An excellent performance and a moving piece of theater awaits you in Lowell at the MERRIMACK REPERTORY THEATRE! The legend who is Billie Holiday comes alive thanks to Jenece Upton who embodies the singer's tragic history and indelible vocals. Written by Lanie Robertson and directed by Candice Handy, LADY DAY AT EMERSON'S BAR AND GRILL [...]
There's nothing funny about the current touring company production of FUNNY GIRL presented by Broadway In Boston and now onstage at CITIZENS OPERA HOUSE. It embodies everything that can go wrong with touring company productions: skimpy sets, costumes, and routine performances. Let it be said I LOVE THIS MUSICAL (Jule Styne/Music, Bob Merrill/Lyrics) which hangs [...]
Buckle up buttercup and get ready for the most courageous and outrageous show I've seen so far this year. AIN'T NO MO' presented by SpeakEasy Stage and Front Porch Arts Collective, a winner of six Tony nominations including Best Play 2023, written by the youngest Black American Playwright nominated for a Tony Award, Jordan E. [...]
I'm just back from a winter break catching up with a couple of productions--and the best of what's now onstage is easily August Wilson's Pulitzer Prize-winning drama THE PIANO LESSON. It is yet another transfixing production mounted by Actors' Shakespeare Project in partnership with HIBERNIAN HALL with an exceptional ensemble bringing visceral life to August [...]
This show is a revelation and gift! TAP into the holidays with a world premiere at the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge: DIARY OF A TAP DANCER! Ayodele (like "deli") Casel whom we last saw in 2022 at the ART chasing magic, wrote and choreographed this show, directed by longtime collaborator Torya Beard. The production [...]
Must see this IMMEDIATELY --without the kids-- and it closes this weekend: ROSEMARY'S BABY JESUS. It's the Gold Dust Orphans' annual Christmas musical spectacular! DESPITE the bawdy send up of Roman Polanski's horror classic "Rosemary's Baby" about a young married couple starring Mia Farrow and John Cassavetes as Rosemary and Guy Woodhouse whose neighbors turn [...]
A new holiday treat has arrived on the Boston scene -- an enduring story which never fails to move me. It cuts right through the Christmas chaos, and gets to the heart of the season: CHARLES DICKENS' A CHRISTMAS CAROL. Commonwealth Shakespeare Company's inaugural production of this touching tale, is an instant classic! Company artistic [...]
I know this about A COMPLETE UNKNOWN: Timothee Chalamet nails it. The new biopic charts poet, musician, Nobel Prize-winner Bob Dylan’s subterranean landing in the middle of the last century, like a depth charge still rippling through time and cultural space. Just voted BEST ACTOR by the Boston Society of Film Critics, Chalamet delivers the [...]
The Boston film critics have spoken! After our shortest gathering in years-- 5 1/2 hours--the votes are in! ANORA, which won the big prize at the Cannes Film Festival, the Palme d'Or, has won four awards from the Boston Society of Film Critics including top prize for Best Picture (the "Elm d'Or" for the Mass [...]
I was dreading seeing it. SO much hype. SO long (2hours 40)and that's just Part 1! And took SO long (more than a decade) to get made. I ADORE the musical and those songs. And our beloved local author Gregory Maguire who imagined more about these two witches (who still haunt my dreams) than I [...]
