It is 2022 still, so . . . a nostalgic romp through a bygone era with a whodunit twist? Bring it! Ken Ludwig transformed Agatha Christie’s novel into a riveting stage text. This timeless mystery is an examination of the limits of a justice system, which may account for its eternal appeal. I will say […]
Tag: Janet Ulrich Brooks
Posted inTheater Review
Pleasant posies
My daughter tells me she likes the 1989 movie version of Steel Magnolias because you can have it running in the background while you do other things, and still more or less follow the plot. The 1987 play the movie is based on has the same virtue. You don’t really have to use all your […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Tiny Beautiful Things gives us a “Sugar” rush
Cheryl Strayed’s advice column becomes a story circle in Nia Vardalos’s adaptation.
Posted inArts & Culture
The Children vividly imagines the worst-case scenario after an environmental disaster.
Playwright Lucy Kirkwood’s devastated world is nightmarishly familiar.
Posted inArts & Culture
Pipeline examines the opposite of white privilege
For some kids, the path to prison starts with just one bad day or one microaggression too far.
Posted inArts & Culture
Janet Ulrich Brooks leads a superb Master Class
Her magnetic, mercurial performance anchors TimeLine’s portrait of Maria Callas.
Posted inArts & Culture
Plantation! uses a sitcom sensibility to explore the case for reparations
The Lookingglass world premiere strives to be a very special episode.
Posted inArts & Culture
TimeLine Theatre’s The Audience is too admiring for the audience’s good
Peter Morgan’s drama gives us a Queen Elizabeth II dull in her dutifulness.
Posted inArts & Culture
Ostensibly a comedy, Victory Gardens’ Native Gardens terrifies
A poisonous dispute over two feet of dirt
Posted inArts & Culture
TimeLine’s Bakersfield Mist is a true tale gone bad
Playwright Stephen Sachs paints a shallow, schematic picture of an art-world saga.
Posted inArts & Culture
The Goodman’s 2666: Epic, eerie, and ultimately unfathomable
Roberto Bolaño’s sprawling novel becomes a phantasmagoric five-and-a-half-hour ride.
Posted inArts & Culture
Goodman Theatre helps redeem Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike
Christopher Durang’s overrated Tony Award winner is a case of absurdism lite.
Posted inBlogs
Reader’s Agenda Wed 2/26: The How and the Why, Metal Church, and Johnny Cash tribute night
What’s on the Reader‘s Agenda for Wednesday, February 26
Posted inArts & Culture
Biologists evolve in Timeline’s The How and the Why
The How and the Why survives on smarts and at least one great performance.