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.
Ken Davenport's new theatre piece is inspired by the nearly 10-year-old web site where guests are invited to anonymously submit the glorious (or gruesome) details of their first sexual encounter.
This flat out hilarious show is for people who love Broadway musicals but who hate Broadway musicals that are based on movies, have jukebox scores, sell on-stage seating, make the actors wear those mouthpiece microphones, wink at the audience with smarmy self-reference, are cheaply produced, are pac
If John van Druten's 1940 drawing room comedy isn't exactly packed with clever conversation and witty exchanges, the Roundabout's smart and stylish production does a darn good job of making up for any shortcomings in the text.
Amber Edwards' grand and glorious documentary about Broadway's most beloved master of the simple, catchy melody is loaded with rare film footage and proof his scores are more than just hummable tunes.
Her new show contains much of the familiar material that has made her every Broadway diva's worst nightmare, but what makes it work so beautifully is the range of artistry she shows as a song interpreter when the masks are lowered and it's just Christine Pedi up there.
The Metropolitan Room is the sight of Julie Wilson's latest love fest and the words and music of Kern, Fields, Styne and Porter have rarely had it so good.
After an Off-Broadway run in 2005, the musical about a family dealing with a daughter's eating disorder is being used as an educational tool for high school productions
August Wilson's evocative final work, debates the issues of urban renewal, racial assimilation and progress at the expense of the preservation of cultural heritage.
It takes a special talent to have an intimate conversation with 20,000 people, and though chances are Barbra Streisand was not on a first name basis with everyone who attended her 2006 concert tour, some of the most fascinating sounds produced by this legendary interpreter of the American popular so