BWW Review: Joe Orton's Dark Comedy LOOT Satirically Examines Societal Stupidity
by Shari Barrett - Jul 15, 2019
Odyssey Theatre Ensemble kicks off its 'Circa '69' season of significant and adventurous plays that premiered around the time of the Odyssey's 1969 inception with Joe Orton's darkly comic masterpiece LOOT, which asks us to wipe the fluff from our eyes and see society the way he sees it. And as a gay man during a time when British society forced artists into the closet, his farce comically examines a sort of rigged system that benefits bullies and oppressors and controls anyone stupid enough to go along with the lies. As directed by Bart DeLorenzo, this tale of corrosive wit, dizzying intrigue and classic farce suggests that the only acceptable alternative is to become a criminal, with Orton supplying laughs at everyone's expense along the way.
Review: ACCIDENTAL DEATH OF AN ANARCHIST Challenges Modern Sensibilities via the Mind of a Maniac
by Shari Barrett - Feb 22, 2019
The Actors' Gang is presenting ACCIDENTAL DEATH OF AN ANARCHIST by Dario Fo, directed at an incredibly fast and mind-boggling pace by Will Thomas McFadden, on Thursdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays, through March 9th. Fo's works are characterized by criticisms of organized crime, political corruption, political murders, Catholic Church doctrine and have employed topics from current news. In this piece of classic international theatre from 1970, Fo writes of a madman who invades a police station interrogation room where an anarchist accused of bombing a railway station has recently 'accidentally' fallen out of a window. Donning various disguises and voices, the madman manipulates policemen into a truth-inducing hysteria in his attempt to discover what really happened.
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