Category: theatre

“To the outsider, the American infatuation with British theatre – specifically its knights and dames – might seem a trifle silly. Dazzled by the crisp accents and whiff of royalty in the titles, plenty of New York audiences swoon at imported London productions, feeling that our workaday theatre has suddenly become a linen-napkin affair.”

Early word on the musical stage adaptation of Disney’s “Little Mermaid” is apparently not so great. “Given Variety’s brutal review (which was written not by a local stringer but by the paper’s chief theater critic) and the show’s tepid industry word-of-mouth, theater people are starting to wonder: What’s gone wrong in the Magic Kingdom – and, if ‘Mermaid’ flops, how much longer will Disney keep throwing its cartoons at Broadway stages?”

“Whereas last autumn at least had the commercial transfers of Rock ‘n’ Roll and Frost/Nixon to set pulses racing, this season is offering retreads, however fresh, of familiar territory: even All About My Mother, like Elling before it, comes to us already a cinema brand name. Not for the first time, one is reminded of the large-scale, commercially viable new play as an endangered species, which is another way of saying that you can’t rely on Alan Bennett and Tom Stoppard to keep theatre afloat every year.”

The Orlando high school canceled after the local Episcolpal Bishop complained. The bishop was surprised “that any high school would sponsor this particular production,” he wrote. “Having to put a ‘PG-13’ warning label on a dramatic production certainly seems an unusual decision for a Christian preparatory school.”

“Site-specific performance has long been a way for young, cash-strapped artists to circumvent the red tape and expense of doing a show at a traditional theater. Enterprising local producers have staged work on and around grain elevators, in driveways, even aboard a succession of automobiles. But a cemetery?”

Disney’s latest effort to recreate the theatrical success of The Lion King and Beauty and the Beast is getting downright dismal reviews in its out-of-town tryout. The Little Mermaid, playing in Denver prior to a November leap to Broadway, was slammed by Variety’s chief critic, and some observers are wondering how much longer Disney will be willing to spend millions of dollars “throwing its cartoons at Broadway stages” if Mermaid goes to a watery grave in New York.

New York is known for staging theatrical performances in unusual locations – think how strange Shakespeare in the Park must have sounded when first proposed – but a musical on a barge? That can’t be easy to pull off. The opening performance “will be the culmination of a yearslong odyssey from concept to performance that involved surmounting death and bureaucracy, illness and poverty, logistical challenges and timing foul-ups in steadfast dedication to a creative vision.”

The Massachusetts-based Berkshire Theatre Festival has roots that stretch far and wide around New England, but the most striking thing about its history is how female-centered it is. “The festival has its roots in expressions of female ingenuity,” was founded by a woman looking to preserve a prized local building, and this season, is focusing squarely on plays that highlight “social aspiration and the cost of women’s advancement.”

Vaclav Havel’s decades-long return to the theatre has been delayed because of his decision to pull his latest play from Prague’s National Theatre after its refusal to allow his wife to play the lead role.

“Seeing as broad a range of work as possible, in as many locations as possible, is invaluable for any critic, but is there a danger of seeing too much?”