Marty Mukhalian

What did our critic think of NONSENSE AND BEAUTY at Theatre22?

Believe it or not, Dear Readers, I was a dancer in my youth. I took tap lessons for 12 years starting in 3rd Grade. And while I didn't do much in the way of competitions, I did see my fair share of stage moms and dancer heartache. So, a play such as Clare Barron's a?oeDance Nationa??, currently being offered from Washington Ensemble Theatre, should be right up my alley. Or it would be if it had a real story. Instead what we got was a too-long one act play that chose to shock more than anything else. With a series of vignettes and dance numbers that ultimately amounted to nothing, the show repeatedly attempts to be over the top rather than clever and has no arc or through line to hold it all together.

Washington Ensemble Theatre has announced the cast for the Seattle premiere of Dance Nation, the Pulitzer-nominated play by Clare Barron about a group of young people discovering the power inside of them and deciding what they're going to do with their potential. Will they squash it, embrace it, sexualize it, share it, or hoard it?

Theatre That Gets People Talking, Mirror Stage's Expand Upon series engages the community in meaningful dialogue, while enabling local artists to develop artistic responses to important issues. Expand Upon initiates conversation by commissioning two new plays responding to a community-selected issue, using the same multi-generational, multi-racial cast. For Expand Upon round four, the community selected the theme Homelessness, and Mirror Stage commissioned Untitled Play About Homelessness in Seattle by Holly Arsenault, and Hand by Tré Calhoun, with dramaturgy by Sara Keats.

Theatre That Gets People Talking, Mirror Stage's Expand Upon series engages the community in meaningful dialogue, while enabling local artists to develop artistic responses to important issues. Expand Upon initiates conversation by commissioning two new plays responding to a community-selected issue, using the same multi-generational, multi-racial cast. For Expand Upon round four, the community selected the theme Homelessness, and Mirror Stage commissioned Untitled Play About Homelessness in Seattle by Holly Arsenault, and Hand by Tré Calhoun, with dramaturgy by Sara Keats.

Well, Dear Readers, this is a first for me. It seems the first Mrs. Rochester got a little over excited and jumped the gun as we had a fire alarm about 20 minutes into opening night of Book-It's "Jane Eyre" and we all were treated to an early intermission and a breath of fresh air. Luckily it quickly resolved itself and we were let back in for the show to pick up where we left off, ironically with Jane discussing the fires of hell with Mr. Brocklehurst. And while Jane does get quite keyed up in that conversation and her subsequent one telling off Mrs. Reed, unfortunately that's about as passionate as our Jane got.

Book-It Repertory Theatre will open its 2018-2019 season with Jane Eyre. Called the 'first historian of the private consciousness', author Charlotte Bronte explores classism, personal agency, and feminine spirituality in this Gothic mystery. Julie Beckman adapted and directed Jane Eyre for Book-It in 1999 and is directing the 2018 production.

Book-It Repertory Theatre will open its 2018-2019 season with Jane Eyre. Called the 'first historian of the private consciousness', author Charlotte Bronte explores classism, personal agency, and feminine spirituality in this Gothic mystery. Julie Beckman adapted and directed Jane Eyre for Book-It in 1999 and is directing the 2018 production.

Book-It Repertory Theatre will open its 2018-2019 season with Jane Eyre. Called the 'first historian of the private consciousness', author Charlotte Bronte explores classism, personal agency, and feminine spirituality in this Gothic mystery. Julie Beckman adapted and directed Jane Eyre for Book-It in 1999 and is directing the 2018 production.

Book-It Repertory Theatre will open its 2018-2019 season with Jane Eyre. Called the 'first historian of the private consciousness', author Charlotte Bronte explores classism, personal agency, and feminine spirituality in this Gothic mystery. Julie Beckman adapted and directed Jane Eyre for Book-It in 1999 and is directing the 2018 production.

Holy Arsenault, playwright, and director Erin Kraft haunting possible futures with Annex Theatre's summer mainstage, The Great Inconvenience.

Book-It Repertory Theatre will open its 2018-2019 season with Jane Eyre. Called the 'first historian of the private consciousness', author Charlotte Bronte explores classism, sexuality, and female expression in this Gothic mystery. Julie Beckman adapted and directed Jane Eyre for Book-It in 2001 and will direct the 2018 production.

Charlotte Jones' "Humble Boy", currently playing at Seattle Public Theater, may not rock your world or alter your perceptions on life or anything like that but this sweet family dramedy has plenty of charm and humor. True it's a bit long winded at times but with such engaging performances and interesting characters, you can get over that and still walk away with a contented little sigh.

Athena Theatre Project and Theatre Off Jackson present THE BUNNER SISTERS from the novella by Edith Wharton adapted and directed by Julie Beckman, today, September 18-October 5.

Athena Theatre Project and Theatre Off Jackson present THE BUNNER SISTERS from the novella by Edith Wharton adapted and directed by Julie Beckman, September 18-October 5.

Opening tonight, March 5, 2014, ArtsWest Playhouse and Gallery presents the last play by Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein.

Opening March 5, 2014, ArtsWest Playhouse and Gallery presents the last play by Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Wendy Wasserstein.

J. B. Priestley's 1938 farcical comedy, set in 1908, is about three couples who married on the same day in the same church, who learn on their twenty-fifth anniversaries that they aren't legally married at all, sending them into a tizzy of spousal re-evaluation. The play is full of funny lines, and is a first-rate screwball comedy - but this hilarious Yorkshire farce has more going on in it than this premise would indicate, because, after all, this is a play by J. B. Priestley!

J. B. Priestley's 1938 farcical comedy, set in 1908, is about three couples who married on the same day in the same church, who learn on their twenty-fifth anniversaries that they aren't legally married at all, sending them into a tizzy of spousal re-evaluation. The play is full of funny lines, and is a first-rate screwball comedy - but this hilarious Yorkshire farce has more going on in it than this premise would indicate, because, after all, this is a play by J. B. Priestley!

ESP presents the great American comedy by the otherwise unjustly forgotten Paul Osborn, Morning's at Seven. Originally produced on Broadway in 1939, and set the year before, it ran only 44 performances, even though directed by the young tyro Joshua Logan. It wasn't until 1980 that the play was widely produced, after enjoying a major Broadway revival directed by Vivian Matalon. This production starred - as the four sisters at the center of the story - Nancy Marchand, Maureen O'Sullivan, Elizabeth Wilson, and Teresa Wright. The revival ran 564 performances, and was later televised by Showtime and PBS, and suddenly people remembered Paul Osborn.