of a 76-year old woman's decline and the impact on her family relationships. Understudy Kippy Goldfarb stepped in and stepped up on the opening weekend for ailing Joanna Merlin and knocked it out of the park.

NEIGHBOURHOOD WATCH, prolific British playwright Alan Ayckbourn's opus #75, is a dark comedy satire and a cautionary tale which serves as a chilling reminder of recent events in our own country. Director David J. Miller's cast of four men and four women form a cohesive ensemble and find the humor in their quirky characters.

Playwright Matthew Lopez uses the Passover Seder as a framing device, paralleling the escape of the Jews from bondage in ancient Egypt with the freeing of American slaves at the end of the Civil War. A Jewish Confederate soldier returns home to navigate the new world order with two former slaves in his household, revealing long-buried secrets and resentments. THE WHIPPING MAN is a moving and thought-provoking drama with a trio of exceptional performances.

Celebrity Series of Boston celebrates its 75th Anniversary Season and brings in Tony Award-winning baritone Brian Stokes Mitchell for his third appearance. With the virtuosic accompaniment of Tedd Firth on piano, Stokes plays a cast of characters from a range of Broadway musicals, from CAMELOT to CAROUSEL, and SOUTH PACIFIC to MAN OF LA MANCHA.

INSIGNIFICANCE is a slight play populated with four iconic characters that have held great significance in American culture. Director Daniel Gidron draws impressive performances from his cast without resorting to caricature or imitation. Stacy Fischer is worth the price of admission.

Company One and ArtsEmerson collaborate to present the New England premiere of Jackie Sibblies Drury's play WE ARE PROUD TO PRESENT A PRESENTATION...about the little known genocide of the Herero of Namibia by German colonialists early in the twentieth century. According to the playwright, "The play is about whatever you think it is about."

Broadway smash and 2012 Tony Award nominee for Best Play VENUS IN FUR is in its Boston premiere at the Huntington Theatre Company. Director Daniel Goldstein and actors Chris Kipiniak and Andrea Syglowski deliver the goods from the mind and pen of playwright David Ives. Venus has come a long way since the days of Frankie Avalon.