Boston Theater Reviews: Best Shows & Critic Recommendations Page 41

BWW Reviews: Kate Burton Shines in Williamstown's HAPGOOD
by Larry Murray - July 12, 2013

With Kate Burton as 'mother' the Williamstown Theatre Festival stages a fluid though viscous Hapgood, Tom Stoppard's complicated send up of James Bond, spy stories and particle physics....

BWW Reviews: Bursting Through the Clouds in Commonwealth Shakespeare's TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA
by Alex Lonati - July 12, 2013

Commonwealth Shakespeare Company's production of Two Gentlemen of Verona, revamped in the style of Rat Pack Las Vegas, is bright and showy with neon colors, flashing lights and sporadic musical numbers, and is playing free in the Boston Common....

BWW Reviews: Energetic OKLAHOMA! from Berkshire Theatre Group
by Larry Murray - July 07, 2013

The timeless musical OKLAHOMA! is on stage again in the Berkshires of Massachusetts....

BWW Reviews: Sater's ARMS ON FIRE Doesn't Quite Ignite At Chester Theatre Company
by Marakay Rogers - July 01, 2013

Stephen Sater's world premiere play isn't setting the world on fire at Chester, but strong cast keeps the tinder lit...

BWW Reviews: Scrappy THE LION IN WINTER Opens Berkshire Theatre Group Season
by Larry Murray - June 30, 2013

Christmas is never easy, even if you are King. With three sons and continually plotting wife, there is no rest for the mighty....

BWW Review: Intimate SPRING AWAKENING at Gloucester Stage Company
by Nancy Grossman - June 28, 2013

A new season of plays on the theme of "Writes of Passage" blooms at Gloucester Stage Company with the 2007 Tony Award-winning Best Musical SPRING AWAKENING. The groundbreaking rock musical about adolescent love in an era of repression resonates, thanks to sensitive direction by Eric C. Engel and a f...

BWW Reviews: Fast Paced ANIMAL CRACKERS Opens Williamstown Theatre Fest
by Larry Murray - June 28, 2013

It may be an economy sized production, but it fills the bill as one of the funniest musical comedies ever conceived. Williamstown Theatre Festival goes all out to deliver a full course of music, theatre and dance for this venerable joyride....

BWW Review: Hamlisch Tribute Offers Smiles for a Summer's Night
by Nancy Grossman - June 27, 2013

The Cape Playhouse in Dennis Village is offering a bouquet of smiles for a summer's night with the world premiere of David Zippel's tribute show, THEY'RE PLAYING HIS SONGS: THE MUSIC OF MARVIN HAMLISCH, honoring both the man and his music. This bittersweet labor of love features the virtuoso piano a...

BWW Review: It's Smooth Sailing for JIMMY TITANIC at New Rep
by Nancy Grossman - June 25, 2013

As a one-man show, the Boston premiere of playwright Bernard McMullan's JIMMY TITANIC sinks or swims on the talents of Tir Na Theatre Company's Producing Artistic Director Colin Hamell. Leave the lifeboats tethered, for it's full-steam ahead with his tour de force performance in New Repertory's blac...

BWW Reviews: Theresa Rebeck's THE SCENE Springs to Life at the Dorset (VT) Theatre Festival
by Larry Murray - June 25, 2013

The Theresa Rebeck fable about the woman in black who turns lives upside down is on stage again, with some tweaks from the playwright....

BWW REVIEW: SPEAKEASY'S 'IN THE HEIGHTS' HEATS UP BOSTON
by Jan Nargi - June 23, 2013

Lin-Manuel Miranda's hip-hop homage to home is enjoying an extended run at the SpeakEasy Stage in Boston through June 30....

BWW Reviews: Impressive OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY at Vermont's Oldcastle Theatre
by Larry Murray - June 23, 2013

When the discussion moves beyond making money to the price that is paid for dismantling a company for profit, the full horror and shallowness of the practice is exposed. Never has a 25 year old play been so relevant....

BWW Review: NEVER FAR FROM HOME: A Cabaret of New Songs
by Nancy Grossman - June 22, 2013

The Cabaret Series continues to bring local artists and new songs to contemporary audiences at the Central Square Theater. Boston-based triple threats Cheo Bourne, Jennifer Ellis, Brian Richard Robinson, and Kami Smith look and sound great, backed by a trio of talented musicians....

BWW Review: Sexy Political MUCKRAKERS at Barrington Stage
by Larry Murray - June 21, 2013

Torn from the headlines, MUCKRAKERS is based on (but not about) Julian Assange and Bradley Manning and revealing government secrets, public privacy....

BWW Review: Reagle's CHICAGO is Splendiforous!
by Nancy Grossman - June 18, 2013

Reagle Music Theatre of Greater Boston celebrates its 45th anniversary season with Fosse-style high kicks, hip thrusts, and splayed hands in Director/Choreographer Gerry McIntyre's delightful production of the longest-running American musical in Broadway history. Sara Gettelfinger, Angie Schworer, a...

BWW Reviews: It's one Helluva ON THE TOWN at Barrington Stage
by Larry Murray - June 17, 2013

The full Bernstein score honors ON THE TOWN, not the truncated movie version, on stage with a great cast, stunning choreography and a fresh new approach under the artful hand of John Rando, director....

BWW Reviews: A Bit in the Dark in Happy Medium Theatre's BLACK COMEDY
by Alexandra Lonati - June 17, 2013

Sir Peter Shaffer's Black Comedy is a classic example of British farce, with abundant physical humor, extreme politeness, mistaken identities, and hidden passions. The story concerns a sculptor who aims to impress his fiance's father and a potential buyer by borrowing his neighbor's fancy furniture;...

BWW Reviews: Stirring HEROES Arrives at Shakespeare & Company
by Larry Murray - June 15, 2013

When three veteran actors from Shakespeare & Company set out to play 'Heroes,' there's no lack of excitement on stage, and even a little warfare....

BWW Reviews: Annette Miller Gets an A+ in MASTER CLASS at Shakespeare & Company
by Larry Murray - June 10, 2013

Maria Callas was one of the great prima donnas of Opera, and in Terrence McNally's Master Class she is played by the formidable actor, Annette Miller at Shakespeare & Company in Lenox, MA....

BWW Reviews: THESE SHINING LIVES Lacks Wattage
by Nancy Grossman - June 09, 2013

THESE SHINING LIVES tells the important story of a 1928 groundbreaking case which established legal precedents for labor safety standards still in effect decades later. Five factory workers, dubbed the 'Radium Girls,' sued their employer after contracting life-threatening radium poisoning while pain...

BWW Reviews: No Idea What You're Going to Get in Sleeping Weazel's REAL REALISM
by Alexandra Lonati - June 05, 2013

Sleeping Weazel, whose mantra is "making different possible", is currently presenting their own abstract piece, Real Realism at the Factory Theatre. In the piece, five strangers are stuck together in a windowless room, apparently unaware of their reason for being so, and discuss their own lives and ...

BWW Reviews: Barrington Stage gets Mixed Report Card for BASHIR LAZHAR
by Larry Murray - May 27, 2013

The premise of the play is that a teacher has committed suicide in her own classroom, a horror the children discover returning from recess. A substitute teacher is hired to take her place, and is expected to help them cope with their loss by pretending everything is normal....

BWW Review: High Seas Highbrow For The Lowbrow
by Nancy Grossman - May 17, 2013

PIRATES OF PENZANCE at the American Repertory Theater's Loeb Drama Center is tantamount to a three-ring circus being held at a beach volleyball tournament. There are beach balls, kiddie pools, beach chairs, and a grass cocktail shack. The cast performs as roving troubadours, each proficiently playin...

BWW Reviews: Lots Happening in Central Square Theater's DISTRACTED
by Alexandra Lonati - May 17, 2013

A show about how complicated raising a child now seems to be with the constant presence of technology, the media, new learning disabilities and disorders, and the fact that everyone is always on the move. Everything is much more complicated, and pure familial values are not always easy to find anymo...

BWW Review: Tap Legend Hines Sings and Tells His Story
by Nancy Grossman - May 16, 2013

Maurice Hines puts his passion for tap, his late brother Gregory, and classic Big Band music on display in TAPPIN' THRU LIFE: AN EVENING WITH MAURICE HINES. Backed by the Berklee College of Music Select Big Band, under the direction of drummer Sherrie Maricle, Hines tells his story, shows off his vo...