Photo by Julieta Cervantes When TV’s Murphy Brown was mocking singer Barry Manilow, I was buying his albums and attending his concerts. I was unabashedly a Fanilow. So I looked forward to “Harmony,” the musical that Manilow wrote with Barry Sussman, …Read more
A viewer should be prepared for intense theater when attending a Eugene O’Neill play. If the show is “Long Day’s Journey into Night,” she should be ready for a lengthy assault on her emotions. The original show ran close to four hours and had three i …Read more
Only Stephen Sondheim could have taken a motley group of would-be murderers and made them sympathetic and funny. At one time, a musical about killing presidents would have been controversial or startling. Certainly that was the case 30 years ago when …Read more
It felt strange to be attending a show last Saturday night instead of sitting in front of the television waiting for SNL to begin. Fortunately, the play was “The Search for Signs of Intelligent Life in the Universe” and the star was Cecily Strong, on …Read more
The playwright George Bernard Shaw must have been a feminist long before the movement became popular. He used his plays to decry the few opportunities for women and observed how they were being abused. His response was to create strong independent fe …Read more
If I had a product to sell, I’d hire comedian /actress Jackie Hoffman to be my spokesperson. With her rubbery face and perpetually dour expression, she’s believable. She would never lie! On top of that, with every line she delivers, every move she ma …Read more
The playbill for Bertolt Brecht’s play The Mother suggests immediately that the drama at The Performing Garage will be unique. Brecht himself noted that the aim of the play is not to entertain, but rather to “teach certain forms of political struggle …Read more
It almost felt normal. Although we had to wear masks to enter the theater and show proof of vaccination to get our seats, we were actually in an Off-Broadway theater sitting next to other patrons. Suddenly the house went dark and Fruma-Sarah (Waiting …Read more
