Tag Archives: Jim Gibbons

In Fine Performance, Misery’s Annie Wilkes May Seem More Familiar Today Than You Recall

An unintended resonance echoes in Empire Stage’s production of Misery that Stephen King likely did not quite foresee. In a world where some people steadfastly, even violently believe whatever they want to believe, somewhere Annie Wilkes is shrugging and asking “What’s your point?”

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Ben Butler About Race Relations Gains Added Spin at Boca Stage

The comedy-drama Ben Butler was meant to explore race relations when it was first produced in 2014. But this tale about a runaway slave seeking refuge on the cusp of the Civil War has taken on an extra spin at Boca Stage in light of the spread of the Black Lives Matter movement in the past few years.

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Rx: The Cure For What Ails You

For older audiences who see the number of expensive pills they take each morning magically multiply over the years, the wicked satire of Big Pharma in the otherwise romantic comedy Rx is welcomed at Boca Stage. But as cutting as Rx can be (one dotty scientist says “If I knew what we were doing, it wouldn’t be called research”) the Rx that playwright Kate Fodor prescribes for the modern malaise is, yes, love.

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Beckett’s Existential Happy Days Gifts Triumphant Performance

Thinking Cap Theatre’s stunning production of Beckett’s Happy Days, offers an unmitigated triumph of a performance by Karen Stephens expertly molded by Nicole Stodard, but to say this absurdist bleak work is not for everyone is a gross understatement. Some will downright hate it. Others will be transfixed. Few will escape without considering whether how we use the time of our lives is meaningless.

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Thinking Cap Unleashes The Wild Ambition of Dance Nation

Dare your adult to take your inner child to see Dance Nation at Thinking Cap Theatre in which adults play teenagers prepping for a competition. Were a prize given out today for Best Ensemble, the cast of Dance Nation would take home a trophy.

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Thinking Cap’s King Lear Is A Study In Imagination

Peter Wayne Galman in Thinking Cap Theatre’s production is a likeable Lear. He’s also narcissistic, ego-centric, driven, demanding, confused, playful and timeless. It helps that Galman delivers William Shakespeare’s poetry like the masters – think Ian McKellen, Sir John Gielgud. There isn’t a word that isn’t sacrosanct. He relishes the work, and, in turn, audiences will, too.

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Raucous ‘Women In Assembly’ Reflects An Unique Vision

Thinking Cap’s world premiere, Women In Assembly, is a satirical comedy credited to Aristophanes but transmuted into a bawdy irreverent satire about Greek women taking over government and reshaping it to their saner philosophies. It’s awash in inventive staging and the cast’s energy, but the riffs go on long after the underlying point is made.

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Straight White Men Succeeds At Thinking Cap Despite Thoughtless Jerks In Audience

Thinking Cap Theatre’s opening performance of Young Jean Lee’s Straight White Men might have been among the best nights of theater in South Florida so far this season. I say “might have been” because I can’t be sure. The evening was crippled by drunken thoughtless, self-centered, rude patrons who learned their audience etiquette from watching Jerry Springer reruns in their underwear at home.

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What Kind Of Year Was It? Our Critics’ “Best Of” 2016 Lists

Critics and award judges have been talking about it for weeks: The sheer amount of high quality work has made evaluating the last 12 months unusually challenging, but also an opportunity to remember one of the most rewarding calendar years in recent memory. So here’s a supremely subjective stab by all three critics here at Florida Theater On Stage at recognizing the shows and performances that stood out from a pack of productions.

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Thinking Cap’s ‘Death of Disney’ Is Wonderful World Of Challenging Theater

A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay about the Death of Walt Disney is not easy theater, by any means, but not one that Thinking Cap would ever shy away from. Their tagline is “theatre exploding with thought” and if any play fits the mission, this one does

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