OFF-BROADWAY THEATER REVIEWS

Though The Metropolitan Room's fine martini selection always suits my refreshment needs very nicely, on Monday night I was feeling a severe hankering for something their bar doesn't stock, PBR in a can.  That's because I was having a swell ol' time watching Daryl Glenn, Jo Lynn Burks and company si...

I suppose it's too late in our current president's administration to see Conversations In Tusculum, playwright/director Richard Nelson's fact-based prequel to assassination of Julius Caesar, completely as a commentary on George W. Bush.  Sure, certain thoughts may come to mind when the Roman dictat...

The thing that always strikes me about Euan Morton, from his New York debut in Taboo to his Obie-winning stint in Measure For Pleasure and various other plays, musicals, concerts and cabarets, is that the guy seems incapable of expressing a dishonest emotion.  While some performers may dazzle you w...

Never one to refuse a complimentary martini or two at Sardi's (remember that the next time you spot me spreading an extra shmear of that cheddar cheese concoction over crackers at the upstairs bar), I too was invited to attend the presentation of three songs from the upcoming musical version of Shre...

I don't know about you, but when I first heard the title of Sarah Ruhl's comic fantasy, Dead Man's Cell Phone, it immediately brought to mind the title of Sister Helen Prejean's book, Dead Man Walking.  The sister's title refers to those who are still living but imprisoned on death row, but Ruhl's ...

As I write these words the opening night party of Roundabout's revival of Sunday in the Park With George, which I'll be seeing on Saturday, is no doubt in full swing, but despite the sublime glories of that Steven Sondheim/James Lapine creation, there's another musical in town about radical artists ...

You would think that Edith Wharton's fizzy little comic novel, The Glimpses Of The Moon, might have been a perfect property for Rodgers & Hart or Kern, Wodehouse & Bolton to musicalize when it was fresh off the presses in 1922.  But no, it took until 2008 for New Yorkers to get a glimpse, not to me...

In the 1979 revival of Oklahoma!, Christine Ebersole insisted that when it comes to men she 'cain't say no,' and this weekend she's showing City Center audiences that when it comes to performing, the same words apply.  Despite suffering musical theatre's most talked-about flu since Faith Prince pla...

There are several reasons I'm looking forward to this week's Encores! concert performance of Charles Strouse (music), Lee Adams (lyrics) and Betty Comden and Adolph Green's (book) 1970 musical version of All About Eve, retiled Applause, this weekend.  Like hearing those mod Broadway rock orchestrat...

There's a great moment in Cecil B. DeMille's gloriously overblown epic, The Ten Commandments, when Sir Cedric Hardwicke, playing Pharaoh Sethi, upon discovering that his beloved son Moses is really Hebrew, makes a proclamation that the name of Moses must be stricken from the history books, despite h...

When a cabaret show is promoted as containing 'an eclectic mix of style and sound,' I generally don't expect to hear 8, count 'em 8, Rodgers and Hart classics, but who am I to question Christian Hoff's good taste in music?  Though never officially announced, Hoff was to star in a proposed Broadway ...

Robert Patrick, that legendary pioneer of Gay Theatre, may spend most of his time on that other coast these days, but his heart always remains at a little storefront on Cornelia Street that once housed the birthplace of Off-Off Broadway, the Caffe Cino.  One of my first assignments for BroadwayWorl...

They say there are three things a guy should never say to a woman on a first date:1)      I have commitment issues.2)      I have mother issues.3)      I really liked Neil LaBute's last play.No other playwright around is known for pushing angering buttons like Neil LaBute, yet both ti...

As foreign as the concept may seem to 21st Century playgoers, there was a time, so I'm told, when audience members freshly entertained by Gotham's newest theatrical endeavors would not rush home to discuss their reactions on the internet.  Instead, elegant couples, rowdy intellectuals and distingui...

Welcome to Showtime, my new little corner table of the blogosphere.  But I'm not the only one with a new blog.  David Mamet has one, too, and no, you don't have to turn off your Safe Search to log on.  Actually, it's a blog written in the point of view of President Charles H.P. Smith, the charact...

Women's Project will present the world premiere production of Liz Duffy Adams's restoration-style comedy Or, directed by Wendy McClellan and featuring Kelly Hutchinson, Andy Paris and Maggie Siff....

There's a good reason for the question mark that is included in the title of FANTASY FOOTBALL: THE MUSICAL? which was part of the New York Musical Theater Festival. It's a 90 minute show that meanders for a good half hour before it decides on what it wants to be-and even then it isn't quite certain....

In Lucy Thurber's ostentatiously searing play 'Killers and Other Family', a young woman trying to escape her past is confronted by her brother and a man with whom she's had a complicated relationship....

The Maltz Jupiter Theatre is excited to announce the all-star cast of Academy, part of the 2009 New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF)'s Next Link Project. Originally part of the Maltz Jupiter Theatre's inaugural Emerging Artist Series in Musical Theater Playwriting, Academy will perform for six p...

Doreen Cronin and Betsy Lewin's children's book comes to life in TheatreworksUSA's annual free production. ...

Joe Iconis' vibrant and angry song cycle has moved to Second Stage....

Peter Mills' latest musical draws its inspiration from JM Synge's controversial 1907 play....

The Cardinal Group (D.H. Johnson & Richard Pepenella) presents Avow by Bill C. Davis, Off Broadway at the 45th Street Theatre, 354 West 45 Street. Previews begin Thursday, February 19, 2009 and the opening is Wednesday, February 25 at 7:00pm for the limited Off Broadway engagement which takes a time...

Resonance Ensemble presents 'Caesar and Cleopatra', George Bernard Shaw's witty prequel to Shakespeare....

Algonquin Theater Productions and Ten Grand Productions present Albert M. Tapper's musical 'Sessions', about group therapy....