Reviews
M Ensemble’s Harlem Duet Is Thought-Provoking But Wildly Uneven Look at Race and Sex
Playwright Djanet Sears has crafted an intriguing contemplation of the intersection of the macro issue of race on the micro-dynamics of an individual marriage in Harlem Duet. But Sears’ insightful script gets a hodgepodge treatment in M Ensemble’s production. Under the leadership of Artistic Director Lowell Williams, this edition is by turns subtle and overly-melodramatic, illuminating and opaque, clear and confusing.
Billy Elliot Mines Imaginative Staging, Superb Choreography
With its flights of imagination – literally, since the hero imagines himself soaring — Billy Elliot, The Musical is a triumph of theatrical staging. If this road tour at the Broward Center for the Performing Arts is not overwhelmingly moving, it remains one of the most thoroughly entertaining musicals to pass through here in some time.
GableStage’s A Steady Rain is a Deluge of Great Acting
The bond between two friends is tested by their own morality and betrayal in A Steady Rain by Keith Huff, now making in southeastern premiere at GableStage in Coral Gables. Together,actors Gregg Weiner and Todd Allen Durkin create a riveting pas de deux that is not to be missed.
Broward Stage Door’s Disappointing My Fair Lady Lacks Magic and Charm
This edition of My Fair Lady at Broward Stage Door is a disappointing muddle other than a few adequate performances under the direction of the usually reliable Michael Leeds. The first two thirds of this evening is mostly a listless, lackluster effort. Surprisingly, the quality improves so significantly in the final third of the show that you wonder if they switched out the casts. But by that time, it’s too late. Even at its best moments, and it has some, there’s no magic, no charm.
Theater Shelf: Show Tunes, Comic Operas and Singers Gordon MacRae & Howard Keel
Theater Shelf, a recurring feature, will review recently-released books, CDs and DVDs of interest to theater lovers. Some will be popular titles like a new Original Cast Recording, others will be works you’ll be intrigued by but didn’t even know about. Show Tunes: The Songs, Shows and Careers of Broadway’s Major Composers – Fourth Edition
Another Shade of Red at the Maltz Jupiter Theatre
Red, John Logan’s illumination of art and artists now at the Maltz Jupiter Theatre, is so insanely popular (50 productions licensed this season across the country; six in Florida) that snobs are beginning to sneer that anything that ubiquitous can’t be really good.Director Lou Jacob’s clear vision here, executed by Mark Zeisler as the abstract expressionist painter Mark Rothko and JD Taylor as his young assistant/acolyte, favors passion as its primary color.
Red Hot Lovers Sizzle At Broward Stage Door
Broward Stage Door Theatre has a knack for Neil Simon. Just when you thought there wasn’t much new to be done with yet another of Simon’s old chestnuts, the Coral Springs theater company presents a fresh production that’s entertaining from beginning to end. With its latest Last of the Red Hot Lovers, Stage Door loads one of Simon’s funniest plays with talent, which only makes the comedy soar higher.
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