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BWW Review: DETROIT RED at ArtsEmerson
by Andrew Child - Feb 7, 2020

In David Mamet's book On Directing Film, he breaks down the way a linear narrative can be conveyed by placing images in direct contrast to each other. a?oeThe dream and the film are the juxtaposition of images in order to answer a question.a?? Certainly, with a majority of the action taking place upstage of a scrim and the fusion of filmed and live material, ArtsEmerson's Detroit Red, an original play by Will Power about Malcolm X's early adult life in Roxbury, leaves one feeling more as though one has watched a movie or woken from a dream than sat through a performance. Recently, I also saw Gloria: A Life, which is playing at the American Repertory Theatre. While I admittedly found the show to be trite and pandering, it obtusely fused projection effects with live performance in a way that felt cheap, gimmicky, and more like a new SnapChat filter than anything else. Contrast that with Ari Herzig's film work for Detroit Red, which snaps the audience effectively between viewpoints in black and white and splays broad images across the haziness of Adam Rigg's nondescript set. The success of the production lies in the success of the filmed elements, which establish a framing device, pinpointing the action to an exact moment in time. Additionally, the projections act as effective abstractions, allowing the actors to waver between realism and poetry as photos of their faces appear as oversized watermarks in space. Lighting designer Alan Edwards equally contributes to the cinematic feel of the piece. Sharp shafts of light slice through open space and act, ingeniously, as the camera lens might in film, focusing our attention on specifics and the relevant details. Aside from a few extraneous hat changes for the three actors who take on all the roles in the piece, between the work of Herzig, Rigg, and Edwards, the performance seems to be a study in the logistics of jump-cuts or cross-fades in real time. Adding to the film-instead-of-theatre feeling in the space, the performance actively roused and engaged the audience, which had a huge swathe of Boston school groups present. The crowd felt comfortable verbalizing responses, in part, because of our physical separation from the action presented to us, and to be able to laugh, cheer, gasp, and grimace in solidarity with those around you is a rare treat.

Cincinnati Shakespeare's THE TWO NOBLE KINSMEN Opens Tonight
by BWW News Desk - May 2, 2014

This May, Cincinnati Shakespeare Company is proud to become one of the first five theaters in the United States to 'Complete the Canon' by producing all 38 plays by William Shakespeare. The final play needed to 'Complete the Canon' is William Shakespeare's 'The Two Noble Kinsmen', which CSC will open tonight, May 2, 2014. This production is generously sponsored by Charles Parsons and Bill McKim and the Canon Club. The design sponsor is PNC Bank.

Cincinnati Shakespeare's THE TWO NOBLE KINSMEN Begins Tonight
by BWW News Desk - Apr 30, 2014

Cincinnati S This May, Cincinnati Shakespeare Company is proud to become one of the first five theaters in the United States to 'Complete the Canon' by producing all 38 plays by William Shakespeare. The final play needed to 'Complete the Canon' is William Shakespeare's 'The Two Noble Kinsmen', which CSC will open on May 2, 2014. This production is generously sponsored by Charles Parsons and Bill McKim and the Canon Club. The design sponsor is PNC Bank.

Cincinnati Shakespeare's THE TWO NOBLE KINSMEN Opens 5/2
by Tyler Peterson - Apr 16, 2014

Cincinnati S This May, Cincinnati Shakespeare Company is proud to become one of the first five theaters in the United States to "Complete the Canon" by producing all 38 plays by William Shakespeare. The final play needed to "Complete the Canon" is William Shakespeare's "The Two Noble Kinsmen", which CSC will open on May 2, 2014. This production is generously sponsored by Charles Parsons and Bill McKim and the Canon Club. The design sponsor is PNC Bank.

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