BALTIMORE THEATER REVIEWS

Strike one! Troy Maxson is at bat ready to hit a homerun in the game of life. What could possibly go wrong for the former Negro League baseball player in 1950’s Pittsburgh? Lots!...

History will record that in 1976, a rock group named Fleetwood Mac, three men and two women, three Brits and two Americans, congregated with an engineer and staff at a recording studio in Sausalito, north of San Francisco, to begin recording a new album....

When F. Scott Fitzgerald’s The Great Gatsby danced its way off the page and into the American consciousness, it became one of the defining portraits of the hedonistic, halcyon Roaring Twenties. ...

Enthusiastic performances, a snappy live band, bright costumes and lively dancing adorn Toby's production of ELF The Musical. This sweet and charming lighthearted family-pleaser will put a smile on your face and a song in your heart. Director/ Choreographer Mark Minnick delivers engaging group numbe...

There is a great deal to like about the dramatization of Jane Austen’s novel Persuasion, just opened at the Chesapeake Shakespeare Company. There’s Kristina Lambdin’s stunning military dress uniforms and high-waisted Regency dresses....

One does not have to be a fan of Shakespeare (or iambic pentameter) to know the tragic tale of JULIUS CAESAR – how this would-be-Emperor was felled by members of the Roman Senate, Caesar’s failure to beware the Ides of March, the famed line, “Et tu, Brute?”, before falling in a pool of blood...

Musicians and vocalists shine in an undersea world that’s full of color and liveliness, longing, love, and a desire for authenticity at Toby's Dinner Theatre in Columbia, Maryland. Mark Minnick directs Disney's THE LITTLE MERMAID, playing through August 17th, 2025....

HOW TO TRANSCEND A HAPPY MARRIAGE, directed by Ann Turiano at Iron Crow, is highly polished and lovingly crafted. The Iron Crow team builds an experience that’s immersive, fascinating and a delight to the senses. Excellent acting and snappy dialogue augment unusual situations in this surreal show...

Salvation in the form of a children's band? Sure, why not? THE MUSIC MAN has captured the hearts of audiences for generations. Now, the beloved Toby's Dinner Theatre in Columbia, Maryland undertakes this winner, through May 18, 2025. It's beautifully done and highly entertaining. ...

Theatre can be illustrative, informative, relevant, educational, emotional, edifying and useful as commentary on current events, past history, and predictive of the future. And sometimes, it’s just a damn funny good time with no redeeming social value whatsoever, and you don’t care because you�...

9 TO 5 at Toby’s is a treat for all your senses, with color-saturated visuals, harmonious, heartwarming songs created especially for the show and strong characters you’ll adore. It’s just the thing to relieve winter ‘blahs’ and get your toes tapping. Experienced performers have snappy timi...

An evening at Toby’s Dinner And Show in Columbia, Maryland for THE SOUND OF MUSIC is a clutter-free treat for your loved ones. Toby's presents a classic, now entertaining a fourth generation, that feels lush and rich with detail and meaning, and contemporary relevance. An audience favorite since t...

When I first learned about the movie Life of Pi, I confess I was less than curious, having neither heard of nor read the book. Several years later, when it was adapted into a movie and then a Broadway play—with stops along the way in London’s West End, where it racked up a slew of Olivier Awards...

Lumina Theatre’s A FEW GOOD MEN at Howard Co. Center for the Arts is More Than A Few Good Actors: visual details and realistic settings offer an intimate angle to audiences of this emerging theatrical company. ...

Hall of Mirrors. Self-referential. Meta. All of these terms might be used to supplement the general category of Thriller into which Deathtrap, Ira Levin’s 1978 Broadway hit currently being resurrected at Spotlighters, fits. Yes, the play is (as a thriller should be) about lethal relationships and ...

Imagine ‘40s fashions, stark lighting, shadow-play, fog, fedoras, fistfights, physical comedy, femmes fatales, torch songs, desperation, dance, and dozens of puns: Happenstance Theater’s CABARET NOIR at Baltimore’s Theatre Project on Preston Street will thrill you with high-contrast comedy, d...

Is it time to Time Warp? Why, yes, yes it is. If it’s October on the East Coast, you can bet your Hot Patootie that there will be an abundance of Sweet Transvestites in many locations who Can Make You A Man at The Rocky Horror Show....

The joint effort of Baltimore's theaters to present the entire Pittsburgh Cycle is a cause for celebration, and this production, the second in the cycle, is superb....

This is almost certainly the funniest thing you’re likely to see all year. Leave your delicate sensibilities behind and go....

In Mel Holley's PILLAR RABBIT, produced by the Baltimore Playwrights Festival, you’ll meet characters you feel you already know, and laugh and cry with them. Director Ta'Von Vinson assembles an excellent multi-generational cast to perform against a beautiful set at historic Spotlighters Theatre in...

In presenting the story of a neuro-diverse protagonist mostly through the protagonist's eyes, and shredding narrative consistency and sequence, the playwright Harmon dot aut has rendered a confusing story. But with captivating characters and subject matter, this is still a play worth seeing....

As a vehicle for making things go bump in the night, I’m not sure this show consistently hits the target. It is a bit too much of a human interest story for that, but a bit too bump-filled to work smoothly as a human interest story either. Yet there are some legitimate skin-crawling moments, and t...

Toby's in Columbia presents the ‘origin story’ of New Jersey natives who became The Four Seasons. The script of JERSEY BOYS is tight, the pace rapid: this script and these songs - the Four Seasons’ catalog, plus others- form a stellar example of a really GOOD jukebox musical. I recommend you g...

This is an important play, to be considered a peer of Angels in America and The Inheritance, a sweeping two-play multigeneration account of the impact of AIDS on the American gay community -- with the difference that this one focuses on men and women of color. It may suffer from some lack of restrai...

It's not an unfamiliar tale, following Holocaust victim Eddie Jaku from comfortable circumstances through horror and gradually out again. Because there has been a sizeable body of Holocaust literature, drama and cinema, little of this is exactly new to us. But Jaku’s personality, his wry way of de...