Tag Archives: Peter Haig
Playhouse’s Noises Off Is Inherently Funny, But Uneven
Noises Off is one of the funniest farces written in the English language and a solid match for Actors Playouse talents. The laughs are plentiful, but this production didn’t wring everything out of this piece that you’ve seen done elsewhere.
Timely ‘All The Way’ Exposes How Your Sausage Is Made
Although the Actors’ Playhouse folks are working very hard to master this Everest of a play, All The Way, about Lyndon Johnson’s campaign to pass the Civil Rights Act of 1964, this time they have barely fought the work to a standstill.
Carousel Swirls And The Music Swells At Actors Playhouse
The miracle of the Carousel when it’s done well, as it is in this Actors Playhouse production, is that although it’s 72 years old and its protagonists are a wife-beating ne’er-do-well and the woman who stubbornly loves him despite the domestic violence, the bloody thing works in the 21st Century.
McCraney’s Choir Boy Examines Individual Struggling With A Conformist Society
A gay teenager leading a religious choir at a regimented prep school for African-Americans is a perfect theatrical metaphor for an individualist struggling to square his uncompromising self into a society built upon conformity. Elevated by thrilling music performed in five-part harmony, a depiction of this difficult dance is the premise of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s Choir Boy in GableStage’s intriguing production.
Home For The Holidays: Comedy In Making God Laugh Morphs Into Poignancy At Playhouse
Put Actors’ Playhouse production of Making God Laugh pretty much in the insightful column. Playwright Sean Grennan uses our recognition of the laughter and pain common to most familial relationships and uses it as a building block in his farcical comedy that transmutes into poignant drama.
McCraney’s Streamlined Hamlet Embraces The Music of the Bard
The miracle of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s streamlined Hamlet at GableStage is that even after surgically slicing two-thirds of the script, the result remains not only effective theater but pure if distilled Shakespeare. It honors the music of the Bard’s language, but places an equal premium on actors communicating a line’s meaning rather than being mindlessly captive to the poetry.
New Theatre’s Educating Rita Is Graded An Underachiever
It’s not encouraging when all through New Theatre’s production of Educating Rita you keep thinking what a great script Willy Russell wrote. This edition sloughs listlessly in the opening 45 minutes or so and really only begins to be mildly engaging near the end of the first act.
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