Greg Kerestan - Page 5

What did our critic think? Split Stage continues to provide a haven for adult-oriented semi-pro theatre. The plot, overly convoluted by design, parodies eighties movie comedies with a 'let's save the rock venue' stream of cliches that get mercilessly savaged. Wannabe rocker Drew (Gabe DeRose) can't seem to make a love connection with nubile waitress Sherrie (Raegan Hochman), while German real estate developer Hertz (Hank Fodor) and his effeminate son Franz (Caleb Feigles) attempt to turn the Sunset Strip into a strip mall. All this mixes with a stream of colorful characters like a hair metal rock god (Michael David Stoddard), a social reformer hippie (Clair Ivy Stoller) and pair of chaotic-bisexual club owners (Josh Reardon and Bill Elder).

What did our critic think? There are a few cultural institutions in the Pittsburgh area of which I'm not just a supporter, I'm an outright stan. Chief among these are the Pittsburgh CLO summer season, the annual farce at Saint Vincent Summer Theatre (more on that later this week), and the Bites and Pints festival at Kennywood. I love live music, delicious food, thrill rides, even the dubious charms of seeing a guy walk around in a kangaroo costume on a hot summer day. (That poor Kenny Kangaroo is a real sport to play along as much as he does.)

Des McAnuff's once-revolutionary 'biopic musical' is still the best in its genre.

Des McAnuff's slick docudrama production style may not be anything new, but it still works like a charm.

Ken Ludwig's farce-mystery hybrid works much better than you'd imagine.

At this point, writing a review of Lin-Manuel Miranda's almost infamously popular hip-hop musical feels redudant. It's Hamilton, people. Go see it.

It may not be a musical anyone especially asked for, but a winning cast and some splashy production makes this one a winner anyway.

You owe it to yourself to see the most divisive musical of the year... or maybe of the decade.

Pop culture is full of paeans to the composer or the playwright; just this past fall, Andrew Garfield starred in Tick Tick... Boom! on Netflix as the young Jonathan Larson. But outside of insider tell-alls, there's not a lot of focus on the behind the scenes creatives of the theatrical world, especially the dramaturge. As a sometimes dramaturge myself, I know the position is misunderstood if it's understood at all: the shepherd of a new work, the dramaturge assists in the creative development of a piece by advising the author and the creative staff, doing research and providing insight and input on structure, tone and other aspects of the work in progress. You can imagine my surprise when I discovered that, one particular weekend, Pittsburgh was showing not one but TWO new plays about the role of the dramaturge in the theatrical process.

While I have my music-nerd quibbles, this is pretty damn good for a non-union touring production.

Hell is other people's favorite restaurant in Wendy MacLeod's quirky date-night comedy.

It's hard to argue with the line-up for Pittsburgh CLO's star-studded concert anniversary.

You don't know what you've got 'til it's gone, and that includes live event entertainers at your local theme park.

Part play, part TED Talk, and part experimental film, Lauren M. Gunderson blends biography, science and fiction into a heady brew.

Sure, this espionage thriller may be treading old ground, but that's just because nothing has changed.

Is it a play? Is it a movie? Is it a dance show? Who cares, it's 'Frankenstein!'

Scott P. Calhoon's dreamlike staging of the S. E. Hinton classic finds moments of beauty and adrenaline in the sometimes clumsy prose of a young adult classic.

This may be Shakespeare's dumbest play, but Alan Stanford's production is still smarter than just about anything else you'll see this year.

I had a conversation with the cast and director of a local production of Cabaret a few days ago, about how theatre changed with the advent of the Internet. The visual presentation and iconic look of shows became much more relevant, much more permanently associated with shows, once photographs and video were as easy to find as cast recordings. You'll rarely if ever see a Cabaret that doesn't exist in the shadow of the Sam Mendes production, or someday a Hamilton without some of the iconic visual and performance signifiers. I'm not even calling it design laziness or plagiarism: the shows of today simply exist in a more tangible, permanent form than they did before the late 1990s. With that said, there's something to be said for productions that take some of those iconic elements and ignore them, crafting something different instead. Split Stage's production of Next to Normal reinvents one of the central characters, and it changes the entire piece.

There are enough fresh touches in this staging of an iconic musical to keep you from getting bored, but enough familiarity to keep you forever on the verge of singing along.