Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Tyler Core. I strongly dislike writing negative reviews. I know that the cast and crew of any show work hard for a long time to create what they are presenting to the public, and a negative review can feel like a slap in the […]
Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Cody Jolly Photography. Harvey Fierstein’s playwrighting career was launched with his sensitive Torch Song Trilogy back in 1982. Though he has spent most of the time since then working in the showier world of musicals (Kinky Boots, Hairspray and others), he returned to the […]
Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Sarah Heilbronner of Aviva Media Company. Jillian Leff’s (Non)Fiction, now playing in a world premiere by the Right Brain Project, is one of those intense little black box gems that so often seem to arrive under the radar at Chicago’s neighborhood theatres. Presented on […]
Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Michael Brosilow. Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Into the Woods has been a source of joy and fascination to me since its 1987 Broadway premiere. I listened to and wore out recordings of its soundtrack long before I ever actually saw the show, and […]
Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Emily Schwartz. Elinor Cook’s impressive, poignant Out of Love belongs to an unfortunately rare genre: plays that, without pulling punches, highlight and explore the complexity of women’s relationships. Its two protagonists, daughters of friends, grow up together and remain connected all of their lives […]
Review by Ed Rubin, member of American Theatre Critics Association, NYC’s Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle; photo by Carol Rosegg There are probably greater painters than Noël. Greater novelists than Noël, greater librettists, greater composers of music, greater singers, greater dancers, greater comedians, greater tragedians, greater stage producers, greater film directors, greater cabaret artists, […]
Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Austin Oie. All Quiet on the Western Front by Erich Maria Remarque is probably the quintessential fictional account of WWI, a novel with German protagonists overwhelmed by the harsh realities of a war they had signed up for after being assured it would be […]
Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Joe Mazza/Brave Lux. When Babes With Blades’ Women in 4G begins, it feels like a fairly normal murder mystery, albeit set in a spaceship orbiting Mars: the captain, who happens to be the only male aboard the small vessel, is killed, and the women […]
Review by Karen Topham, American Theatre Critics Association member; photo by Jhenai Mootz. It’s Shakespeare versus an army of cicadas at Oak Park Festival’s Much Ado About Nothing and, at least for the first half hour or so, the insects clearly have the upper hand. As the expositional scenes of the play set up the […]
Review by Ed Rubin, member of American Theatre Critics Association, NYC’s Drama Desk, and Outer Critics Circle; photo by Jeremy Daniel. While New York City recently celebrated the 50th anniversary of the Stonewall uprising with much hoopla and an enormous, traffic-stopping Gay Pride parade that went on well into the night, New York’s Lincoln Center […]