Terry Shea

As more new theater companies emerge across the state, particularly in the Providence/Cranston area, diversity and choice clash with opportunity and availability. Audiences and resources are stretched thin and the most immediate practical need – performance space – becomes a literal showstopper. Many theater companies form with a wealth of talent, but no place to […]

The one-person show is a producer’s dream. Less overhead, same ticket price, more control over the process. Often the domain of comedians and comedic actors, the one-person show does actually have an honorable dramatic tradition, often in the context of bringing to life historical personalities for either educational purposes or for a contemporary retelling of […]

Rhode Island theater, for the uninitiated, can be a complex mess of posters, social media events and pages of listings in the local papers. Even those folks who have been going to see shows at Trinity Rep or Theatre by the Sea for 30 years are shocked to hear that, on any given weekend, you […]

I don’t know about art, but I know what I like. This frustrating aphorism creates boundaries and absolves the person using it from the burden of responsibility for their opinion. It is how Everyman relates to the aesthetic in much the same way we can spout insensitivity with the qualifier, “I’m just saying…” Both phrases […]

In 1987, Theatre by the Sea was still a Tommy Brent operation and this writer was a teenage intern learning the intricacies of set building, ensemble acting, sound design for musicals and how to pick up a few extra dollars singing in the postshow cabarets. That season featured a nostalgic burlesque review called Sugar Babies, […]

Ever since Book of Mormon became a runaway hit, skewering a religious viewpoint via musical theater seems almost de rigueur, but this is fertile ground and Elemental Theatre’s latest iteration of their evolving (yes, evolving) musical, A Brief History Of The Earth And Everything In It does it better than most. Motif’s publisher briefly considered […]

Déjà vu is a singular experience shared by all. We all know how that ephemeral sensation can be maddening and heartbreaking all at once. Technically, of course, déjà vu has nothing to do with past lives, kindred spirits or wandering souls, but talking about the corpus callosum and misfiring synapses is a sure fire way […]