1880, South Africa: The Queen’s flag flies high and proudly; Victorian roles of men and women are clearly defined; classes are correctly divided; whites rule and those of color serve; social norms are clear, and proper manners are strictly followed. Well, that is at least true until Caryl Churchill paints a bit different picture of what that supposedly blissful life is … [Read more...] about Cloud Nine
Mother of the Maid
A girl in her late teens announces to her Ma, “Saint Catherine bin’ appearin’ to me,” to which her mother glances up from cleaning burrs from sheep wool and says sweetly, “Oh, she’s a lovely saint; that’s lovely, Joanie.” When the girl describes how the Saint “fills me up … slays me … takes me apart” and that she can feel Saint Catherine “here and here” (her hands cupping her … [Read more...] about Mother of the Maid
Bull in a China Shop
Mary Emma Woolley (1863-1947) was the first female to attend Brown University, a women’s suffrage advocate, a peace activist, and the president of Mount Holyoke College (MHC) from 1900 to 1937. She was also in a secret relationship with a former student who became an English professor at MHC during the years Woolley was there, Jeanette Marks. Recently, MHC hosted a digital … [Read more...] about Bull in a China Shop
Miss Saigon
The story originating from Puccini’s much-beloved opera Madame Butterfly is well enough known that most audience members arrive – as they might for Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet – anticipating the tragic ending to its ill-fated love story. Decade-long runs both in London and New York in the 1990s as well as continual, packed-house tours worldwide these past twenty years also … [Read more...] about Miss Saigon
Gypsy: A Musical Fable
The show that New York Times revered and feared theatre critic Ben Brantley has referred to as “what may be the greatest of all American musicals” and Times essayist/columnist Frank Hart Rich Jr. once called “Broadway’s own brassy, unlikely answer to King Lear, Gypsy: A Musical Fable in the end is nothing without a Rose who can join a long line of divas of a certain age to try … [Read more...] about Gypsy: A Musical Fable
A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Coming off recently winning four Theatre Bay Area Awards for this past year’s Twelfth Night, the Arabian Shakespeare Festival opens A Midsummer Night’s Dream that should also be a top prospect for both production and acting awards in the coming year. Shakespeare’s oft-performed, much-loved comedy of love spats and mishaps; fairy shenanigans; and a hilarious play within the … [Read more...] about A Midsummer Night’s Dream
Amaluna
With seventy per cent of the forty-eight-member cast and all of the musicians and singers being women, Cirque du Soleil’s nineteenth and latest show touring the world – Amaluna – is a tour de force of female power and prowess. In an evening where the reverberating voices, the gasp-producing athleticism, and the eye-popping pageantry of women reigns supreme, no better segment … [Read more...] about Amaluna
Testmatch
Cricket – a sport created by England and played today mostly by the mother country and countries of her former Empire – becomes the backdrop for Kate Attwell’s Testmatch, now in its time-traveling, gender-bending, hard-reality-and-parody-prolific world premiere at American Conservatory Theater. A Pandora’s Box of issues bursts open in the course of the ninety-minutes, including … [Read more...] about Testmatch
Anne of the Thousand Days
To produce Anne of the Thousand Days on the stage is a huge undertaking, given the breadth of events and the number of players with names familiar both to history and Shakespeare buffs. Dragon Productions has taken up the challenge of presenting on its intimate stage with a cast of eight this sweeping drama involving twenty named characters and a number of other servants and … [Read more...] about Anne of the Thousand Days
The Cake
“If cake were free for everybody, there would be a lot less problems in the world.” In fact, or at least so goes Della’s thinking, invite the leaders of ISIS into her cakery – Della’s Sweets in Winston, North Carolina – and a few bites of her butter cream icing might just improve their dispositions for good! As soon as we meet Della in Bekah Brunstetter’s play, The Cake, it … [Read more...] about The Cake
Elevada
He is a self-proclaimed “online agitator” with four-to-five million followers who rarely leaves his apartment or takes a shower and has never been on a blind date. She is on her eighth, online-generated, first-date in the past three weeks (alas, no second dates yet). He has signed a contract with a megacorporation to sell his identity and cease to exist as a person for the … [Read more...] about Elevada
Urinetown the Musical
When Mark Hollmann’s (music and lyrics) and Greg Kotis’ (book and lyrics) Urinetown the Musicalpremiered in 2001, critics and audiences alike immediately could list a plethora of targets for its biting, yet hilarious satire: corporate greed, political bribery, liberal naivite, mismanaged bureaucracies of all types. Experiencing in 2019 the highly entertaining, laugh-out-loud, … [Read more...] about Urinetown the Musical
Monty Python’s Spamalot
One of the joys of any Monty Python’s Spamalot production for all of us musical lovers are the obvious (sometimes painfully so) parodies that Eric Idle and John Du Prez continually insert on other musicals such as Les Miserables, Fiddler on the Roof, A Chorus Line, West Side Story, and anything by Andrew Lloyd Webber. In addition, the show’s over-the-top stunts, eye-popping … [Read more...] about Monty Python’s Spamalot
The Daughters
In 1955 their meeting in a San Francisco apartment could have resulted in all of them being arrested, losing their jobs, and being shunned by family and friends. In 2015, their having a special place in the City by the Bay to meet was deemed as no longer needed (or financially viable). In a matter of sixty years, was it time to declare triumphantly, “Face it, we won!” as … [Read more...] about The Daughters
The Rocky Horror Show
Hot men and women in sensuous, black corsets of torn lace and slicked leather who are raised on high by heeled boots, all singing and dancing in rock numbers that are precursors of later musicals like Grease or Hairspray can mean only one thing: The Rocky Horror Show is yet once again in revival. Generations of costumed, crazed audiences around the world have sustained … [Read more...] about The Rocky Horror Show
