From time to time, to quote my favorite song from Dear Evan Hansen, “words fail.” At the moment, words fail as I search for a way to describe (and adequately praise) a show whose gentle beauty and emotional force defy description, and which, ironical …Read more

“Whether on stage in front of an audience, or over the phone to a friend – we need to tell our stories. When we tell our stories, we give others permission to do the same. This is how we break the stigma.” So says Adina Taubman in the program note fo …Read more

Mary Todd Lincoln: misunderstood First Lady, bereft mother, obsessive widow–and now, the unlikely subject of a trippy piece of experimental theatre. In american vicarious’ new work Shooting Celebrities, written by John Ransom Phillips and directed b …Read more

I was hooked from the title. As someone who loves folk music and was largely raised on “songs about trains,” I was pretty sure I was going to love it before I even stepped into the theatre: a darkened auditorium with hanging lights, antique-looking c …Read more

Much has been written (and, especially lately, staged) about marginalized people’s troubled relationships with the non-marginalized. But what about the relationships of different marginalized groups with each other? When a young Chinese immigrant fal …Read more

Women have really been getting screwed over from the beginning. That was one of my takeaways from #SoSadSoSexy, presented by Tapestry Collective at The Tank. Written and created by Emily Cordes, Alison Leaf, and Kendra Augustin, and directed by Simha …Read more

If you’re a Shakespeare aficionado who wants to laugh out loud for two hours straight and doesn’t mind a touch of bawdy humor, then Jane Anger is for you. The Jennifer Campos Production, currently playing at the New Ohio Theatre, reimagines what migh …Read more

In my experience, any production that includes Steve Earle on its creative team is sure to have at least a few good things going for it. In the case of Coal Country, Audible Theater’s new limited engagement of The Public Theater production at Cherry …Read more

In Debate: Baldwin vs. Buckley at A.R.T./New York South Oxford Space, the american vicarious recreates the famous event word for word, with Teagle F. Bougere as Baldwin and Eric T. Miller as Buckley. (Christopher McElroen directs.) The debate may be …Read more

Living in Harlem definitely has its benefits. Recently, it meant that I could walk a few blocks from my apartment to the small but significant cultural treasure that is the Harlem Stage Gatehouse, spend a couple hours jiving with Pedrito Martinez and …Read more