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Mabou Mines deconstructs Ibsen, plus The Civilians

In the Heights
I have been looking forward to this Obie-winning allegory built on Ibsen's A Doll's House since it opened in New York in 2003.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | November 08, 2011

The Divine Sister's comic convent at SpeakEasy Stage

Team spirit
Larry Coen directs SpeakEasy Stage's Boston premiere of Charles Busch's The Divine Sister, this time without Busch's gender-bending talents in the starring role of Mother Superior.

By: MADDY MYERS | November 02, 2011

Cambridge moves to Boston in Before I Leave You

Autumn garden
Fear of mortality is a domino in Before I Leave You, the play with which 72-year-old dramatist Rosanna Yamagiwa Alfaro, who has been flexing her inky fingers in Cambridge for 40 years, enters the big time.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | November 02, 2011

Tina Packer explains the Bard for you

Will power
Tina Packer has been in bed with Shakespeare for at least 40 years.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | October 25, 2011

Lyric's Or, mines the Restoration

Before and aphra
Liz Duffy Adams's dramaturgical homage, Or, , is more florid than floral and sometimes clever bordering on cute. But the play, being given a brisk area premiere by the Lyric Stage Company of Boston (through November 6), is ingenious.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | October 18, 2011

ASP's Twelfth Night enters laughing

Clown show
The challenge in any production of Twelfth Night isn't the love triangle.

By: STEVE VINEBERG | October 12, 2011

Zeitgeist skips through Tony Kushner's short plays

Serious fun
The fall season has begun with a lot of starry events.

By: ED SIEGEL | October 05, 2011

SpeakEasy's heart-wrenching Next Fall

Revelations
It's a story you've heard before: a young gay man, raised by Bible-thumping Southern parents who would disown him if he were to come out, moves to New York City.

By: MADDY MYERS | October 05, 2011

John Malkovich freaks out at ArtsEmerson

You don't know Jack
In the flesh, the thing itself was about as odd and amusing as it had appeared on paper: John Malkovich delivering the "confessions" of convicted Austrian serial killer Jack Unterweger while accompanied onstage by a Baroque orchestra and a couple of sopranos singing arias.

By: JON GARELICK | September 30, 2011

Laurie Anderson is still really good

Mother lover
If I hesitate to offer a review of Laurie Anderson's Delusion (at ArtsEmerson's Paramount Center through October 2), it's because I fear the whole thing will be just one big spoiler.

By: JON GARELICK | September 30, 2011

Brustein takes another look at Will's world

Bardic fun
Call it the revenge of Tom Stoppard. Considered a great contemporary playwright by most theater writers, Stoppard has been something of a punching bag to Robert Brustein, one of America's most distinguished critics.

By: ED SIEGEL | September 20, 2011

Lyric Stage navigates Big River

Finn tuning
Compared to the mighty Mississippi, Big River is just a Tony-winning tributary. But to borrow a lyric from its composer, Roger Miller, the show climbs on the river's back and rides.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | September 13, 2011

New Rep's new Rent stays mostly true, with one twist and some noise

Highs and lows
Every director who helms Rent must struggle in the shadow of the original production.

By: MADDY MYERS | September 14, 2011

Groundlings, rejoice: The 11 most anticipated theater shows of the fall

Stage worthies
Fall came early to Boston boards this year, bringing with it "Summertime."

By: CAROLYN CLAY | September 14, 2011

I loves you, Porgy

The A.R.T. streamlines a classic
So shoot me, Porgy purists. To my mind, the retooling of The Gershwins' Porgy and Bess for American Repertory Theater is compelling enough to push past quibbles.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | September 02, 2011

Brits, Yanks, and Horovitz still fighting over Beverley

Dockside doll's house
What if Nora Helmer had waited until she turned 70 to slam that door heard 'round the world?

By: CAROLYN CLAY | August 30, 2011

Tina Packer tackles Molly Ivins

Patriot game
Red Hot Patriot is the work of twin-sister journalists Margaret and Allison Engel, the former the head of the Alicia Patterson Foundation, which awards journalism fellowships, the latter communications director for the University of Southern California.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | August 23, 2011

Intriguing Love Song hums two tunes

Heart heist
Comedy and metaphor collide in the plays of John Kolvenbach.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | August 11, 2011

Reimagining Porgy and Bess

The A.R.T. takes on the Gershwins' classic and prep it for Broadway
In the new production at the American Repertory Theater, directed by Diane Paulus, Messrs. Heyward and Gershwin have been reworked by two actual African-Americans: two-time Obie Award winner Diedre L. Murray and Suzan-Lori Parks, the first African-American woman to win the Pulitzer Prize.

By: EUGENIA WILLIAMSON | August 12, 2011

All's Well on Boston Common

Love sick
I think of Measure for Measure , with its fanatically chaste heroine, and All's Well That Ends Well , with its lovely lass in pursuit of a lout, as Shakespeare's "Smart Women, Foolish Choices" plays.

By: CAROLYN CLAY | August 08, 2011

Company One takes on Jason Grote's whirling 1001

American Nights
Grote uses the same framing device as the original One Thousand and One Nights , which begins with Shahriyar (Nael Nacer) discovering his wife's infidelity and deciding that the only way to prevent his future wives from cheating is to marry virgins, deflower them, and execute them the next morning.

By: MADDY MYERS | July 26, 2011

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