Off-Broadway Reviews

Review of Forbidden Broadway: The Next Generation at York Theatre Company

Long a staple of Off-Broadway musical entertainment, Gerard Alessandrini's Forbidden Broadway has been keeping people in stitches since 1979. Playfully ruthless in its send-ups of musical theater, the show skewers with abandon. The current iteration, Forbidden Broadway: The Next Generation brilliantly keeps the laughter flowing. It is a delight from start to finish.Alessandrini has an incredible gift for finding the funny. Both in his choice of material and the way he crafts his musical...

Review of Emojiland at The Duke on 42nd Street

Since emojis first made an appearance in Japanese technology in the late 90s, they have grown into a language within themselves, shifting the way that humans virtually communicate and even making the Oxford dictionary word of the year in 2015 (with the laughing, tear emoji). With that understanding, it was disappointing to find that Emojiland, the new musical from Keith Harrison and Laura Schein now playing The Duke on 42nd Street, didn't contain any deeper message for (or symbolism of) the...

Review of Sing Street at New York Theatre Workshop

PLEASE NOTE: This is a review of the Off-Broadway world premiere of Sing Street at New York Theatre Workshop.The moral of Sing Street, as taught by a group of moody teenagers and put-upon adults, is that music, even 1980's pop music, can transform a boy into a man, especially when aided by the love of a pretty girl and the support of an older brother. This new musical, receiving its world premiere at New York Theatre Workshop, is a distillation of the 2016 semi-autobiographical film by John...

Review of 'Twas the Night Before...by Cirque du Soleil at The Hulu Theater at Madison Square Garden

We all know it. At least parts of it. 'Twas the Night Before Christmas originally titled A Visit from St. Nicholas by Clement Clarke Moore. The poem first published in 1823 became an instant classic, an American tradition. It is the basis for all that we have come to think of as Santa - the reindeers, the chimney, dressed in red, all of it. It is read throughout the country in homes and churches and libraries and schools. That little old elf has become a part of our folklore, ingrained into...

Review of London Assurance at Irish Repertory Theatre

For a short period of time a canny observer will find a time traveller's portal on the south side of West 22nd Street. The price of a ticket for the Irish Rep's London Assurance puts you smack in the middle of the nineteenth century.Revivals of nineteenth-century comedies probably struggle for an audience. If you read "farce" and walk in to London Assurance looking for The Play That Goes Wrong, you will be disappointed. This period piece is charming and fun. Just saying you should know what you...

Review of The Thin Place at Playwrights Horizons

All theatrical roads are leading to Lucas Hnath these days. As if to celebrate, Mr. Hnath would like to mess with our minds. He pretty much says so in the program, quoting his director Les Waters as having first used the phrase and defining it thusly, "It's the place where the line between this world and some other world is very thin." Hnath made a note of the phrase, thinking it would make a good title. He invites us to watch this play with an open mind. The Thin Place is indeed on that very...

Review of Greater Clements at Lincoln Center Theater

What in tarnation is going on here? Why the sudden glut of plays that are three hours long? Have all the dramaturges traded in their shingles for a "Gone Fishin'" sign? Three hours is just too damn long - The Ferryman is an exception. Greater Clements has now joined the three hour club, and for no good reason unless exposition and obfuscation are your preferred delivery formats for the theatre.Let's start with the good news. Samuel D. Hunter has created a character, Joe, who is unstable in the...

Review of Anything Can Happen in the Theater: The Musical World of Maury Yeston at York Theatre Company

Famous for hit musicals like Titanic, Grand Hotel and Nine, Maury Yeston is a Tony Award-winning composer whose stylistic gifts range from witty to uplifting to solemn. In Anything Can Happen in the Theater: The Musical World of Maury Yeston, Gerard Alessandrini, of Forbidden Broadway fame, has gathered a diverse cast of five singers to explore the wealth of material in Yeston's library. Clearly enjoying the music and each other, the group has a rapport that is vital when performing in a small...

Review of Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven at Atlantic Theater Company

How do you produce a play that is two hours and forty-five minutes long - not a musical, just a play - and have total confidence that you will not lose your audience by intermission? Make sure your writer is Stephen Adly Guirgis and your director is John Ortiz. I was so in it with this ensemble cast of characters in Halfway Bitches Go Straight to Heaven, that I would have gladly spent three more hours with them. Raw human struggle served without a prescription for hope or cheerful poetic...

Review of MsTrial at New World Stages

Dep Kirkland is the playwright, star and own worst enemy of MsTrial. Tasked with portraying a high-powered attorney who is not above committing a violent assault when tanked up on tequila, Kirkland underplays the part to mixed effect. And as playwright, this former trial attorney loads the script with legalese and misdirection in the first act, before unloading a devastating lesson on the misunderstanding and withholding of evidence in the second. Despite the play's punny title, this is no...