Rhode Island Theater Reviews
BWW Review: ASSASSINS at The Gamm Theatre Hits the Mark
by Erica Cataldi-Roberts - March 10, 2020
ASSASSINS, the 1990 Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman show featuring the stories of nine successful and would-be presidential assassins, may seem like an odd choice of subject for a musical, particularly as the first musical in the Gamm Theatre's 35 season history. However, with inventive staging an...
BWW Review: HELLO DOLLY Dazzles But Disappoints at PPAC
by Andria Tieman - March 04, 2020
HELLO DOLLY first landed on Broadway in 1964, and the current (2017) revival, playing at Providence Performing Arts Center through March 8, won the Tony Award for Best Revival and Best Actress for Bette Midler. While those who have nostalgia for this show will no doubt think it's fun, the uninitia...
BWW Review: Spectacular MARIE ANTOINETTE At Brown/Trinity MFA
by Andria Tieman - February 29, 2020
Providence theatre-goers have the opportunity to spend considerable time in 18th century France this spring--both at Trinity Rep's A Tale of Two Cities, and now at Brown/Trinity's MFA production of MARIE ANTOINETTE. Seeing both productions back-to-back makes for an interesting juxtaposition as Tale...
Justice Done to Dickens A TALE OF TWO CITIES at Trinity Rep
by Larry O'Brien - February 26, 2020
When you get seated inside the Chace Theater at Trinity Rep, you might think you're in the wrong place. Eugene Lee's set for A TALE OF TWO CITIES, written by Brian McEleny and based on Dickens' novel, looks like a library. Stacks and stacks of books on two levels set behind rows of tables. When Chri...
BWW Review: CALENDAR GIRLS at The Community Players offers spirited comedy
by Jessica Tabak - February 23, 2020
In Tim Firth's Calendar Girls, now being performed by Pawtucket's Community Players, an unlikely group of women bares it all for a charity calendar a?" and learns what each of them is made of in the process....
BWW Review: ANGELIQUE KIDJO at The VETS
by Barb Burke - February 23, 2020
Angelique Kidjo shines in Providence, RI....
BWW Review: FIDDLER ON THE ROOF at Providence Performing Arts Center. Don't Miss It!
by Larry O'Brien - February 12, 2020
There are times when being a theater reviewer is a fabulous gig. Last night at the Providence Performing Arts Center was one of those times. FIDDLER ON THE ROOF, running through Sunday at PPAC is not to be missed. It is warm, funny, sad, uplifting, and helps us see the world from the vantage point o...
BWW Review: Exquisite AGNES OF GOD at Epic Theatre
by Andria Tieman - February 09, 2020
Despite the fact that Norman Jewison's AGNES OF GOD has existed as both an award-winning play and later film, it doesn't seem to have been produced very often. That's all the more reason to rush out and see Epic Theatre's well-executed version of a play that is strange, fascinating and heartbreakin...
Trinity REP Scores a Hole-in-One with August Wilson's RADIO GOLF
by Larry O'Brien - February 05, 2020
Some shows seek to entertain; think the first act of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion. Some seek to inform; think the second act of George Bernard Shaw's Pygmalion. What director Jude Sandy has come up with in this amazing production of August Wilson's RADIO GOLF is a play that is both wildly enterta...
BWW Review: EDWARD II Electrifies at Burbage Theater Company
by Jessica Tabak - January 26, 2020
With its stellar performances and resourceful staging, the Burbage Theatre Company's gutsy, vigorous production of Edward II invites audiences to thrill at Edward's brashness even as we cringe at his excess....
BWW Review: Searing ADMISSIONS Shines at The Gamm
by Andria Tieman - January 22, 2020
Joshua Harmon's ADMISSIONS is a play that wants to challenge well-meaning white people to reconsider how they seek to lift up people of color. That may make it seem like it's a slog, or like it's a bitter pill one should swallow, but thankfully the biting dialogue and exceptional performances all a...
BWW Review: Trinity Rep's FADE Delights and Infuriates in Equal Measure
by Andria Tieman - December 10, 2019
Tanya Saracho's FADE is a witty and insightful look into work/life power dynamics. What makes this particular story so interesting is the manipulation of status as a minority in the workplace--against another person of the same minority group. Our two characters--Lucia (Elia Saldana) and Abel (Dan...
A CHRISTMAS CAROL Brings Holiday Spirit to Contemporary Theater Company
by Robert Barossi - December 08, 2019
At its most fundamental, theater is a group of people coming together to tell a story in front of an audience. In its earliest days, that's all it was, basic and pure, without any need for today's technological lights and sounds (not that there's anything wrong with those). Contemporary Theater Comp...
Holiday Perfection at Gamm's IT'S A WONDERFUL LIFE: A LIVE RADIO PLAY
by Robert Barossi - December 08, 2019
Nowadays, it seems that everything old is constantly being rebooted, updated, adapted, reimagined, etc. etc., so on and so forth. Any time something is re-imagined or adapted into something else, such as the many new Broadway musicals based on Hollywood movies, it can be a risky proposition. In the ...
BWW Review: YOU GOT OLDER shines at Wilbury Theatre Group
by John McDaid - December 06, 2019
Playwright Clare Barron has a keen eye and a gift for seamlessly blending the mundane and the weird. The Wilbury Theatre Group's stellar production of her 2015 Obie-winning play 'You Got Older' powerfully captures Barron's charming oddball pathos....
BWW Review: Absolutely Fantastic COME FROM AWAY at PPAC
by Andria Tieman - December 04, 2019
On the morning of the terror attacks of September 11, 2001, there were a lot of other planes in the sky that had to be re-routed and emergency landed wherever pilots were able to find a runway. Thirty-eight of those emergency landings took place in the tiny town of Gander, Newfoundland's quiet airp...
