One thing that fascinates me about anime culture is the heavy emphasis on music. Shows have so much music to pull from that Japanese theater companies are able to license titles for stage adaptations and use a lot of the…
Though the shows expected to rack up the nominations–Pippin, Matilda, Kinky Boots, and Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike–did just that, the 67th Annual Tony Award Nominations were filled with surprises. The biggest shocker, to me, is that the…
What is it that has kept us coming back to Shakespeare again and again for centuries? Is it the masterful wordplay? The colorful characters? The layers of meaning and themes interwoven throughout? The structure that binds each play together? Alan…
So far during Spring Into Suspense, we’ve focused a lot on horror, thrillers, and crime dramas. Naturally, these are not the only genres that benefit from suspense. Even comedies can riff on the uncertainty of what will happen next, though…
I’ve been obsessed with Carrie: The Musical for much of my life. The ill-fated big budget Broadway adaptation of the Stephen King novel and the Brian De Palma film has perplexed and delighted theater fans for years. The infamous soundboard…
I recently had the pleasure of chaperoning a group of advanced high school theater students to a production of Tony Kushner’s little seen play A Bright Room Called Day. I’ve known for years about the problematic text (and even saw…
Allegiance is an original musical with Broadway ambitions. They even called it Allegiance, A New Broadway Musical in some press releases earlier this year. It’s now more humbly subtitled A New American Musical but you just know they want to…
Jayne Houdyshell was nominated for Featured Actress in a Musical at the Tony Awards for her performance as Hattie Walker in the Follies revival. That character gets to perform one of the more cheerful and upbeat numbers in the show,…
Susan Blackwell has really grown to be a great interviewer. For her to take on the monumental task of interviewing all the winners backstage at the Tony Awards is one thing. To do it while maintaining her trademark wit is…
There’s been rumblings about a revised Side Show for a couple years. The cult musical about Daisy and Violet Hilton, conjoined twin side show performers, has a beautiful score. It’s a rare school year if a few of my theater…
There’s an odd trend popping up on Broadway that I’m getting a kick out of. Shows that recently closed on Broadway are coming back a year or two later for limited sit down engagements. This is not to be confused…
The 66th Annual Tony Awards were held last night and it was a great night if you were connected to Once or Peter and the Starcatcher. These two shows picked up the lion’s share of the statues last night. Once…
Despite what you may have been taught in school, not all of William Shakespeare’s plays premiered at the Globe Theatre. The theater was built for Lord Chamberlain’s Men, true, but it wasn’t constructed until 1599 and burned down in 1613.…
Seeing Taboo was one of those theater experiences I will never forget. Though the crowd was already dwindling by the time I caught it, the attendees were very enthusiastic. Taboo is a show that has a strong identity and will…