The first thing that strikes you about Bianca Marroquín is her light. If she were performing in a darkened room, she would make it brighter through sheer force of will. Her megawatt smile lighting every single corner it touched. After that comes her …Read more

Seamus Heaney’s The Burial at Thebes, a translation of Sophocles’ tragedy Antigone, was written as a response to the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Telling the story of one woman who dares to defy a king and society for what she believes is just, The Buri …Read more

For most writers, there is much catharsis in storytelling. In the case of Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s novella The Gambler, the real-life roulette addict wrote with considerable knowledge about a fictional roulette addict. The novel’s true purpose however, i …Read more

Recently, I had the pleasure of talking about the new play I and You by Lauren Gunderson, having its New York premiere Off Broadway at 59E59, and the process of developing new work with theater director Sean Daniels.  A few days later, I had the good …Read more

There are two major psychological forces at play in Chris Thorpe and Rachel Chavkin’s theater cum performance art piece Confirmation, which took place at the Invisible Dog Art Center in Boerum Hill as a part of New York City’s annual Coil Festival, a …Read more

The classic operatic double feature, Cavalleria Rusticana (Rustic chivalry) and Pagliacci (the clowns) is almost as sure as La Bohème to please Italian opera fans and newcomers alike. In fact, each of these short operas is almost never performed with …Read more

An exuberant play written and performed by Frank Boyd, The Holler Sessions, part of Performance Space 122’s Coil festival, brings jazz and Village charm to the forefront. From his cramped studio in Kansas City, the wiry, frenetic Boyd shares a loving …Read more

Invigorating fun best describes an early Sunday afternoon conversation with theater director Sean Daniels in the empty 59E59 theater, where Friday night I’d just seen the first preview of Lauren Gunderson’s stunning two hander I and You, a tour de fo …Read more

As much as we may love them, the julep-drenched eccentricities of Tennessee Williams’ plays have always cried out to be burlesqued. I have fond memories of a hilarious parody called Swan, presented decades ago on the campus of San Francisco State Uni …Read more

Four friends become entangled in a game of deception and seduction in Brendan Gall’s Wide Awake Hearts, an erotically charged work making its New York City debut at 59E59. Two actors, a director, and an editor working together on a movie, fail to see …Read more