Two World Premieres & More Set for Center REP 24-25 Season
by Chloe Rabinowitz - Apr 17, 2024
Center Repertory Company has unveiled its 57th season—an extraordinary lineup of six works to be presented September 2024 through June 2025. See full programming and learn how to purchase tickets.
SoHo Playhouse Reveals Lighthouse Series Lineup
by Stephi Wild - Apr 9, 2024
Coming off the massive success of the Lighthouse Series 2022's winner, JOB, with two sold out runs, and with the 2023 winner IT'S NOT WHAT IT LOOKS LIKE primed to take the stage later this summer, SoHo Playhouse has announced the 2024 Lighthouse Series lineup.
Interview: Local Spotlight on Emmy Award-Winning News Anchor Tracy Kornet
by Carolan Trbovich - Apr 9, 2024
BroadwayWorld readers know the theater is blessed with talented people who not only perform on the stage but also manage operations behind the scenes. From tech crews, producers, directors, and writers, to publishers, instructors, and dramaturgs, these folks have their own “stage presence” that leans toward the creative side of this craft.
Kennedy Center Teams Up With Netflix To Stream Mark Twain Prize
by Michael Major - Mar 14, 2024
The Kennedy Center collaborates with Netflix to stream the Mark Twain Prize, and sets the cast. Get the latest updates on this exciting partnership and the star-studded cast lineup. This year's program will feature a cast of leading performers, including Dave Burd aka “Lil Dicky,” Dave Chappelle, Jimmy Fallon, Tiffany Haddish, and more.
Review: Bold Staging of HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH Rocks Chance Theater
by Michael Quintos - Feb 9, 2024
Featuring a humorous yet surprisingly poignant original story from John Cameron Mitchell and piercing, high-octane tunes from composer Stephen Trask, the gloriously ribald glam-rock musical HEDWIG AND THE ANGRY INCH is currently flipping its wigs out in a brand new extremely engaging production at the Chance Theater continuing thru February 25.
Curtain closes on Celtic Connections 2024
by Natalie O'Donoghue - Feb 5, 2024
From Thursday 18 January to Sunday 4 February, the city came alive with over 300 incredible events involving 1,200 artists across 25 of the city's venues.
Broadway Shows Based on the Top 1000 Highest-Grossing Films
by Michael Major - Jan 21, 2024
Of all the films on IMDB's list of the 1000 highest-grossing movies of all time, 31 have been adapted into Broadway musicals. Check out a guide to each those musicals below, along with musicals that are in development or ones that have not yet made their way to Broadway.
Review: JUDGEMENT AT NUREMBERG at MET's Warwick Theatre
by Alan Portner - Jan 13, 2024
“Judgement at Nuremberg” at Metropolitan Ensemble Theatre’s (MET) Warwick Theatre is a fictional rendering of the 1947 Judge’s War Crime Trial held at Nuremberg, Bavaria, Germany. “Judgement at Nuremberg” is a painful remembrance of an attempt to both punish those accountable for the barbarisms committed in the name of the German state and to be consciously impartial in the administration of an accused’s trial rights.
Eighteen million people died at the hands of the Third Reich and its National Socialist (NAZI) leaders. Six and a half million of the dead comprised two-thirds of Europe’s Jewish population. It was a determined and deliberate stated goal of genocide of a people.
Post war, many of Europe’s surviving Jews fled places they had lived for millenniums in favor of reestablishing a sovereign state in their ancestral homeland where they could finally feel safe. It is ironic that this play opened in Kansas City on the very day that South Africa brought an accusation of genocide against the descendants of the survivors, today’s Israelis, at the International Court of Justice.
The play centers on three main characters. One is Dan Heyward, a retired American District Court Judge called to lead a panel of three non-biased jurists in the trial of three NAZI era judicial officials. The second is a renowned German Judge named Ernst Janning. Janning had once sat in the chair similar to America’s Attorney General during pre-NAZI days. The third character is a youngish defense attorney named Oscar Rolfe, a volunteer defender of the estimable Ernst Janning. Janning initially refuses to recognize the authority of the court.
It is two years since the end of the war in Europe. The scope of the evil that was done has become clear. The question facing the court is how far down into the German Bureaucracy must consequences for the German people reach?
Usual suspects have already been tried, convicted, jailed, executed, or committed suicide. What is left to adjudicate are those who have allowed the worst to happen and why they allowed it. Were they true believers? Were they people who went along in hopes the system would self-correct? Is there any defense for crimes against humanity? Judge Heyward is our eyes as we attempt to understand how this monstrosity that was the Third Reich could have ever happened.
“Judgement at Nuremberg” by Abby Mann is sixty-three years-old, yet it mirrors the Donald Trump era in exquisite detail. The arguments put forward in the staged court and from Judge Heyward’s investigation are heard in today’s legal briefs almost word for word. This makes “Judgement” frightening and important for 2024 audiences to see. When you see this play, you will recognize modern, living associates of the past administration mouthing dialog written before they reached their majority.
MET has done an excellent job of casting. Director Karen Paisley has choreographed an exquisite twenty-four scene, two-act play in precise detail using minimal, yet effective set pieces. The few conceits adopted for this production work exceptionally well. Most acting is restrained and understated; except for two or three explosions from wholly appropriate characters when needed. Ms. Paisley has incorporated vintage documentary film from the era and what almost seems like a motion picture score backing up the action.
“Judgement” is the third iteration of this story by Abby Mann, born Abraham Goodman, a son of Russian Jewish immigrants to the United States. The story first appeared as a television episode of Playhouse 90 in 1957, a feature film in 1961, and this version, a Broadway play in 2001. The Broadway version of “Judgement” was performed a total of fifty-six times. The expanded filmed version recently became available on “Prime Video.”
The leading cast members in the MET production are John Clancy as Judge Dan Heywood, Tim Ahlenius as Ernst Janning, and Michael Dragen as Oscar Rolfe. They are backed up by a fine supporting cast.
All the characters in this play are products of the playwright’s imagination. They are inspired by similar, real life people. True, historic situations influenced the plot and the legal arguments.
“Judgement at Nuremberg” continues at the Warwick Theatre through January 21. Tickets are available at https://www.warwickkc.org/ or by telephone at (816) 569-3226.