Boston Theater Reviews: Best Shows & Critic Recommendations Page 16

BWW Review: MACBETH at Actors' Shakespeare Project
by David Tompkins - November 04, 2018

In Saturday Night's performance of Macbeth at The United Parish Church, Brookline, MA, Nael Nacer as Macbeth, (and in an inspired bit of casting as Macduff's son), was truly outstanding, backed by a strong company of actors. This production of Macbeth is the world premiere of a new verse translation...

BWW Review: HAIRSPRAY at North Shore Music Theatre
by David Tompkins - November 01, 2018

The 2003 Broadway Musical Hairspray, with a Tony Award-winning book by Mark O'Donnell and Thomas Meehan and a Tony Award-winning score by Marc Shaiman and Scott Wittman featuring the hit songs 'Welcome To The '60s,' 'You Can't Stop The Beat,' 'Mamma, I'm A Big Girl Now,' 'I Know Where I've Boon,' ...

BWW Review: THE ROOMMATE: Strange Middle-aged Bedfellows
by Nancy Grossman - October 27, 2018

It is probably an unintended coincidence that the Lyric Stage Company's production of Jen Silverman's two-hander, THE ROOMMATE, passes the Bechdel Test with flying colors, even as FUN HOME, based on Alison Bechdel's graphic novel/memoir is onstage down the street at the Boston Center for the Arts. F...

BWW Review: EMERSON STRING QUARTET AND SHAI WOSNER at Alice Tully Hall At Lincoln Center
by Joanna Barouch - October 26, 2018

The Emerson String Quartet's concert on Sunday, October 21, 2018 was a rich and satisfying chamber music feast....

BWW Review: SpeakEasy Stage's FUN HOME: It's To Die For
by Nancy Grossman - October 23, 2018

FUN HOME is a true story about real people, and Producing Artistic Director Paul Daigneault's production at SpeakEasy Stage Company, the Boston regional premiere of the 2015 Tony Award-winning musical, will make a believer out of anyone who sets foot in the Roberts Studio Theatre. Based on Alison Be...

BWW Review: THE TRAGIC ECSTASY OF GIRLHOOD: Teen Angels?
by Nancy Grossman - October 20, 2018

Inspired by her experiences working in the recreation department at a youth residential care facility in the Lone Star State, Kira Rockwell has written a fictional story about five adolescent girls that portrays their back stories, personalities, and behaviors with authenticity, while trying to eras...

BWW Review: WE WILL NOT BE SILENT: A Rallying Cry For The Resistance
by Nancy Grossman - October 18, 2018

New Repertory Theatre's mission is "to produce plays that speak powerfully to the vital ideas of our time," a statement which they adhere to vigorously. In this season, under the theme of "Awakening," New Rep presents the New England premiere of WE WILL NOT BE SILENT, a docudrama by playwright David...

BWW Review: Gloucester Stage Signs Off 39th Season With World Premiere MY STATION IN LIFE
by Nancy Grossman - October 17, 2018

Simon Geller and WVCA-FM, his one-man classical music radio station, were part of the local color of Gloucester, Massachusetts, for 24 years. From 1964 until he retired in 1988, Geller lived, breathed, ate, and slept to single-handedly produce commercial-free broadcasts from his in-home studio, doin...

BWW Review: Theater Uncorked Flies High With ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST
by Nancy Grossman - October 16, 2018

Theater Uncorked returned to the First Church Cambridge this past weekend for two performances of a staged reading of ONE FLEW OVER THE CUCKOO'S NEST, a 1963 play by Dale Wasserman, based on the novel of the same name by Ken Kesey. Lest the inmates run the asylum, the strong directorial hand of Bob...

BWW Review: FRANKENSTEIN: Monster or Metaphor?
by Nancy Grossman - October 11, 2018

The Central Square Theater, in conjunction with Catalyst Collaborative@MIT, has a corner on the market of blending art and science. It is no easy task to create intelligent, dramatic entertainment that can live up to their mission and put across its message with clarity, as well as artistry. However...

BWW Review: THE GLASS MENAGERIE at Barrington Stage Company Reminds Audiences That Simple and Easy are Not the Same.
by Marc Savitt - October 10, 2018

Thanks to Julianne Boyd and the team at Barrington Stage Company, Berkshire audiences can be transported back to a 'simpler time' through THE GLASS MENAGERIE....

BWW Review: Celebrity Series of Boston Kicks Off 80th Season with ALAN CUMMING: LEGAL IMMIGRANT
by Nancy Grossman - October 09, 2018

A year ago, almost to the day, Alan Cumming made his debut with the Celebrity Series of Boston, performing his touring show SINGS SAPPY SONGS at Sanders Theatre. This time around, Cumming and his quartet of crack musicians took the stage Sunday night at the considerably larger Symphony Hall, wowing ...

BWW Review: DIRTY SECRETS: A GOLDEN GIRLS LOST EPISODE: Fond Memories With a Twist
by Nancy Grossman - October 08, 2018

Playwright/director Michael Gaucher and Bitter Bitch Productions bring a live edition of the beloved sitcom to the stage at Club Cafe. DIRTY SECRETS: A GOLDEN GIRLS LOST EPISODE is your chance to get up close and personal with the other Fab Four in Gaucher's original story, complete with song, dance...

BWW Review: SHERLOCK'S LAST CASE: Anything But Elementary
by Nancy Grossman - October 05, 2018

There is much fun afoot in this cleverly written, earnestly acted, and crisply directed play being revived on the main stage at the Huntington Theatre Company. SHERLOCK'S LAST CASE had its world premiere in 1984 in Los Angeles before transferring to Broadway for a short run in 1987 with Frank Langel...

BWW Review: NAKED at Berkshire Theatre Group closes the 90th season with twists, turns, and complexity.
by Marc Savitt - October 04, 2018

At each turn, characters undergo significant changes in personality, demeanor, and motivation. It can be both exhilarating and at times slightly confusing for audience members to watch the characters twist along with the plot. It is rewarding, however, as we are entertained by an exploration of th...

BWW Review: BETWEEN RIVERSIDE AND CRAZY: Seeking Asylum on the Upper West Side
by Nancy Grossman - September 27, 2018

Embarking on its 28th season, SpeakEasy Stage Company presents the New England premiere of the 2015 Pulitzer Prize-winning play BETWEEN RIVERSIDE AND CRAZY by Stephen Adly Guirgis. Director Tiffany Nichole Greene is the navigator and masterfully guides a stellar cast on this journey. From the openin...

BWW Review: JEKYLL & HYDE at North Shore Music Theatre
by David Tompkins - September 27, 2018

Jekyll & Hyde opened last night at North Shore Music theatre (NSMT) to yet another standing ovation and thunderous applause. Overall the evening was a winner....

BWW Review: NATIVE GARDENS Bloom at Merrimack Repertory Theatre
by Nancy Grossman - September 24, 2018

Merrimack Repertory Theatre opens it 40th anniversary season with NATIVE GARDENS, #8 on American Theatre magazine's list of the top 10 most-produced plays of 2018-2019. With a dozen theaters mounting Karen Zacarias' delightful tale that pits a millennial, Latinx couple against a white, baby boomer c...

BWW Review: Zeitgeist Stage Opens Curtain on Final Season With N.E. Premiere of VICUÑA
by Nancy Grossman - September 18, 2018

In news recently reported, the 2018-2019 season will be Zeitgeist Stage Company's last, after seventeen years of notable productions as an acclaimed stalwart of the Boston fringe theater scene. Artistic Director David J. Miller has never shied away from plays that deal with controversial or highly c...

BWW Review: East Coast Premiere of BEING EARNEST at Greater Boston Stage Company
by Nancy Grossman - September 17, 2018

What happens when you take an Oscar Wilde classic play from the Naughty Nineties, add about a dozen original musical numbers, and update the story and setting to London's swinging Carnaby Street in the sixties? Well, if you put it in the hands of Director/Choreographer Ilyse Robbins and Music Direct...

BWW Review: HIR at Shakespeare & Company pushes boundaries in a powerful examination of why people “DO” like they “DO”.
by Marc Savitt - September 16, 2018

HIR is anything but traditional. Playwright Taylor Mac has termed his work 'absurd realism' wherein 'the absurdity comes from a heightened but realistic point of view'. Those bold, brave, and open enough to sit in the discomfort that may come with looking at things from diverse points of view will...

BWW Review: World Premiere THE NICETIES: Brookline Playwright Burgess Takes Both Sides
by Nancy Grossman - September 16, 2018

Brookline playwright and former Huntington Playwriting Fellow Eleanor Burgess captures the zeitgeist in her fast-paced and intense new play, THE NICETIES, now receiving its world premiere by the Huntington Theatre Company at the Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts. Inspired by a 20...

BWW Review: KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN: The Power of Love
by Nancy Grossman - September 13, 2018

Lyric Stage Company opens its 44th season with the Tony Award-winning (seven, including Best Musical) KISS OF THE SPIDER WOMAN, directed and choreographed by Rachel Bertone, with music direction by Dan Rodriguez, who gets pizazz and a far bigger sound than anyone would expect from a five-piece orche...

BWW Review: STRAIGHT WHITE MEN: Boys Will Be Boys
by Nancy Grossman - September 11, 2018

New Repertory Theatre presents the New England premiere of Young Jean Lee's STRAIGHT WHITE MEN, most recently seen on Broadway over the summer. Lee became the first Asian-American female playwright to have a play produced on Broadway with this exploration of privilege, identity, and American values ...

BWW Review: THE BLACK CLOWN World Premiere at A.R.T.
by Nancy Grossman - September 08, 2018

World premiere musical theater piece adapted by Davone Tines and Michael Schachter from 1931 Langston Hughes poem, 'The Black Clown.' Dramatic monologue with orchestral accompaniment is part elegy, part declaration of independence, and part celebration which resonates in 2018 America. Tines gives a ...