Tag Archives: Margaret M. Ledford

We’re Still Here: A Look Back at South Florida Theater 2022

Quite a come back year: World premieres, epic musicals, moving two-character dramas, you name it. Here’s not so much a “best of the year” list – no such list can be reliable or complete – but a random recognition of outstanding performances, productions, trends and just moments that theaterlovers will carry with them into 2023.

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City Theatre’s Constitution May Be Season’s Most Important Play

The contradictions of what we say the Constitution is, what we want it to be, and what it really is, what it really does are at the heart of one of the most timely and important pieces of theater to be produced in South Florida this past year — City Theatre’s What the Constitution Means to Me.

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Summer Shorts Finally Gets to Celebrate 25th Anniversary

Like death and taxes, one of the few truly dependable things in life is that the venerable Summer Shorts from City Theatre is going to be a satisfying mix of light comedy with a few mildly serious moments. And its silver anniversary production remains a thoroughly entertaining source of 10-minute plays executed by a seasoned cadre of pros.

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Post-Partum Woes Turn to Madness in Theatre Lab’s Bow Overactive Letdown

Buckle up if you’re attending the world premiere run of Overactive Letdown at Theatre Lab as a new mother spirals out of control in a harrowing descent into madness. Crumbling under the post-partum pressures of caring for an infant, aggravated by today’s tsunami of parenting dictates, our heroine Christine’s considerable intelligence, humor and charm evaporate.

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Dickens Nailed It: South Florida Theater Two Years In Review

If Dickens’ opening line in A Tale of Two Cities has become a trite cliché through overuse it has become a painfully accurate truism about theater over the past two years, especially South Florida theater. Crippling loss and inspiring resurrection. Surrender and perseverance. And , now, the Covid threat has reasserted. But looking back on those two years delivers a testament worth celebrating and learning from.

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Racism & South Florida Theater: Changing The Dance Steps

Asked to spotlight specific problems and potential solutions, everybody had a story of racism infecting the South Florida theater community. Some cited unintentional micro-aggressions in pressure-laden rehearsals. Others underscored systemic failings whose reform will require leaders, supporters and audiences to revaluate everything from what goes on stage to who decides what goes on stage.

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GableStage Opens Commissions For Brand-New Online Works

GableStage is coping with the death of Joseph Adler plus the shuttering of live performances, but it has started new initiative meant to originate new material and support artists financially. Engage@GableStage is commissioning original world premieres for online works that mirror the theater’s vein of thought-provoking stories. Proposals/applications for the grants will be accepted through June 12.

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City Theatre’s The Cake Honestly Explores Multiple Layers Of Current Controversy

City Theatre’s production of The Cake, about a baker who refuses to make a cake for a lesbian couple, digs deep below stereotypes to examine the contemporary clash between sincerely held principles that threaten to cripple relationships among people who care for one another – or at least have to live in the same world.

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She Shorts Is Female-Centric, But Message Is For Everyone

Alright ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls, she’s and he’s, and those who would prefer not to self-identify, Thinking Cap Theatre and City Theatre’s summer short play fest, She Shorts is for you, so that means everybody.

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Miami’s Shorts Is Once Again A Welcome Summer Cooler

They make it look so easy.

The 23rd annual City Theatre Summer Shorts crew slip seamlessly from broad comedy with a hint of a moral to bittersweet drama with a soupcon of dry wit and back again in nine separate playlets.

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