Archive for November, 2011

Why do people go to the theatre, asks Lawrence Casler’s tight little play in two quick acts, A NIGHT IN THE THEATRE. To get the answer to this poser, we join a foursome, the Paces and the Lockers, seating themselves at curtain’s rise to attend the new HAMLET at the [...]

With a consistently bittersweet passion, the Passage Theatre Company’s production of THE HISTORY OF LIGHT makes its audience voyeur to a journey of self-discovery across terrain hazardously defined by other peoples’ affection. Accented by tensions of race, politics, family, and love, Eisa Davis’s play travels through history, memory, and dreams [...]

“What happens to a person when they live in a world where you can’t believe anything and the things you don’t want to believe are actually true?” On October 2, 2006, a man entered an Amish schoolhouse in Lancaster County, Pennsylvania, and opened fire, killing five young girls and wounding [...]

This season has seen a wealth of Jewish-themed plays in Philadelphia, from EgoPo’s deeply moving THE DIARY OF ANNE FRANK, to the Wilma’s haunting OUR CLASS, and Media Theatre Company’s upcoming THE SOUND OF MUSIC (running November 22-January 15). A new book by art historian Tim Bonyhady, GOOD LIVING STREET: [...]

This fall, I’ve had the amazing opportunity to study abroad in London, a city with quite a lot to offer that I can’t possibly see entirely in 3 months. And while most everything really is spectacular, what has stuck with me the most is my experience at The Globe, a [...]

Sit back and watch as the plots unwind, rewind and wind up in some hilariously silly situations as directed by Erin Guard. Set in 19th century Scotland, in a gloriously spooky old family manor by a loch near the moor, Rick Abbot’s BRIDE OF BRACKENLOCH pokes great fun at gothic [...]

Into the woods, It’s time to go,  I hate to leave, I have to, though.    Into the woods—It’s time, and so I must begin my journey. “Once upon a time, in a kingdom far away…”    Each of us remembers hearing those words as we snuggled in our jammies at night.     [...]

Billed as an evening of “chilling murder and mystery,” Lansdowne’s Celebration Theater is presenting TRIFLES by Susan Glaspell and Lucille Fletcher’s SORRY, WRONG NUMBER November 4th thru the 13th. Celebration was founded in 2000 by local actor Geoffrey Berwind and has been presenting productions at the historic 20th Century Club [...]

Burlington County Footlighters is a venerable, South Jersey theatrical mainstay about to celebrate its 74th year in operation. A non-profit corporation, they had been gypsy until 11 years ago, associated but never at home with several venues before lighting upon a permanent base which turns out to be a community [...]

Sizzling hot performances await those lucky enough to catch Forge Theatre’s production of CABARET, which opened on November 4th, and will run through December 3rd, with a break for the Thanksgiving holiday weekend. If you only know of the 1972, Joel Grey/Liza Minnelli movie version of this musical, based on [...]

Brat Productions opened its 2011-12 season with MEANWHILE…, a world premiere spoof of classic American crime stories of the 1930s and ‘40s. Written by Brat’s multi-talented Founding Artistic Director Madi Distefano, the fast-paced, quick-change send-up of film noir and pulp fiction whodunits is an uproarious homage to the popular genre, [...]

Robert Louis Stevenson’s DR. JEKYLL AND MR HYDE has continued to fascinate audiences since the novella first appeared in 1886. The first theatrical adaptation, for the great actor Richard Mansfield, appeared one year later and JEKYLL has remained popular in film and theater versions ever since. This adaptation by Jeffrey [...]

Halloween has recently come and gone. We’ve already had our first snow fall of the season. We might as well start decking the halls now, right? Let’s not get carried away just yet. We still have football to watch, turkeys to carve, and parades to enjoy. Also, let’s not forget [...]

It is difficult to imagine anyone not familiar with Louisa May Alcott’s novel Little Women. First published in 1868, the story of four sisters living with their mother in a New England home, while their father is away during the Civil War, has long been beloved for its warmth and [...]

First of all—go see this show. The only two weaknesses I found were opening-night glitches which will be fixed by the time you see it. Go see the show. You’ll see a better version of it than I did, and I’d buy a ticket to the very show I saw [...]

Wayne Meadows directs Neil Simon’s delightful BAREFOOT IN THE PARK at the Wilmington Drama League. Masterfully, Simon draws us into the lives of Corie and Paul Bratter, two newlyweds who have rented a midtown Manhattan apartment sight unseen. Their fifth-floor walk-up (“if you don’t count the stoop as a flight”) [...]

MAROONS, by Ray Saraceni, now receiving its world premiere at the Iron Age Theatre, tells not only the story of the Pottsville football team that stormed the National League, and had the NFL title stolen from them; it is about the birth of the sport we know today. In 1925 [...]

Cole Porter wrote songs for many film and stage musicals. Of these, ANYTHING GOES is right up there with KISS ME, KATE as his most famous. There are very few people who don’t recognize the tunes when they hear it to “I Get a Kick Out of You” and especially [...]

The Ira Brind School of Theater Arts at the University of the Arts on Broad Street is transformed for the next few days into a decadent rococo society in their latest production, LES LIAISONS DANGEREUSES. Originally an epistolary novel by Choderlos de Laclos told over four volumes, it was converted [...]

ActorsNET of Bucks County is presenting a classic early George Bernard Shaw comedy CANDIDA as its fall offering. A very modern late Victorian play.  CANDIDA is the story of an English cleric James Maver Morell, played with his usual charm by George Hartpence, and his wife Candida Morell portrayed with [...]