In the first five minutes of Last of the Red Hot Lovers, we learn just about everything we need to know about the main character without a word of dialogue, as he bumbles around his mother’s apartment, obsessively trying to odor-neutralize his fingers, blanching at the taste of scotch and anxiously preparing for his coming […]
Ira Levin’s Deathtrap boasts the title of longest running comedy-thriller on Broadway. Granted, there are only a handful of works that fall into such an oxymoronic category, so perhaps this isn’t as impressive an accomplishment as it may sound. It’s not difficult to imagine why so few plays like this exist; it’s a genre that […]
Epic Theatre continues its season, themed “Conviction,” by tackling one of the ultimate tests of conviction. Stephen Alby Guirgis’s 2011 play, Motherfucker with the Hat, tackles a challenge of addiction that is less often discussed but perhaps the most difficult: preventing a relapse. After the intense season opener, We Are Proud to Present…, this is […]
The Community Players open their 98th season with a community theater staple, Social Security, directed by James Sulanowski. It opened on Broadway in 1986 and ran for about a year, during which time it picked up a few awards, mostly for the set design. Locally, it has been performed by a few different community theaters […]
Right from the title, the play is a doozy: We Are Proud to Present a Presentation About the Herero of Namibia, Formerly Known as Southwest Africa, From the German Sudwestafrika, Between the Years 1884-1915. Not exactly a title that rolls off the tongue, is it? Written by Brooklyn-based playwright Jackie Sibbles Drury, this play places […]
Head Trick is returning to its roots with a classic Shakespeare in the park. As the opener of their 2018-19 season, themed “Making a New World,” this is the first of three forays into reimagining classic plays as escapism, as seen from the perspective of women, the LGBT community and people of color, rather than […]
Often considered among the greatest films of all time, Gone with the Wind got off to a wildly inauspicious start. A few weeks into filming, producer David Selznick suddenly halted production. He fired the director and brought in Victor Fleming straight from the set of a little film called The Wizard of Oz. He then […]
Beyond Button Hole Golf Course at 180 Button Hole Drive in Providence lies an unassuming strip of buildings. For years, the Academy Players have called the tiny black box theater inside home. However, this season, past visitors will notice that things look a little different … okay, a lot different. Thanks to the efforts and […]
For their last show at the 117 Washington St location in West Warwick, The Arctic Playhouse is taking audiences down the rabbit hole for the classic Lewis Carroll tale, Alice in Wonderland. Adapted by Brainerd Duffield, this version takes 14 episodes from “Alice in Wonderland” and “Through the Looking Glass” and knits them into a […]
When it comes to musicals about French revolutions, Les Mis has the market cornered. But there is another oft-forgotten musical about the same topic. The Scarlet Pimpernel came about a decade later, and like Les Mis, it was adapted from a novel. In addition to the glaring similarity in subject matter, there are some similar […]