DALLAS THEATER REVIEWS

The 1991 Disney film Beauty and the Beast is a spectacular work of animated musical storytelling. Belle, a type of feminist in a sense (at least within the context of Disney, especially when compared to Ariel, who taught millions of young girls just two years earlier that it is important to change w...

There may only be a few remaining performances of Lyric Stage's ANYTHING GOES, but there's still plenty to see and hear before the ship sails beyond closing night this Sunday. The show (which features a cast of 37 actors and an astounding 33-piece orchestra) appears as a never-before-seen edit, writ...

Prior to my attendance at Dallas Theater Center's DREAMGIRLS this weekend, my familiarity with the show was based on the 2006 motion picture and the 2001 Actors Fund concert recording (not to mention the Tony Awards clip featuring Jennifer Holliday). Basically knowing only the film, I had often cons...

Wednesday night Dallas theatergoers sipped their wine and slipped back to the salacious days of the roaring 20's. The National Tour of Bullets Over Broadway landed for its Dallas premiere June 14th and the audience couldn't have been more welcoming. Written by Woody Allen based on a screenplay by ...

18.1% of adults in the United States are suffering with a diagnosed mental illness. This number does not include substance abuse and it's even higher for women: 21.8%. With these statistics, it's easy to see why so many contemplate how these illnesses might play out in the daily lives of those who a...

BEAUTIFUL: THE CAROLE KING MUSICAL might not have the same soundtrack as Beyonce's recent LEMONADE album, but there's enough dirty laundry aired in this musical biography to rival Ms. Knowles' infamous troubles. 'So Far Away,' 'Will You Still Love Me Tomorrow,' 'The Locomotion,' 'It's Too Late,' and...

When SPAMALOT opened on Broadway in 2005, I wasn't much of a Monty Python fan, but the buzz around town convinced me to go see the show before it eventually won three Tony Awards, including Best Musical. And even though a few jokes (and a cow) seemed to fly right over my head, when the British shtic...

I can't be the only theatregoer who found the tour of CABARET chilling. During an election year where fear mongering and racial intolerance are sitting center ring, the story of pre-Holocaust Germany seems especially relevant and cautionary. But that doesn't mean the musical, which just arrived at t...

Our parents are the people who raised us. They taught us things, kept an eye on us, bathed us, changed our diapers, and most significantly, they provided us with an over abundance of memories that ultimately helped shape who we are as we age and grow. But, now bare with me for a moment, what if an u...

Walking into the Music Hall at Fair Park Tuesday night, I was extremely eager to enjoy Ahrens and Flaherty's lavish, Tony Award-winning score in the tour of RAGTIME. Together with Terrence McNally's dynamic script, RAGTIME is celebrated as perhaps one of the greatest book musicals of the past two d...

In 2007, Dunken Sheik and Steven Sater's rock musical SPRING AWAKENING took home eight of the eleven Tony Awards it was nominated for, including the coveted Best Musical award. It was bold, new, edgy - and it caught the hearts and minds of everyone who saw it. Although the current local production a...

In 2015, U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement (ICE) detained and deported 69,478 individuals residing within the United States. More than 1.76 million residents of the United States were brought here as undocumented youth, immigrant children who attend school here, work here, and pay taxes here,...

By 2009, when the musical MEMPHIS opened on Broadway, America had nearly 60 years since the Civil Rights Movement began in the 1950s. But, despite significant progress, headlines even today continue to affirm our society's failings in the areas of discrimination and prejudice. Monday night, when the...

Artes de la Rosa will open on May 21st the Regional Premiere of WELCOME TO ARROYO'S by Pulitzer Prize Nominee Kristoffer Diaz....

The Broadway blockbuster WICKED is easily one of the most popular musicals of the past several decades, and I write that without any pun intended....

Since 2010, SEUSSICAL has been listed as one of the top five musicals most frequently performed in the United States. By the time I entered Casa Manana's auditorium last weekend to see SEUSSICAL JR (a version that has been shortened for younger attention spans), it took both hands to count the numbe...

Television was forever changed in 1989 when 'Seinfeld' aired leading to subsequent generations of fans obsessed with 'a show about nothing.' And just as 'Seinfeld' altered the course of television, [TITLE OF SHOW] has forever changed the modern musical with a story of two best pals, their two actres...

Although it's been nearly five decades since the legendary Judy Garland died at age 47, her timeless performances on screen have infinitely preserved her youthful image. In fact, despite the tragic finale of Garland's young life, audiences born post-Vietnam might solely remember the actress skipping...

ALL THE WAY opens with blinking blood-red lights, deafening gunshots, vibrant colors in impressionistic soft-focus. Moments later, you can cut the tension with a knife or the crisp, clear black and white projections. From the start, Director Kevin Moriarty establishes that the Dallas Theater Center ...

Although I don't remember seeing the film of THE LITTLE MERMAID in theatres, I do recall being five years old when the VHS tape was released. Watching on the 12-inch screen in my grandmother's guest room, I'd sing as I played, rewound and replayed the tape for hours on end. The fact that I'd have t...

This weekend, local alternative theatre company L.I.P. Service Productions opened their newest work, LAUGHING WILD by Christopher Durang (author of the 2013 Tony Award-winning VANYA AND SONIA AND MASHA AND SPIKE). With only two speaking actors and a minimal stage, the oddball comedy centers around a...

It's one thing to be the leading lady in a musical; it's another to be the lead in a show bearing your character's name in the title. Luckily, The Firehouse Theatre's production of THOROUGHLY MODERN MILLIE has found the perfect plucky namesake star (Janelle Lutz) for its current production. Lutz's t...

Upon hearing the term 'ballet' one typically envisions fluffy tutus and satin pointe shoes: the very epitome of girlish grace and beauty showcased in lithe bodies adorned in tulle and rhinestones. Ballerinas are given the stage as the protagonists, while oft times the men are utilized simply as supp...

Like many artists before him, composer Jonathan Larson's genius wasn't fully acknowledged until after he had passed away. As any "Renthead" could tell you, Larson tragically died on the morning of the first off-Broadway preview performance of RENT, which would go on to become the mega rock hit of th...

When IF/THEN debuted on Broadway in March 2014, it reunited original RENT stars Idina Menzel and Anthony Rapp with RENT director Michael Grief. Brian Yorkey and Tom Kitt, whose 2008 rock musical NEXT TO NORMAL had received the Pulitzer Prize, wrote the much-anticipated show, and New York celebrated ...