Brett Cullum - Page 12

From the bodily fluid throwing Miggs to the naked and tucked Buffalo Bill, expect to see everything you witnessed in the movie recreated live onstage by a company who at times don Lambchop hand puppets to narrate the action. It's fast, furious, and like being blasted by hits of nitrous oxide constantly without the pain of dental work.

This is a production that should be sought out by theatre patrons wanting something a little more powerful than a simple musical or another romantic comedy. LIDLESS is a play that looks at the darkest and lightest parts of our culture and our souls.

This is theater by design rather than organic moments of human emotion. The director has taken her background in dance and created a show that is colorful and choreographed as any ballet or opera would be.

Conversations can be hard to follow, and we're never quite sure what is happening with our couple or our hermit. We're just observing them as they try to fill in the gaps in their lives with items and words.

A GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE TO LOVE AND MURDER plays out as if you took SWEENEY TODD, let Gilbert & Sullivan rewrite the score, and staged it on a revolutionary picture book set that utilized digital scenery. It's a show that will have you smiling from start to final curtain, and it's got an amazing amount of energy to share with an audience.

Anchoring SINS OF THE MOTHER is a uniformly great cast who flesh out these roles with passion and sincerity. Key to the whole piece are sisters played by Shundranieka Ross and Sonya Gooden who do a duet of dizzying acting expertise.

HEATHERS the musical at TUTS Underground is very very. It's full of Swatch dogs, Diet Cokeheads, and teenage angst that comes with a body count... backed up by buoyant songs about being popular and pretty.

This is a community theatre that pulls off a spectacular English show by keeping things simple. They give EQUUS soul by playing it in their own voices, and they mine the depths of the emotions often missed in the wordy script and dream sequences.

It's charmingly adolescent, and full of cock and pecker jokes which feature prominently in this lark of a piece. Who knew Greek comedy could be so broad and bawdy?

I always turn to Catastrophic Theatre for the best in edgy experimental work in Houston. The thing about experiments though is sometimes they fail, and in this case I am afraid it does.

SPEAKEASY has a great cast, some catchy songs, a nice plot, and a great sense of interactive fun that should have audiences on their feet doing the Charleston.

The tour Broadway Across America has brought into Houston is outstanding in how it handles expectations and shatters them in new and original ways. This is a great production of a thought-provoking show, and it brings the Roundabout Theatre Company experience out of New York City.

TUTS Underground has a crowd pleaser on its hands, and this one should have a deservedly successful run with plenty of fans at the end of it. THE SWEET POTATO QUEENS tells a great story, has a solid cast, and is a ton of fun.

Like Garland herself, the show is obsessed with high energy musical uppers contrasted with dark dramatic downers in between. It's a roller coaster ride of songs mixed with self destruction as we watch a star orchestrate her own death.

A brave cast, a spot on director, and amazing technical direction just can't make STRAIGHT WHITE MEN appealing.

SHADOWS ON OAK ISLAND works best when it is looking at Jackson and Rene losing their child, and plunges into silly nonsense when trying to decipher the Knights of the Templar legends or hint at ghosts.

Main Street Theater's production of VENUS IN FUR is the sexiest and most thought-provoking play you can see in Houston right now. It's a pas de deux examining power between women and men, dominants and submissives, as well as actors and directors.

A.D. Players has taken their one act A CHRISTMAS OF MANY PARTS, and extended it to a more formal two act structure for the holiday season. It's a great deal of fun, and theater goers should find a lot to love here

Broadway at the Hobby Center has brought Houston one of the best touring versions of PHANTOM OF THE OPERA out there, and it notably soars hitting most all of the notes we demand. Audiences should have an absolute blast at this one.

Pitch Me This Productions has done a great job bringing THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW to life for this year's annual dose of absolute pleasure and sins of the flesh. The circus idea is fun, even if it doesn't truly make a ton of thematic sense with the Gothic material.