Duchess! Duchess! Duchess!
online

All you closeted Royalists lurking in the United States—you know who you are—are hereby warned that if you want to envision the British Empire's headline-making Duchesses of Cambridge and Sussex in this latest installment of Steppenwolf's NOW series of new plays, it's strictly on you. Vivian J. O. Barnes wrote her play in 2018, the two women who swap dialogue therein are identified only as "Duchess" and "Soon-to-be Duchess"—oh, and both are unambiguously Black.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
March 2021
Bad Dates

For great fun, and a breathless romp through one woman’s topsy-turvy life, Bad Dates, George Street Playhouse’s filmed version of Theresa Rebeck’s 2003 zany one-woman play starring Broadway actress Andréa Burns (In The Heights, On Your Feet, The Nance), is the hip place to be.

Ed Rubin
Date Reviewed:
March 2021
Baskerville
online

Baker Street purists are hereby warned that a) our sleuth's stimulant of choice is now, not cocaine, but tobacco, b) he is played by Breon Arzell (who is Black), while Dr. Watson is played by Meg Elliott (who is female), and c) the other 43 characters in Baskerville are played by a trio of actors (Rachel Livingston, Jason Richards and Gabriel Fries—one female and two male). This is because it's 2021, we're still in the middle of a pandemic and the adapter of our play is Ken Ludwig, author of the hit comedy Lend Me a Tenor.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
March 2021
Where Did We Sit on the Bus?
online

Brian Quijada's third-grade teacher might have been merely concerned with adhering to the lesson plan for illustrating the significance of Rosa Parks in the history of American racial desegregation, but when a pupil of Salvadorean immigrant parentage inquired, "Where did we sit on the bus?" her reply—"You weren't there"—raised cosmological questions sufficient to inspire a ninety-minute account of the young inquirer's search for an answer.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
Principal, Principle
online

Milwaukee’s Next Act Theater continues its all-virtual season with an excellent examination of public school dysfunction in Principal, Principle. Playwright Joe Zarrow, himself a former educator in Chicago’s public school system, must have been taking good notes while working in the classroom.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
Crucible, The
online

Family-friendly First Stage, one of the country’s leading theaters for young audiences, continues its all-virtual season with an audio production of the Arthur Miller classic, The Crucible. For children old enough to embrace a modern-day “radio show” format, this is a wonderful way to exercise their imaginations.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
Fannie: The Music and Life of Fannie Lou Hamer
Asolo Repertory - Terrace Stage

For two years, the pandemic has delayed full presentation of Fannie: The Music and Life of Fannie Lou Hamer, mainly by Goodman Theater, Chicago.  Preliminary versions were spatially limited, even  to a truck through the city and to Seattle Theater working on a West Coast showing. Finally, at Sarasota’s Asolo Rep, one of few major regional theaters presently offering big shows live, its administrative and production teams joined with those in Illinois and Washington to premiere, in a traditional way, all of Fannie’s important life and music to audiences.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
Odd Couple, The
Crighton Theater

Perhaps William Shakespeare was not predicting our approaching Texas pandemic winter storm when he wrote the line, “…Now is the winter of our discontent…” for Richard III in 1594. But who among us has not heard the phrase, “We’ll get through this!” during the harrowing past twelve months? Well maybe it’s true.

David Dow Bentley
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
Out, Darn Spot!

Op-night viewers might have thought they had logged onto the wrong vimeo, since the first fourteen minutes of Hell In A Handbag's latest online production is wholly devoted to a compilation of mid-20th-century vintage television commercials taking us from the wholesome family-oriented Fifties to the sensual youth-market Sixties. (Any of you Boomers remember Noxzema's "Take it all off" campaign?) The purpose of this chronology is to acquaint us with the dramatic universe occupied by our heroine, whose tragic demise is formatted in the mass media entertainment of the period.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
Tchaikovsky

The first name that comes to mind whenever the name Hershey Felder comes into play is that of actor Sacha Baron Cohen. Not only do both men physically resemble each other and are somewhat similar in age, but both are wizards, albeit at different ends of the spectrum, at being somebody other than themselves.

Edward Rubin
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
In Love with Shakespeare
The Bazaar

Using those of Shakespeare’s works in which love’s course does not in some way “run smooth,” In Love With Shakespeare consists of fully staged scenes from Midsummer’s Night’s Dream, Taming of the Shrew, Romeo and Juliet, and Richard III. In three of these plays, the romantic pairs aren’t as compatible—at least until the denouements—as the titled lovers in Romeo and Juliet.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
School Girls, or the African Mean Girls Play
online

Whether you're the privileged daughter of a rich father or a slum-bred bantling attending on a scholarship, it's not easy being one of the rare Nigerian girls lucky enough to receive an education. Not only must you excel at academic pursuits, but do so while modeling exemplary social skills and a veneer of cosmopolitan savvy to arouse the envy of your peers.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
February 2021
Escape from Peligro Island
online

Family-friendly First Stage offers its online viewers a new, interactive realm in Escape from Peligro Island . Depending on which way the audience “votes” throughout each live performance, the script will shift accordingly. This means that no two performances will ever be exactly the same.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
January 2021
Red Folder, The
online

We meet our narrator in the first grade, where the teacher hands out folders to each student for the purpose of collecting their work assignments—correctly finished ones in one pocket, and those containing errors in the other. As our hero struggles to overcome a persistent spelling glitch impeding successful completion of the tasks, however, the inanimate agents of his humiliation begin to verbally chastise him for his imperfections.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
January 2021
Fabulous Fanny
online

Have you heard the story of the famous comedian whose antics delight millions of devoted fans but whose personal life is a mess? Of course you have! No playwright ever lost money assuring audiences that behind every clown's smile lurks a tragic past. This moralistic myth becomes even more ubiquitous when our hap-hap-happy hero is a woman, doomed by our cultural biases to wallow in Marianistic melancholy in order to earn our pity and affection. 

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
January 2021
World is My Home: The Life of Paul Robeson, The
online

Paul Robeson was one of the most important figures of the 20th century. Actor, singer, scholar, activist, he dominated his era and redefined the black male image. He enjoyed great success until the McCarthy era, when America’s right wing turned on him for his leftist politics. The government not only feared him but hounded and blacklisted him, making it almost impossible for him to make a living in the USA.

Stogie Kenyatta dramatizes these facts in his stirring one-man play, The World is My Home—The Life of Paul Robeson.

Willard Manus
Date Reviewed:
January 2021
Black Woman on Purpose
online

Gift catalogues and television sitcoms would have us believe that women spend their days swilling white wine, relying upon diurnal infusions of caffeine to restore consciousness when expediency demands. The three generations of women in Michael Turrentine's play, Black Women on Purpose, conduct their daily zoom chat over whiskey, however—imbibed with no apologies (though Grandmother conceals hers in a tankard-sized coffee mug, Mother quaffs hers from a tumbler and teenage Daughter sips contemplatively from a rocks-glass).

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
January 2021
Meet Me in Saint Louis
online streaming

Whereas the new film version of The Prom disappoints, Irish Repertory Theater’s hybrid stage-screen production of the holiday classic Meet Me in St. Louis is more modest in its aims and succeeds in its execution. The beloved 1944 MGM film of St. Louis was previously presented on Broadway in an overblown 1989 stage version, and then IRT scaled it down for a cozy, intimate Off-Broadway adaptation in 2006.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
Skylight Sings
online

Milwaukee audiences who have been wishing for a glimpse of Skylight Music Theater performers will be pleased to learn that a Skylight-sponsored holiday-themed showcase is on view virtually through January 10, 2020. Skylight Sings: A Holiday Special from Our Home at the Cabot Theater has a stocking-full of musical gifts for the whole family, ranging from traditional seasonal music to Broadway show tunes, pop adaptations and, of course, a smattering of comedy.

Anne SIegel
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
We Need a Little Christmas
Asolo Terrace Stage

The title, “We Need a Little Christmas,” aptly conveys the sentiments of participants and audience for a scripted musical formed like a not-intimate cabaret concert.  The “need” is amply met by a quartet of singers (including a narrator) and a spectacular technical crew that creates a true spectacle of light and sound.  A live orchestra off to one side of the specially constructed Terrace Stage of Asolo Rep seems to urge every musical number happening across the center.

Marie J. Kilker
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
Chimes, The
online

Before Henry W. Longfellow heard the bells on Christmas Day, or George Bailey came to embrace his not-ungenerous fate—indeed, barely a year after Scrooge awoke from his ghostly holiday gallivant—Charles Dickens attempted to repeat the success of his bestselling holiday fable with a parable of New Year's epiphany, inspired by the Genoese cathedral bells he encountered while vacationing in Italy.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
Burning Bluebeard
online

It's only natural for a show conceived in a former funeral home, where the characters remind us that we are an audience watching a Christmas play about an audience that died while watching a Christmas play, to benefit from the ambience of its real-life environment.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
Hershel and the Hanukkah Goblins
online

Who doesn't like a good trickster fable? Whether the hero is a Norwegian teenager named Peer Gynt, a Chinese Monkey named Sun Wu Kong, a West African Spider named Anansi, or our own American Br'er Rabbit, we never tire of hearing how the Clever triumph over the Powerful.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
This Wonderful Life

The whole crew of Bedford Falls is gathered together once again for a live replay of the 1946 film, “It’s a Wonderful Life.” Except that, in 2020, the entire show is performed by a single actor, Nate Burger, a staple of the American Players Theater cast in Spring Green, Wis. This is APT’s first venture into virtual theater-making, and they make quite a splash with this terrific show.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
What is Left, Burns
online

It's 2020, in the midst of a nationwide health crisis. In one conference-call window on our screens is American Lit professor Keith—now middle-aged, divorced, estranged from his grown son, and recently relocated to Manhattan on the eve of his retirement. In the other window is former protegé Ronnie, now a successful young West Coast poet deserving of his former mentor's congratulations.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
Estella Scrooge
online

Streaming Musicals’s new holiday offering Estella Scrooge goes even further into stage-video hybrid territory with truly dazzling special effects—Tyler Milliron is listed as director of photography and editor, and Zach Wilson is credited with production art design. Subtitled “A Christmas Carol with a Twist,” this update on the immortal Christmas tale of a miser’s reclamation through the intercession of three spirits is a visual treat and chock-a-block with cuddly good intentions but feels forced and phony.

David Sheward
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
APT Holidames
American Players Theater

Although viewers are most often gazing at these three actresses while sitting on a hillside under a starry moon, now there’s a chance to see them in a far more intimate setting. Holidames: Tangled in Tinsel is more like a valentine to American Players Theater (APT) subscribers than a Christmas gift. It is broadcast virtually, right to one’s home. The talented women (under the spicy direction of Keira Fromm) undertake a veritable variety show of skits, songs, poems and even a bit of Charles Dickens to bring merriment to all.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
December 2020
Bette Davis ain't for Sissies
online

Of all the celebs channeled by drag queens and female impersonators, Bette Davis, like flies to honey, has always been at the top of every performers list. Her mannerisms, her clipped New England cadences, her famous lines like “fasten your seatbelt this is going to be a bumpy night,” and the forever dangling cigarette in her airborne hand, like the actress herself, are legendary.

Edward Rubin
Date Reviewed:
November 2020
Christians, The
online

Sometimes, life’s events seem to merge perfectly with the theme of a particular play. So it is with The Christians, written by award-winning, New York-based playwright Lucas Hnath (pronounced NAYth). A lively and thought-provoking look at Christianity, the play’s focus is also universal in terms of asking us about our personal beliefs, and what those beliefs say about us.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
November 2020
Great Divorce, The
online

C.S. Lewis wrote The Great Divorce, a novel, in 1945. The title derives from William Blake’s 1793 poem “The Marriage of Heaven and Hell.” It presents us with a set of travelers who take a bus from Hell to the outskirts of heaven and are offered the opportunity to enter heaven if they repent--that is, acknowledge their error. Most of the travelers decline the offer, wedded to their tragic flaw.

Steve Capra
Date Reviewed:
November 2020
She Kills Monsters
online

Family-friendly First Stage continues its season of entirely virtual plays with She Kills Monsters: Virtual Realms . This play was first performed at New York’s Flea Theater in 2011. It has had productions in various cities throughout the U.S., and over time it became one of the most-performed shows by U.S. high schools. The First Stage production is taken from the play’s recently released virtual version. It is a gripping, powerful look at some of the adult issues that teens face today.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
November 2020
Fragments
online

If Dee Dee Batteast's No AIDS, No Maids represented a sorely needed caveat for casting agents, directors and audiences alike on looking beyond cultural stereotypes, Karissa Murrell Myers’s Fragments now makes a case for a segment of our population likewise ignored, not based in demographical misapprehension, but in excessive reliance on taxonomical convenience.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
November 2020
Every Waiting Heart
online

Surprising as it may be to devout secularists, even religious communities hold "singles night" events—albeit declaring their purpose to be facilitation of ecclesiastically-approved marital attachments—and if Annette's Mom had just chosen to test the waters in the dating pool of a different denomination than that of a rock-ribbed sect whose adherents equate "strength" with discipline, obedience and self-denial, it might have saved both mother and daughter considerable pain.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
November 2020
Spin, The
online

In an unnamed American metropolis, the Public Works Director has been discovered to have a cache of pedophile images on his work computer, but even under house arrest awaiting trial, he threatens to reveal the identities of his fellow perpetrators, active and unwitting alike.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
November 2020
Coastal Elites
online

A pre and post-COVID-19-slanted offering muchly peppered with condemnation of Trump and the current administration – it was presented one time only this past September--was HBO’s Coastal Elites. Originally written to be performed as a play at New York City’s Public Theater by playwright, and novelist Paul Rudnick, widely known for his humorous and satirical writings which regularly appear in the New Yorker, and directed by Matthew Jay Roach (“Meet the Fockers,” “Trumbo,” “Bombshell”), the closing of all theaters in the city nixed that idea.

Ed Rubin
Date Reviewed:
October 2020
Line, The
online

Ever since Covid19 shut down our theaters, movie houses, museums, concert halls, opera houses, jazz clubs, and stadiums – in short, our entire country’s entertainment industry – thus robbing thousands upon thousands of singers, actors, writers, producers, directors, musicians, athletes and countless others, of their livelihood, not to mention their raison d’etre, a marked increase in entertainment offerings on TV, cable, online, blogs, websites and streaming services like Netflix, Hulu and Disney ensued.

Ed Rubin
Date Reviewed:
October 2020
Black Magic
online

Even if her late grandmother hadn't been a New Orleans spiritualist practicing under the agnomen of "Tituba" (after the Obeah sorceress referenced in the Salem Witch Trials), her death would still have left some big shoes for her granddaughter to fill. Eldest sibling Sasha's filial responsibilities include forsaking her roommates on the South Side of Chicago and moving into a two-bedroom apartment so that her college-bound brother can qualify for in-state tuition, even as she struggles to pay off her own student loans on a barista's wages.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
October 2020
Quest for Solomon's Treasure, The
online

Family-friendly First Stage, one of the country’s leading theaters for young audiences, begins its full season of entirely virtual plays with The Quest for Solomon’s Treasure . This world premiere is an original weekly serial that debuted on October 4, with installments arriving each Sunday. There are seven installments in this series. Solomon’s Treasure was created by veteran playwright John Maclay, who has debuted a number of popular First Stage shows over the years.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
October 2020
Weekend Comedy
online

Who would have thought that one of Milwaukee’s smallest theater companies would be the first to offer its audiences two tantalizing choices: to see an in-person performance, or stay home and watch a virtual production? Village Playhouse, located in a Milwaukee suburb, has done just that with Weekend Comedy. Prospective theatergoers can choose to see one of six live performances, with capacity restrictions of 20 people per show. (Social distancing will be provided in the audience seating.) Those with COVID concerns can opt to view a filmed version at home.

Anne Siegel
Date Reviewed:
October 2020
Box and Cox
online

There's these two guys, you see, and they're roommates—they just don't know it yet. This is because Mr. Cox is a hatter who works days, while Mr. Box is a printer who works nights, and Mrs. Bouncer, their landlady, has discovered she can charge two rents for the same furnished apartment.  To be sure, Mr. Cox has detected a lingering odor of cigar smoke in his quarters, and Mr.

Mary Shen Barnidge
Date Reviewed:
October 2020

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