Reviews

Judy’s Back and In Delray Beach At Theatre At Arts Garage

There’s no room for missteps at the intimate Theatre at Arts Garage cabaret. In this production of Beyond the Rainbow: Garland at Carnegie Hall everything is up close and very personal in a creatively re-imagined staging of the show.

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Class Struggle And Coping With The Past Makes Good People Great Theater At Gablestage

Cut through the South Boston accents and into the fibers of Good People, and you’ll find that David Lindsay-Abaire’s 2011 Tony nominee is a character study of the finest sort. However, the fact that the lead character, Margie has remained in South Boston’s Lower End should not be understated — this attachment to one’s childhood roots is what forms the foundation of Good People, now at Gablestage.

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Jim Brochu’s Character Man Is Affectionate Amble Through Broadway’s Past And Its Pros

If you’ve dreamed of sitting in the upstairs bar of Sardi’s to hear journeymen trade war stories about Broadway’s past, you can get a taste at Jim Brochu’s new one-man show, Character Man. The veteran New York actor-playwright, who triumphed in 2009 with Zero Hour, spends a couple of acts at Broward Stage Door recollecting his meetings with famous and not-as-famous stalwarts from Jackie Gleason to Jack Gilford, Zero Mostel to David Burns.

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Actors Playhouse Rated P For Parenthood Is Frothy Fun

Rated P For Parenthood at Actors Playhouse is a 90-minute hoot that bowed off-Broadway last year strings together almost 30 vignettes that chronologically trace the joys and absurdities of raising a child from conception to empty nesting.

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Dramaworks’ Man of La Mancha Is Far More Than Staged Concert

Beautifully sung, passionately acted and staged with as much movement and business as anyone can ask of a limited rehearsal period, Palm Beach Dramawortks’ concert version mines much of the beauty and heart from one of the most glorious scores and emotionally-affecting scripts in American musical theater.

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Slow Burn’s Wedding Singer May Be A Trifle But It’s A Cute Hoot

fSlow Burn Theatre Company’s daffy production of the summer trifle The Wedding Singer feels like a sweet, sloppy kiss from a scruffy dog that could really use a trip to the groomer, but who’s lovable all the same. What this silly smile of a show undeniably lacks in polish and consistency, its cast makes up for with grinning enthusiasm and goofball abandon

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Summer Shorts Is, As Usual, A Daffy, Uneven, Goofy Smile

By Bill Hirschman Sometimes for actors, especially playing comedy, the only option is to jump off the cliff and see if you can fly. The miracle is that sometimes, as in City Theatre’s Summer Shorts, is that, indeed, they soar. …

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Broward Stage Door’s Brighton Beach Memoirs Stumbles A Bit, But Is Genuinely Touching

Acknowledge that Broward Stage Door’s revival of Neil Simon’s thirty-year-old warhorse Brighton Beach Memories is uneven and stumbles. Then acknowledge, at least this critic will, that Stage Door’s edition frequently reaches into that moldy storehouse of decades-old memories of family relationships — and makes the throat close up, the eyes mist and starts a sudden epidemic of sniffling around the auditorium.

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Outre Stages Solid Outing Of Larson’s tick, tick…BOOM!

Outré Theatre Company has mounted a smooth and solid production of Jonathan Larson’s other produced work, the semi-autobiographical rock musical tick, tick…BOOM! Built around an impassioned and winning performance by Mike Westrich as Larson’s stand-in, Artistic Director Skye Whitcomb and Music Director Kristen Long have created an emotionally satisfying evening worth the trip to Boca Raton.

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Dramaworks’ Dancing At Lughnasa Is Slow Sweet Elegy

Amid blockbuster musicals and dysfunctional family dramas, one of the disappearing genres of theater and much of art is the slow, sweet sad song. And as Palm Beach Dramaworks’ slow, sweet sad production of Brian Friel’s Dancing at Lughnasa shows, nobody sings them like the Irish.

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