Drew Eberhard - Page 2

Fat Ham is a dramatic play, and a modern adaptation of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet. James IJames play received the 2022 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and was nominated for 5 Tony Awards, including Best Play.

9 to 5: The Musical is a stage adaptation of the 1980 film of the same name, featuring music and lyrics by Dolly Parton. This outlandish musical comedy features a book by Patricia Resnick, and is based on the screenplay by Resnick and Colin Higgins.

Songs For A New World is a musical theater work often considered a song cycle with music and lyrics written and composed by Jason Robert Brown. Originally produced off-Broadway at the WPA Theatre in 1995, this is Brown’s first produced work. Director of the 1995 premiere Daisy Prince said this about the show and it sums up the interwoven narrative the best...

The Butterfly’s Evil Spell was the first play written by twentieth-century playwright and poet Federico Garcia Lorca. Drawing much of its inspiration from the works of Yeats and Maeterlinck, the plot of Lorca’s play deals with the journey of an injured butterfly who is temporarily stranded amongst other insects, but does indeed fly away despite the love of a cockroach.

Based on the 2005 British film of the same name, the musical features music and lyrics by Cyndi Lauper, and a book by Harvey Fierstein. Mostly inspired by true events, the musical tells the story of Charlie Price, a man who is down on his luck and has just inherited a failing shoe factory from his father. To help save the business, Charlie meets and eventually befriends Lola, a local Cabaret performer and Drag Queen. The two form an unlikely bond and produce a line of high-heeled boots for a certain “niche market.” Through the business venture and unlikely partnership, the two discover they are not so different after all.

“There are songs that come free from the blue-eyed grass, from the dust of a thousand country roads. This is one of them.” These are the first words stemming from the first line of the Foreword in Robert James Waller’s sweeping tale of love, passion, and the ability to see another, as if you have been waiting for them your entire life.

With book, music, and lyrics by Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss, SIX is a modern retelling of the lives of the six wives of Henry VIII. The show is performed in a pop concert style, with each performer singing about their time with Henry and battling it out to see who suffered more, and can become the group’s lead singer. Therefore not making the plot overly complicated, SIX is a high-energy spectacle that is a good time from start to finish.

Into the Woods is a Tony Award-winning 1986 Musical written by Stephen Sondheim (Music/Lyrics) and James Lapine (Book), marking their second collaboration following Sunday in the Park with George (1984). Into the Woods premiered in 1986 at San Diego’s Old Globe Theatre and then was followed by a Broadway transfer in 1987 which amassed three Tony Awards (Best Score, Best Book, and Best Actress. A year in which many know the “Great White Way,” was dominated by The Phantom of the Opera.

This evening, or rather last evening, during their “Final Preview,” I was once again regaled to my seat with baited breath as I waited for the lights to fall on McDonagh’s masterpiece and, forthrightly, my favorite play, The Pillowman.

A Beautiful Noise is a Jukebox musical centered around Neil Diamond’s life, times, and music. It celebrated its Opening Night on Broadway at the Broadhurst Theatre on December 4, 2022. Garnering much acclaim, the musical grossed more than $1 million at the Box Office leading up to its official opening night performance.

MAD Theatre of Tampa proudly presents Rock of Ages, the high-energy, feel-good musical that takes audiences on a rock-and-roll journey back to the 1980s. Opening January 16 and running through February 2, 2025, this electrifying production will light up the Shimberg Playhouse at the Straz Center for the Performing Arts.

What did our critic think of USHERING IN THE HOLIDAYS WITH ITS A WONDERFUL LIFE: A LIVE RADIO PLAY at TampaRep?

Jobsite Theater once again dives headfirst into a world only they know how to portray. A world reveling in the strange, the unorthodox, and yet proving to be a masterclass of all things twisted and warped. This production which harkens back to their production of Shockheaded Peter, a few seasons back, once again dives into a little unfamiliar territory than we normally witness in the area, but an area so well known to Jobsite and its followers. Perfectly demented and, perfectly placed this deranged grouping of child-like tales have a bleak ending for most of the characters involved.

Somewhere in a world on a road less traveled, between the likes of The Rocky Horror Picture Show, American Psycho, Carrie, and the more recently conceptualized Beetlejuice lies the twisted campy world in which the characters of Evil Dead the Musical reside. First performed in 2003 in Toronto, this campy rock-filled musical made its transfer to Off-Broadway at New World Stages in 2006. In 2012 a production opened in Las Vegas as a 4-D Experience and complete with a 100 chair “Splatter Zone,”and as of 2017 making it the longest running theatrical experience on the strip. With Book, Lyrics, and Music by George Reinblatt, Evil Dead the Musical brought Sam Raimi’s characters to life in true blood-filled fashion.

Alice Paul...remember her? In 1920, she was THE WOMAN, THE SUFFRAGIST, who secured the right to vote for women, and wrote the unratified Equal Rights Amendment. Further explanation of her movement can be found in the recent musical Suffs, Shaina Taub’s musical which more recently won Best Book of a Musical at this years Tonys Ceremony. However, this is not Suffs, nor is this a musical. Instead, this is the blistering, hilarious, farcical take on women in the White House behind every dumb ass that could’ve ever held power. Its borderline lumbering subtitle says it all, “Behind Every Great Dumbass Are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive.” Selina Fillinger’s hilarious play proves just that. Women are in power, and behind every great man is a woman trying to save the day. Feminism at its finest, and proving that this is the moment to be alive.

In researching and marinating the events that played out in my head following the opening night performance of the Off-Central Player’s production of David Harrower’s Blackbird, I ran across this quote. The quote in which I will speak about is actually fitting to the play itself. I’m going to post it now as a way to reflect and then continue with my thoughts on the show itself. The quote states, “The best theater teaches again and again that before one can truly love another, one has to find justice and connection with oneself.”

Though Shakespeare’s Tragedy is often regaled as one of the “Greatest Tragedies ever written,” it does little if any true accounts behind the people these characters actually were. Regarded as being steeped in its history, one of Shakespeare’s most popular plays is actually founded in lore, and ghost story.