Michael Dale
After 20-odd years singing, dancing and acting in dinner theatres, summer stocks and the ever-popular audience participation murder mysteries (try improvising with audiences after they?ve had two hours of open bar), Michael Dale segued his theatrical ambitions into playwriting. The buildings which once housed the 5 Off-Off Broadway plays he penned have all been destroyed or turned into a Starbucks, but his name remains the answer to the trivia question, "Who wrote the official play of Babe Ruth's 100th Birthday?" He served as Artistic Director for The Play's The Thing Theatre Company, helping to bring free live theatre to underserved communities, and dabbled a bit in stage managing and in directing cabaret shows before answering the call (it was an email, actually) to become BroadwayWorld.com's first Chief Theatre Critic. While not attending shows Michael can be seen at Citi Field pleading for the Mets to stop imploding. Likes: Strong book musicals and ambitious new works. Dislikes: Unprepared celebrities making their stage acting debuts by starring on Broadway and weak bullpens.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Dear Funny Girl: Let Julie Benko Sing!Sunday Morning Michael Dale: My Favorite Cease and Desist Letters
August 14, 2022
A while back. I was in an audience of theatre fans watching an onstage conversation between Frank Rich and Stephen Sondheim and the subject of unauthorized changes made in regional and amateur productions came up. The composer/lyricist mentioned that he had heard of a production of Company that ended with Bobby committing suicide by shooting himself.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Dear Funny Girl: Let Julie Benko Sing!
August 7, 2022
Like many theatre fans, I'd been reading the raves she's been getting as Beanie Feldstein's standby, and since I doubted press would be offered comps during her run, I sprung for a ticket to see for myself.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Alison Fraser Thrillingly Reinvents Cat On A Hot Tin Roof's Big Mama
July 31, 2022
A popular stage actor best known for being quirkily funny in musicals (Off-Broadway in March Of The Falsettos, on Broadway in Romance, Romance, The Secret Garden and Gypsy), Fraser reinvents a classic character and turns in a performance that thrills with its gutsy power masked by her character's well-rehearsed elegance.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: All Singing! All Dancing! All Legal! Cannabis! A Viper Vaudeville Opens at La MaMa
July 24, 2022
A collaboration of two of Off-Off-Broadway's favorite historically subversive companies, the HERE production of Cannabis! A Viper Vaudeville, presented at La Mama is an entrancingly fun and educational two-hour festival of song, dance and spoken word, beginning as a relaxing communal experience and evolving into a call for activism.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Ukrainian Children Coming To Brooklyn in a Play They Premiered in a Bomb Shelter
July 17, 2022
Irondale is arranging for Ukrainian solider Oleg Onechchak's ensemble of child actors to give two performances in Brooklyn of Mom On Skype, which was originally performed in a warehouse-turned-bomb-shelter in the city of Lviv.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: The Fire This Time Festival's 13th Year of Spotlighting Early-Career Playwrights From The African Diaspora
July 10, 2022
With a name lending new urgency to a rhyming couplet from the African-American spiritual 'Mary, Don't You Weep' ('God gave Noah the rainbow sign / No more water, the fire next time') the annual Fire This Time Festival has produced dozens of ten-minutes plays in its mission to 'provide a platform for early-career playwrights from the African diaspora to explore new directions for 21st century theater'.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Steph Del Rosso's Sharp Social Commentary, 53% Of, Takes On Added Significance After Supreme Court Rulings
July 3, 2022
The title refers to the 53% of white women who voted for Donald Trump in 2016, but that's just the starting point.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: 1909 Typist Turned Playwright Elizabeth Baker Writes of Chasing Your Dreams in Chains
June 26, 2022
The Mint brings back another forgotten gem by Elizabeth Baker and Martha Clarke explores the Biblical playboy who tossed it all.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Madhuri Shekar's Fascinating Moralistic Drama Queen Explores The Flexibility of Truth
June 19, 2022
We're told that numbers don't lie, but when the numbers conflict with what we see in front of us, are they really telling the truth?
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Best Friends Become Two Unlikely (or Maybe Perfectly Matched) Lovers (or Maybe Not) in Reality-Based Musical Straight Forward
June 12, 2022
Billy Aberle and Chris Sabol's Straight Forward is an original musical inspired by an article by Mike Iamele that went viral on social media in 2014, explaining how he began developing romantic and sexual feelings for his male best friend Garrett Lech, despite them both identifying as straight.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Mara Vélez Meléndez's Notes on Killing... A Subversive Burst of Creative Energy
June 5, 2022
Count Christine Carmela Herrero and Samora La Perdida as early favorites for Stage Pair of The Season, as they crackle with chemistry in Mara Vélez Meléndez's playfully packaged political outrage.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: They're Over The Moon For Idina Menzel in Which Way To The Stage
May 29, 2022
Musical theatre fandom and body image issues in Ana Nogueira's hilarious and touching Which Way To The Stage. Also, Clubbed Thumb's Summerworks commences with Trish Harnetiaux's fun and offbeat California and jazz favorite Nancy Harrow scores a pair of Russian classics.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Billy Crystal, Mr. Saturday Night and The Tricky Business of When (and when not) To Be Funny
May 22, 2022
When portraying a comedian in a play, sometimes getting the laugh is not the point.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Giants Can Be Good in Into The Woods & Artist and Subject Fight For Control of the Narrative in Shooting Celebrities
May 15, 2022
Three plays where what seems like the truth might be a subjective point of view.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Getting Scatological at POTUS and Unique Looks at History in H*tler's Tasters and The Trojan Women: A Native American Adaptation
May 8, 2022
This week I saw a Broadway farce, an Off-Broadway history play and an Off-Off Broadway adaptation all written and directed by women.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Austin McCormick's Company XIV, Still Creating The Sexiest Date Nights In Town
May 1, 2022
Seven Sins returns to Brooklyn, plus thoughts on Funny Girl and 'for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf'
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Witnessing History with All The Mournful Voices and Getting a History Lesson with Citizen Wong
April 24, 2022
Immersive All The Mournful Voices takes audience members to a time that tore the country apart just as it was beginning to heal and Citizen Wong celebrates a 19th Century activist for Chinese American rights.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: David Greenspan Goes Solo in The Patsy and Take Me Out Prompts a Mets Memory
April 17, 2022
Notes on David Greenspan in The Patsy, a Mets memory from Take Me Out and keeping track of New York theatre's Lenape Land Land Acknowledgements.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Broken Box Mime Tackles Contemporary Issues
April 10, 2022
Broken Box Mime Tackles Contemporary Issues, I get emotional at Suffs and Dominique Morisseau encourages laughter at Confederates.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: The Wizard of Oz's Celebrity Pooch Tells All and An Anti-War Pageant Arrives From Kosovo
April 3, 2022
And Toto Too is riotously funny and remarkably true, Balkan Bordello arrives at La MaMa from Kosovo, and Gong Lum's Legacy combines romantic comedy with a controversial Supreme Court case.
August 14, 2022
A while back. I was in an audience of theatre fans watching an onstage conversation between Frank Rich and Stephen Sondheim and the subject of unauthorized changes made in regional and amateur productions came up. The composer/lyricist mentioned that he had heard of a production of Company that ended with Bobby committing suicide by shooting himself.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Dear Funny Girl: Let Julie Benko Sing!
August 7, 2022
Like many theatre fans, I'd been reading the raves she's been getting as Beanie Feldstein's standby, and since I doubted press would be offered comps during her run, I sprung for a ticket to see for myself.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Alison Fraser Thrillingly Reinvents Cat On A Hot Tin Roof's Big Mama
July 31, 2022
A popular stage actor best known for being quirkily funny in musicals (Off-Broadway in March Of The Falsettos, on Broadway in Romance, Romance, The Secret Garden and Gypsy), Fraser reinvents a classic character and turns in a performance that thrills with its gutsy power masked by her character's well-rehearsed elegance.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: All Singing! All Dancing! All Legal! Cannabis! A Viper Vaudeville Opens at La MaMa
July 24, 2022
A collaboration of two of Off-Off-Broadway's favorite historically subversive companies, the HERE production of Cannabis! A Viper Vaudeville, presented at La Mama is an entrancingly fun and educational two-hour festival of song, dance and spoken word, beginning as a relaxing communal experience and evolving into a call for activism.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Ukrainian Children Coming To Brooklyn in a Play They Premiered in a Bomb Shelter
July 17, 2022
Irondale is arranging for Ukrainian solider Oleg Onechchak's ensemble of child actors to give two performances in Brooklyn of Mom On Skype, which was originally performed in a warehouse-turned-bomb-shelter in the city of Lviv.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: The Fire This Time Festival's 13th Year of Spotlighting Early-Career Playwrights From The African Diaspora
July 10, 2022
With a name lending new urgency to a rhyming couplet from the African-American spiritual 'Mary, Don't You Weep' ('God gave Noah the rainbow sign / No more water, the fire next time') the annual Fire This Time Festival has produced dozens of ten-minutes plays in its mission to 'provide a platform for early-career playwrights from the African diaspora to explore new directions for 21st century theater'.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Steph Del Rosso's Sharp Social Commentary, 53% Of, Takes On Added Significance After Supreme Court Rulings
July 3, 2022
The title refers to the 53% of white women who voted for Donald Trump in 2016, but that's just the starting point.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: 1909 Typist Turned Playwright Elizabeth Baker Writes of Chasing Your Dreams in Chains
June 26, 2022
The Mint brings back another forgotten gem by Elizabeth Baker and Martha Clarke explores the Biblical playboy who tossed it all.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Madhuri Shekar's Fascinating Moralistic Drama Queen Explores The Flexibility of Truth
June 19, 2022
We're told that numbers don't lie, but when the numbers conflict with what we see in front of us, are they really telling the truth?
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Best Friends Become Two Unlikely (or Maybe Perfectly Matched) Lovers (or Maybe Not) in Reality-Based Musical Straight Forward
June 12, 2022
Billy Aberle and Chris Sabol's Straight Forward is an original musical inspired by an article by Mike Iamele that went viral on social media in 2014, explaining how he began developing romantic and sexual feelings for his male best friend Garrett Lech, despite them both identifying as straight.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Mara Vélez Meléndez's Notes on Killing... A Subversive Burst of Creative Energy
June 5, 2022
Count Christine Carmela Herrero and Samora La Perdida as early favorites for Stage Pair of The Season, as they crackle with chemistry in Mara Vélez Meléndez's playfully packaged political outrage.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: They're Over The Moon For Idina Menzel in Which Way To The Stage
May 29, 2022
Musical theatre fandom and body image issues in Ana Nogueira's hilarious and touching Which Way To The Stage. Also, Clubbed Thumb's Summerworks commences with Trish Harnetiaux's fun and offbeat California and jazz favorite Nancy Harrow scores a pair of Russian classics.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Billy Crystal, Mr. Saturday Night and The Tricky Business of When (and when not) To Be Funny
May 22, 2022
When portraying a comedian in a play, sometimes getting the laugh is not the point.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Giants Can Be Good in Into The Woods & Artist and Subject Fight For Control of the Narrative in Shooting Celebrities
May 15, 2022
Three plays where what seems like the truth might be a subjective point of view.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Getting Scatological at POTUS and Unique Looks at History in H*tler's Tasters and The Trojan Women: A Native American Adaptation
May 8, 2022
This week I saw a Broadway farce, an Off-Broadway history play and an Off-Off Broadway adaptation all written and directed by women.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Austin McCormick's Company XIV, Still Creating The Sexiest Date Nights In Town
May 1, 2022
Seven Sins returns to Brooklyn, plus thoughts on Funny Girl and 'for colored girls who have considered suicide / when the rainbow is enuf'
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Witnessing History with All The Mournful Voices and Getting a History Lesson with Citizen Wong
April 24, 2022
Immersive All The Mournful Voices takes audience members to a time that tore the country apart just as it was beginning to heal and Citizen Wong celebrates a 19th Century activist for Chinese American rights.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: David Greenspan Goes Solo in The Patsy and Take Me Out Prompts a Mets Memory
April 17, 2022
Notes on David Greenspan in The Patsy, a Mets memory from Take Me Out and keeping track of New York theatre's Lenape Land Land Acknowledgements.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: Broken Box Mime Tackles Contemporary Issues
April 10, 2022
Broken Box Mime Tackles Contemporary Issues, I get emotional at Suffs and Dominique Morisseau encourages laughter at Confederates.
Sunday Morning Michael Dale: The Wizard of Oz's Celebrity Pooch Tells All and An Anti-War Pageant Arrives From Kosovo
April 3, 2022
And Toto Too is riotously funny and remarkably true, Balkan Bordello arrives at La MaMa from Kosovo, and Gong Lum's Legacy combines romantic comedy with a controversial Supreme Court case.
