Rotterdam: I liked its inhabitants

by | Jun 23, 2023 | Review

This production of Rotterdam from the new queer company Under His Lyre features good work by emerging actors in a script that’s pretty bad. In Rotterdam, playwright John Brittain tells the story of Fiona and Alice. They’re a couple, and Alice is just about to...

As You Like It (most of the time)

by | Jun 19, 2023 | Review

It’s wonderful. There are holes in it. But it’s still wonderful. When I first saw director Daryl Cloran’s Beatles-inspired adaptation of As You Like It in its premiere at Bard on the Beach five years ago, I was smitten. Cloran has cut half of Shakespeare’s text and...

Beautiful (in some ways): The Carole King Musical

by | Jun 17, 2023 | Review

There are so many great songs in this show. And there’s so much talent on the Arts Club stage. But there’s so little story in Beautiful: The Carole King Musical that it often feels more like a concert than theatre. Douglas McGrath’s slim book follows the legendary...

A Flea in Her Ear: There are powders for that

by | Jun 4, 2023 | Review

All sorts of people call A Flea in Her Ear one of the great farces. I’m not sure if the script is salvageable. Written by Georges Feydeau in 1907 and seen here in the 2006 adaptation by David Ives, Flea concerns a woman named Raymonde Chandebise who suspects her...

God Said This: bluntly

by | Jun 3, 2023 | Review

Leah Nanako Winkler’s God Said This explores important experiences, but does so in annoyingly sentimental and on-the-nose ways. Fortunately, in this Pacific Theatre production, there are significant rewards in both the performances and physical production. In the...