Lyric Stage’s ‘Assassins’ Hits the Mark

September 19, 2023September 19, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Cast of “Assassins” at Lyric Stage Company. Photos by Mark S. Howard

‘Assassins’ – Music and Lyrics by Stephen Sondheim. Book by John Weidman. Courtney O’Connor (Director). Dan Rodriguez (Music Director). Ilyse Robbins (Select Choreography). Baron E. Pugh (Scenic and Lighting Design). Rachel Paula-Shufelt (Costume Design). Alex Berg (Sound Design). At Lyric Stage, Clarendon Street, Boston, through October 15, 2023.

by Linda Chin

Like the late composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim, Lyric Stage has not shied away from exploring challenging themes or dark material. But opening a theatre season in the angry aftermath of a post-Trump America with one of Sondheim’s less familiar works – about violent attacks on U.S. presidents, no less – is a risky proposition. Assassins takes us into the minds of nine men and women who gained notoriety through our nation’s history because they killed (or failed to, but gave it a good shot) former Presidents Lincoln, Garfield, Roosevelt, McKinley, Nixon, Ford, Reagan, and Kennedy). Not exactly uplifting fare, but in the capable hands of director Courtney O’Connor, music director/conductor Dan Rodriguez and his four-piece orchestra, and 15 outstanding actors, audiences can expect a thoroughly engrossing and entertaining theater experience.

“Prayer for the French Republic” Tackles Existential Issues with Humor, Grit and Gravitas

September 19, 2023December 26, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Cast of The Huntington’s ‘Prayer for the French Republic’. Photo by Nile Hawver.

‘Prayer for the French Republic’ – Written by Joshua Harmon. Directed by Loretta Greco. Scenic Design by Andrew Boyce. Costume Design by Alex Jaeger. Lighting Design by Christopher Akerlind. Sound Design and Composition by Fan Zhang. Presented by Huntington Theatre, 264 Huntington Ave., through October 8.

By Shelley A. Sackett

Playwright Joshua Harmon has a gift for tackling important, profoundly challenging and topical subjects and, through sheer brilliance of characters and dialogue, creating intimate and accessible theater that both rivets his audience and leaves them in a standing ovation of thunderous applause.

He did it with “Bad Jews,” “Admissions,” and “Significant Other,” which Boston theatergoers had the good fortune to see at SpeakEasy Stage Company. Thanks to the Huntington Theatre’s season opener, the 2022 Drama Desk Outstanding Play Award-winning “A Prayer for the French Republic,” they have the opportunity to experience this supremely talented writer’s latest and most ambitious project.

And experience it they should.

Speakeasy’s ‘POTUS’ Mines Chaos, Laughs in the Oval Office

September 19, 2023September 19, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Cast of SpeakEasy Stage’s production of “POTUS.” (Courtesy Nile Scott Studios)

“POTUS; Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive” – Written by Selina Fillinger. Directed by Paula Plum. Scenic Design by Jenna McFarland Lord; Sound Design by Audrey Dube; Lighting Design by Karen Perlow; Costume Design by Rebecca Glick; Fight Choreography by Angie Jepson. Presented by Speakeasy Stage Company at the Boston Center for the Arts, 527 Tremont St., Boston, through October 15

by Mike Hoban

There’s a lot to like about POTUS, the opening production for Speakeasy Stage’s 2023-2024 season. Featuring not only an all-female cast but an all-female production team, this lightning-paced farce sends up the absurdity of a crew of over-qualified, under-appreciated women propping up a misogynistic boob as he bumbles his way through his leadership role. Only in this case, it’s not an American corporation or institution; it’s the most pressure-packed job on the planet – the U.S. presidency.

“TOPDOG, UNDERDOG” at the Gamm Theatre

September 13, 2023September 18, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Anthony Goss and Marc Pierre in Topdog/Underdog at the Gamm. Photo by Cat Laine

Reviewed by Tony Annicone

Gamm Theatre’s opening show of their 39th season is “Topdog/Underdog,” the 2002 Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Suzan-Lori Parks, the first African-American woman to win the prize. In 2023 this show won the Tony Award for Best Revival of a Play. This play is about brotherly love, sibling rivalry, and surviving the American Dream. The story centers on two fiercely competitive African-American brothers with a troubled past who share a room in a squalid boardinghouse. The two brothers are Lincoln and Booth. Lincoln is an ex-card shark now working a “straight” job impersonating Abraham Lincoln at an arcade, while Booth is a petty thief set on surpassing his older brother’s reputation as a notorious three-card Monte hustler. Director Cliff Odle casts these two roles splendidly and elicits multilayered performances from both actors. They fully embody these two characters, displaying what makes them the way they are. The audience discovers where they’ve been and how each has either changed or stayed the same. It examines how these two brothers live in dire economic circumstances and how they try to navigate them differently. As Lincoln and Booth, Anthony Goss and Marc Pierre display great depth of emotions as these two siblings. Their brilliant performances propel the audience to their feet at the end of the show. Bravo on jobs well done.

With “The Half-God of Rainfall,” A.R.T. Once Again Breaks New Production Ground

September 13, 2023September 13, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Cast of “The Half-God of Rainfall,” at A.R.T. Credit: Lauren Miller

‘The Half-God of Rainfall’ – Written by Inua Ellams. Directed by Taibi Magar. Movement Direction by Orlando Pabotoy. Scenic Design by Riccardo Hernández. Lighting Design by Stacey Derosier. Sound Design and Music Composition by Mikaal Sulaiman. Projection Design by Tal Yarden. Orisha Movement Consulting/Choreography by Beatrice Capote. Costume Design by Linda Cho. Presented by American Repertory Theater in co-production with New York Theatre Workshop. At Loeb Drama Center, 64 Brattle St., Cambridge, through Sept. 24.

By Shelley A. Sackett

Will we ever become inured to the other-worldly team at American Repertory Theater and its ability to sprinkle fairy dust on Boston’s theater scene? With “The Half-God of Rainfall,” now in production through September 24, the answer is a resounding “No!”

It helps that Nigerian native Inua Ellam’s sinuous play is a masterful blending of unlikely ingredients: Greek mythology and Nigerian Yoruba spirituality, a war between mortals and gods, basketball, toxic patriarchy, white supremacy, female empowerment, and maternal love. Couple that with a script crafted as an epic poem, a stellar cast that works as a seamless ensemble, and breathtaking choreography, lighting, and sound designs, and well, you have all the makings for a night of unparalleled theatrical pageantry.

The scope and ambition of Ellam’s work is staggering.

“A Raisin in the Sun” Captivates at New Rep

September 9, 2023September 18, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Lorraine Victoria Kanyike, Joshua McKenna, Juanita A. Rodrigues, Valyn Lyric Turner, Damon Singletary, and Jon Vellante in “A Raisin in the Sun” at New Repertory Theatre. Photos by
Ken Yotsukura Photography

by Michele Markarian

“A Raisin in the Sun” by Lorraine Hansberry. Directed by Lois Roach. Presented by New Repertory Theatre, 321 Arsenal Street, Watertown, MA through October 1.

“Colored folks ain’t gonna get ahead in the world unless they start investing in some different things,” Walter Lee Younger (Damon Singletary) says to his wife, Ruth Younger (Lorraine Victoria Kanyike). Walter is tired of chauffeuring around rich white men and wants to do something of his own, namely, set up a bar with two friends. He’s hoping that his Mama Lena (the magnificent Juanita Rodrigues) will give him access to an insurance check coming to the household, after the death of his father, Walter. But Lena wants to move her family to a more spacious home in a nice neighborhood, rather than stay in the dilapidated apartment she’s had since the beginning of her marriage. Walter feels trapped, caught between two oppressors – the white world of privilege and his domineering mother. His manhood, and judgment, are affected by it. When a mild-mannered white man, Karl Lindner (Jon Vallante), from the neighborhood association of the home they’ve yet to move into comes to the apartment with a proposition, Walter Lee has to decide what kind of man he wants to be.

Trinity Rep’s “The Good John Proctor”

September 3, 2023September 16, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

by Tony Annicone

Trinity Repertory Company’s opening show of their 60th season is “The Good John Proctor” by Talene Monahan. The show is a prequel to Arthur Miller’s “The Crucible” as Monahan imagines the inner lives of the four young girls whose accusations led to the witchcraft trials in Salem, MA, in 1692. The girls were pre-teens, but in this show, they are portrayed by adult actors and told from their viewpoint. All the girls in real life were actually much younger; Abigail Williams was 11 years old; her cousin, Betty Parris, was nine years old; young high-strung Mercy Lewis sought solace in alcohol while Mary Warren was an epileptic orphan. When Abigail started working for 60-year-old farmer John Proctor, their lives started to unravel from playing with poppets and churning butter into something completely unexpected. However, John Proctor doesn’t appear in this play at all. Director Kimberly Senior casts these four roles beautifully and elicits stunning performances from all of them.

Becky Nurse Of Salem Bewitches at Trinity Rep

August 31, 2023October 1, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

The cast of *Becky Nurse of Salem*. Photos by Mark Turek.

Reviewed by Tony Annicone

Trinity Rep’s second show, performed in repertory with “The Good John Procter,” is “Becky Nurse of Salem” by Sarah Ruhl, which is the better one of the two. Becky is a descendant of Rebecca Nurse from the Salem witch trials and was also a character in “The Crucible”. This Becky is plagued with a curse of bad luck that she needs to be exorcised so she can get on with her life. She is a poor 52-year-old grandmother who is raising her granddaughter and struggling to make ends meet. The cast sings “Sweet Children Mine,” and then we first meet Becky as a museum docent as she tells the “high school” audience the tales of witchcraft in the city and where Rebecca Nurse was hung either at what is now Dunkin Donuts or at Walgreen’s. She also drops some F-bombs in front of the nuns and is she is fired from her job. The audience follows her roller coaster journey from there to the end of the show, where we all learn the most important thing in life is to love and be loved. The audience leaped to their feet at the end of the extremely poignant and comic show, masterfully presented by director Curt Columbus and his extraordinary and talented seven-member cast. Brava to leading lady Angela Brazil on her breathtaking performance, who never left the stage in this two-hour and fifteen-minute show.

Gloucester Stage ‘s Thought-Provoking ‘The Ding Dongs’ is a Theatrical Tour-de-Force

August 15, 2023December 26, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Erica Steinhagen, Karl Gregory, and Nael Nacer in Gloucester Stage Company’s ‘The Ding Dongs’

‘The Ding Dongs’ — Written by Brenda Withers. Directed by Rebecca Bradshaw. Costume Design by Camilla Dely; Lighting Design by M. Berry; Sound Design by Julian Crocamo. Presented by Gloucester Stage, 267 East Main St., Gloucester, through August 27.

By Shelley A. Sackett

We’ve all been there. That split second when we realize that all may not be as it seems, that we have misread a vital clue and that all is about to go south. The Ding Dongs, in production at Gloucester Stage through August 27, takes that moment and straps it to a steroid drip.

Don’t be put off by the title, as I almost was. (Is it a tribute to Hostess? To a bebop group? To the comedic wrestling duo?) The Ding Dongs will keep you on the edge of your seat for its entire 75 minutes from lights up to fade out and leave you dying to talk about it to anyone within earshot.

When is the last time theater had that kind of visceral effect?

Goodspeed’s ‘Summer Stock’ is a Feel-Good, ‘Get Happy’ Experience

August 3, 2023 michaelhobanLeave a comment

Corbin Bleu and the cast of Goodspeed’s ‘Summer Stock’. Photo by Diane Sobolewski

‘Summer Stock’ – Book & Additional Lyrics by Cheri Steinkellner. Direction and Choreography by Donna Feore. Music Supervision, Arrangements, Orchestrations by Doug Besterman. Music Direction by Adam Souza. Scenic Design by Wilson Chin. Costume Design by Tina McCartney. Lighting Design by Jeff Croiter. Sound Design by Jay Hilton. At Goodspeed Musicals, East Haddam, CT, through August 27

by Linda Chin

Post-pandemic, performing arts venues across the country are reporting difficulties maintaining their subscriber base or filling seats, but at Connecticut’s Goodspeed Musicals, this does not seem to be the case. Based on the classic 1950 MGM film featuring Gene Kelly and Judy Garland, Summer Stock was rewritten and updated by Cheri Steinkellner (Cheers, Sister Act) to tell a story that appeals to modern audiences, supports a diverse cast of characters, and includes many more songs than the nine in the film. With delightful direction and classy choreography by Donna Feore, jazz-inspired musical arrangements by Doug Besterman, and expert music direction by Adam Souza, eight musicians (including Souza on keyboards) and a cast of 20 triple-threats perform over 20 song and dance numbers. From start to finish, Goodspeed’s Summer Stock is a feel-good “Get Happy” experience.