BOSTON THEATER REVIEWS

Boston's Huntington Theatre Company stages Todd Kreidler's funny yet poignant adaptation of the ground-breaking 1967 film about the hidden prejudices that surface when two liberal families are confronted with their children's desire to commit to an interracial marriage....

Imaginary Beasts consistently puts out what they call 'adventurous' and I would call 'ludicrous' theatrical productions, pushing boundaries, disregarding conventions (gender bending is a staple of their shows), and twisting reality. Their most recent production was Knock, a devised premiere combinin...

Karen MacDonald fuels Stoneham Theatre's gripping production of John Patrick Shanley's Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning DOUBT: A PARABLE through September 28....

Three-time Tony Award nominee Carolee Carmello wowed 'em in a one-night only performance presented by FUDGE Theatre Company Founding Artistic Director Joey DeMita, in association with Matt Phillipps. With her virtuoso piano accompanist/Music Director Phil Reno, the versatile artist stormed through a...

Leigh Barrett, one of Boston's most formidable musical theater talents, makes an impressive professional directorial debut with New Repertory Theatre's CLOSER THAN EVER....

The national tour of THE LION KING returns to kick off the 10th Broadway In Boston season at the Boston Opera House, most fittingly as the musical reopened the venue following its historic renovation in 2004. Some of the effects have diminished over the years, but the opening night audience roared i...

It was a winning night at Fenway Park for the Commonwealth Shakespeare Company and the hometown fans as they celebrated with an all-star roster for SHAKESPEARE AT FENWAY. The one-night event had comedy, tragedy, and some extra excitement (not unlike the Red Sox) for a great start to CSC's 20th anniv...

Revenge is anything but sweet in the Lyric Stage Company of Boston's compelling, often gut-wrenching take on Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler's musical masterpiece about Victorian London's notorious demon barber of Fleet Street....

Ogunquit continues its 'high-flying' 82nd season with the American Northeast premiere of Cameron Mackintosh's THE WITCHES OF EASTWICK, a musical adaptation based on John Updike's novel and the 1987 Warner Brothers hit motion picture....

Gloucester Stage Company concludes its 35th season with Pulitzer Prize-winning drama FENCES, the sixth in August Wilson's ten-play chronicle of 20th century American history from the perspective of African-Americans. In Director Eric C. Engel's production that strives to illustrate the universal nat...

For those who think that Christopher Durang's popular VANYA AND SONIA AND MASHA AND SPIKE is a strawhat comedy, this production proves it's goat real heart too, just as in any Chekhov play....

Just as central character J. M. Barrie needs to find his true voice in order to break through the writer's block that is hampering his playwriting career, FINDING NEVERLAND, the new musical about the family that inspired the beleaguered author to create Peter Pan, needs to find its voice, too. Teete...

Translations, directed by M. Bevin O'Gara, takes place in 1833 rural Ireland, with most of the action occurring in a school whose adult students often discuss incorporating English into their studies and other methods of furthering themselves in a constantly changing world. Soon, British soldiers co...

When a professor with Asperger's Syndrome needs DANCING LESSONS, he meets an injured dancer, and they both find life lessons in this uplifting and romantic comedy....

Ogunquit Playhouse in Ogunquit, Maine is on a roll, following its thrilling, record-breaking production of BILLY ELLIOT with another beloved British musical import, Disney and Cameron Mackintosh's MARY POPPINS. Featuring a terrific cast, crisp, thoughtful direction by Shaun Kerrison, and energetic c...

Playwright Amy Herzog's 4000 MILES is a slice-of-life drama that observes a month in the relationship between a 91-year old grandmother (Nancy E. Carroll) and her 21-year old grandson Leo (Tom Rash) who drops in on her in the middle of the night at the end of a harrowing cross-country bicycle trip. ...

Broadway legend Chita Rivera makes her Williamstown Theatre Festival debut opposite Festival favorite and former Artistic Director Roger Rees in the newest incarnation of Kander and Ebb's THE VISIT, the musical based on the 1956 tragicomedy by Swiss playwright Friedrich Durrenmatt, with book by Terr...

PUMP BOYS AND DINETTES is a country music revue that feels right at home in the big old barn that is the Cape Playhouse in Dennis. It offers up rockin' music, folksy charm, and good home cookin' with a cast of six who sing, dance, and play a variety of instruments....

The Nora Theatre's HER ACHING HEART and Commonwealth Shakespeare's TWELFTH NIGHT are the theatrical equivalents of light summer reading, and both deliver spirited romance for a mid-summer night....

You don't go into a show called The Annotated History of the American Muskrat without some very specific preconceptions. While you may have no idea what the piece is actually going to be about, you know it's probably safe to say that it isn't about to be your standard Tennessee Williams drama. The C...

Writer/director Kevin Cirone's labor of love is having its world premiere in the subterranean Davis Square Theater in Somerville. Good musical variety and an ensemble of eager, committed actors are among the positive attributes, but character development and storyline need some fine-tuning....

Nina Arianda and Sam Rockwell team up as May and Eddie in Sam Shepard's FOOL FOR LOVE at the Willliamstown Theatre Festival and the fireworks on stage are spectacular to watch. Daniel Aucin directs this visceral production....

The Hub Theatre Company of Boston is presenting The Complete Works of Shakespeare [Abridged], a hilarious, highly physical, wacky portrayal of all of the Bard's plays originally conceived by Adam Long, Daniel Singer, and Jess Winfield....

A rethinking of the 1986 biographical play by Hugh Whitemore about mathematician and computing innovator Alan Turing who was instrumental in solving the Nazi's Enigma Code yet was vilified as a homosexual and chemically castrated before ultimately being pardoned 60 years after his death. A swirling ...

Few vocal performers of our day are as closely identified with American classical music as this renowned artist....