BOSTON THEATER REVIEWS

Roundabout Theatre Company's North American tour of its award-winning CABARET revival is a stunning production that stands out in high relief to the theatrics playing in our nation's capital. Fifty years after the pre-Broadway Kander and Ebb musical tried out in Boston, the show still packs a punch....

Ronan Noone is both an alumnus and adjunct assistant professor of the M.F.A. Playwriting Program at Boston University. He has written a revision of his play THE ATHEIST, reimagining the satirical comedy with a female protagonist. At Boston Playwrights' Theatre, Georgia Lyman gives a robust, multi-di...

Character-driven Alan Ayckbourn play is a complex sequence of branching storylines, leading to numerous endings, with multiple characters played by two actors. Olivia D'Ambrosio directs fine performances by Sarah Elizabeth Bedard and Jade Ziane at the Nora Theatre Company at Central Square Theater....

With nine Tony Award nominations under its belt, SOMETHING ROTTEN! closed on Broadway on January 1, 2017, and barely took a breather before hitting the road with three of its principal players reprising their roles. Director/choreographer Casey Nicholaw brings Rob McClure, Adam Pascal, and Josh Gris...

WINTER PANTO 2017: THE PRINCESS & THE PEA is served with a generous portion of political satire. What better villains than orange-haired Queen Clump and her alt-right hand man Stompundstammer? The best jokes go over their heads, but definitely bring the kids to this loosey-goosey fantasy world of fu...

Edward Albee's 1962 barn-burner at the Lyric Stage Company is an emotional conflagration that rages and consumes everyone in its path. Director Scott Edmiston adheres to the playwright's strict blueprint, but takes full advantage of the singular qualities of his quartet of actors - Steven Barkhimer,...

Huntington Theatre Company's staging of a new adaptation of Henrik Ibsen's classic drama, directed by Melia Bensussen, belongs to Andrea Syglowski and her formidable interpretation of Nora. James Noone's scenic design deserves kudos....

Johnny Lee Davenport and Director Benny Sato Ambush collaborate for a powerful production of George Stevens, Jr.'s THURGOOD in its area premiere at New Repertory Theatre in Watertown. Together, they create a humanized portrait of Thurgood Marshall, the first African-American Supreme Court Justice, t...

FAITHLESS is an intimate study of a Boston Irish-Catholic family facing a crisis. Mom is dying, but the adult children have different beliefs, resulting in a debate about her fate and a rehashing of family history before any resolution is possible. Sitting in a hospital waiting room with these four ...

The American Repertory Theater reunites with Oregon Shakespeare Festival Artistic Director Bill Rauch to present FINGERSMITH, Alexa Junge's adaptation of Sarah Waters' 2002 novel of the same name. The playwright's Herculean effort capsulizes the 582-page opus into a taut two-hour drama enhanced by e...

FIDDLER ON THE ROOF is not just a revival; it has the hallmarks of a revival meeting. It inspires the audience with its themes of tradition, community, and family, and, under the direction of Austin Pendleton, is a shofar call to stir the hearts and minds of all who would recall the Holocaust motto,...

Merrimack Repertory Theatre presents the world premiere of Steven Drukman's GOING TO SEE THE KID, an homage to an icon of "Red Sox Nation." Two Boston Globe reporters journey to Florida to interview an aging and ailing Ted Williams, but learn more about working as a team from each other. It's a feel...

The Gold Dust Orphans' 2016 Christmas show features "The World's Foremost Drag Detective" Shirley Holmes and her sidekick Dr. Jody Watley attempting to solve a series of mysterious deaths in Ryan Landry's MURDER ON THE POLAR EXPRESS. Directed by Larry Coen, it has an impressive roster of veterans an...

MURDER FOR TWO is a musical whodunit in its Boston premiere at Lyric Stage Company. A pair of versatile actors provide their own piano accompaniment and play a total of thirteen characters between them. Jared Troilo and Kirsten Salpini are a charming and energetic twosome who entertain with song, da...

Kathy St. George may be diminutive in stature, but she is a feisty force of nature as the title character in MAME at Stoneham Theatre. Mary Callanan returns from Broadway and national tours to play her sidekick Vera, and ten-year-old triple threat Cameron Levesque plays her precocious nephew Patrick...

Moonbox Productions, Director Allison Olivia Choat, and Music Director Dan Rodriguez pay precise attention to the musical framework of Peter Shaffer's AMADEUS, with music performed by the Baroque ensemble Grand Harmonie Orchestra. Matthew Zahnzinger owns the spotlight as Antonio Salieri and newcomer...

Author and humorist David Sedaris made his 12th appearance with the Celebrity Series of Boston as the final stop on his Fall 2016 tour. He read some of his essays and diary entries to a packed Symphony Hall Sunday night and proved that there is no such thing as a bad show when he is at the podium....

Tony Award-winner Beth Leavel launched the Broadway Series at The Black Box at the Franklin Performing Arts Company in a boffo one-night-only concert, accompanied on piano by Musical Director Phil Reno. The star was joined onstage by five young FPAC vocalists who portend a bright future for musical ...

Arthur Miller's 1947 Tony Award-winning play ALL MY SONS is strikingly relevant nearly seventy years later. There is still much to be learned from this compelling play and the Elements Theatre Company production doesn't shy away from the ugly truths or raw emotions embedded in Miller's story. Sr. Da...

Bad Habit Productions inaugurates their 10th anniversary season with the world premiere of Kirsten Greenidge's HOW SOFT THE LINING, a historically-based play about the unusual relationship between Mary Todd Lincoln and her seamstress Elizabeth Keckley, a freed slave. Director M. Bevin O'Gara draws s...

ArtsEmerson presents the world premiere of Melinda Lopez's one-woman play MALA. Ostensibly autobiographical, it is an honest representation of the ups and downs of one woman's journey as she bears witness to the most ordinary, shared human experience, the act of dying. As playwright, she incorporate...

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Joie de vivre is in short supply in AN AMERICAN IN PARIS, the acclaimed Broadway musical now launching its first national tour in Boston through November 6. Inspired by the beloved 1951 MGM movie musical starring Gene Kelly and Leslie Caron, this Broadway iteration looks and feels monochromatic comp...

Success in academia is not always transferable to personal or professional success upon leaving the halls of ivy. Playwright Mike Lew explores this phenomenon in his new comedy TIGER STYLE! The laughs come fast and furiously as siblings Albert and Jennifer Chen struggle to figure out who to blame fo...

Boston premiere of Kenneth Lin's ('House of Cards') "political thriller" at Lyric Stage Company ultimately works because of a trio of fine performances by Steven Barkhimer, Michael Tow, and Jessica Webb, under the taut direction of Dawn M. Simmons. You may have had more than your fill of politics fo...