ATW NewsClips - Mid-Atlantic, New England, and Southern Print - The Week's Links

Washington Post

'Xanadu' Special Edition: Let the Good Times Roll

At the Source
A Local Theater Tradition Is Back, Thanks to an 'Electric Personality'

Rorschach Makes 'Progress'
Despite losing its performance space, Rorschach Theatre hits its stride with the provocative play "This Storm Is What We Call Progress."

Pushing the Envelope
The Post's theater critic picks the season's most (and least) ovation-worthy moments.

Hare's Strong 'Stuff,' Weakened by Time
Never in a million years would you mistake the deftly intuitive Washington actor Rick Foucheux for George W. Bush. Yet something in the way that Foucheux fixes his gaze and carries his body captures Bush uncannily in "Stuff Happens."

Abba-Dabba-Do!
"Mamma Mia!" is back at the National Theatre for the umpteenth time, and it's still irresistible enough that one audience member couldn't keep from interrupting a dramatic pause by soloing on the Abba chorus she knew was coming.

'Underpants' Frayed Around the Edges
Enjoying Little Theatre of Alexandria's production of "The Underpants," the 1911 lampoon of German bourgeois sensibilities from German satirist Carl Sternheim, might be primarily an exercise in managing expectations.

Theater: Desolate Places at the Mason Festival

'Neverending' Creativity: At Imagination Stage, a New, Puppet-Centered Adaptation of Michael Ende's Novel Favors the Fantastical Over the Familiar

Adventure Theatre's New Season

Theater: Source Fest Playwrights, Making Every Minute Count

Washington City Paper

Intensive Scare
Hypochondriacs and evangelicals find common complaints in two new productions

Twist of Deflate
Too many costume changes and not enough jokes in Irma Vep

Philadelphia Inquirer

Sherlock fans are in for a treat
'Logic is essential to the construction of a stage play." So Sherlock Holmes advises Oscar Wilde, in Katie Forgette's amusing and supremely logical Sherlock Holmes & The Case of the Jersey Lily, a world premiere at People's Light & Theatre Company.

Philadelphia Weekly

Stage
The Color Purple at the Academy of Music and Q:The Songs of Martin and Biello at the Gay and Lesbian Theatre Festival.

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette

PICT board members clash with artistic director
Shaken by differences about leadership and finances, the Pittsburgh Irish & Classical Theatre has seen the recent mass defection of the five-person executive committee and another half-dozen ...

Stage Review: 'Arrivederci, Al!' is dinner theater with a deadly family
The general rule about dinner theater is that it's rarely very good as either. ...

Woman returns from L.A. to direct play
When "Around the World in 80 Days" opens tonight at Saint Vincent College, main character Phileas Fogg won't be the only one making a homecoming. ...

Stage Review: 'Peter Pan's' magic appeals to the kid in everyone
If the thought of never growing up didn't appeal to you before, it will after you see Pittsburgh CLO's production of "Peter Pan." ...

Pittsburgh Tribune-Review

St. Vincent Theatre brings Jules Verne classic to stage

Cathy Rigby stars in 'Peter Pan'
Cathy Rigby gives eight amazingly limber, rambunctious and highly entertaining performances a week cavorting and flying as J.M. Barrie's classic little boy who refuses to grow ...

Baltimore Sun

Elvis songs make stirring 'Shook'

New chief might shake up city's Shakespeare Festival

Boston Globe

Tales of survival don't add up in 'Rising Water'
Bonnie Black and Barry Press star in the Vineyard Haven Playhouse production of John Biguenet's "Rising Water."

Stages: School pals put on 'Fancee Panties' for some laughs
Former Boston Latin classmates Carolynne Warren (right) and Mary Callanan (left) have teamed up for the musical-comedy revue "Fancee Panties."

'Butler' serves up farce

Boston Herald

There’s little to love in ‘Closer’
The Independent Theatre Company’s “Closer” isn’t fit for anyone but the cast and production...

New troupe masters ‘Anger’ management
Step aside, Commonwealth Shakespeare. There’s a new breed of free summer theater. Young troupe Orfeo Group...

Boston Phoenix

Mad men
Orfeo’s Look Back in Anger; WHAT’s What the Butler Saw

Providence Journal

Forgot your lines? No problem!
Prepare for the unprepared, actors who don’t know their lines.

Dated George M! creaky, contrived
With July Fourth just around the corner, Theatre by the Sea must have thought this was a good time to once again dust off George M!, the cornball saga of Rhode Island-born song-and-dance man George M. Cohan. While this trite 1960s musical is mostly about Cohan’s 25-year reign over Broadway during the early 1900s, there are a few patriotic tunes apropos of the season, along with some unabashed flag waving.

Providence Phoenix

Play time
A snappy Inspector Hound
The Barn Summer Playhouse is currently staging a snappy rendition of some of the most original and intellectually entertaining theater in the English language.

Never say die
Revisiting George M !
George M! is a trip back to a time when entertainers were bigger than life, and flag-waving patriotism set off applause as easily as puppies and cute babies prompt aaahs.

Berkshire Eagle

BTF at 80: Witnessing a changing personality
In the summer of 1986, my first as Berkshire Eagle theater critic, Josephine Abady was in her eighth, and next to last, season as artistic director of the Berkshire Theatre Festival.

Actor gets a workout in an edgy new play
Augustine Early, the title character in Ronan Noone's play at Williamstown Theatre Festival's Nikos Stage, learned at an early age that there is no God.

Artistic director to start tenure
With his production of "She Loves Me," director Nicholas Martin is raising one curtain while lowering another.

Berkshire Stages
A digest of what's playing on regional stages based upon reviews by Berkshire Eagle theater critic Jeffrey Borak.

Orlando Sentinel

Humor of 'Crossing Delancey' wins over judges for Melon Patch Players' Sara Awards

Miami Herald

With help of a little magic, former understudy morphs into Celia on the stage
Anyone lucky enough to have watched Celia Cruz perform live can attest to her magical, infectious force. There was no way to take your eyes off a woman with an energy that was almost supernatural and a voice that thundered with Afro-Cuban soul.
Video: Anissa Gathers performs as Celia Cruz in scenes from 'Celia'
Audio: Anissa Gathers sings a snippet from Celia Cruz's 'Quimbara'

Terrific singing derailed by a witless script
Showbiz history is littered with the ghosts of partner acts that sizzled, then splintered. Think Dean Martin and Jerry Lewis, Robert Goulet and Carol Lawrence, Sonny and Cher.

Rights activist comes to life in solo show
Those without a deep knowledge of the civil rights movement might not recognize the name Fannie Lou Hamer. The granddaughter of slaves, Hamer was both a leader and a soldier in the push for voting rights, a woman who inspired her fellow 1960s activists through both word and song.

Miami Herald Drama Queen Blog

A fast festival gets bigger
Last November, the little Naked Stage had a big idea: Why not bring the 24-hour theater concept, a quick creative process that has worked well in so many cities, to South Florida? ....

The videoed invalid
Heads up, Actors Equity. You know this already, but in addition to crinkling candy wrappers, ringing cell phones and audience members who ....

A young playwright soars
Since he was a student at Coral Reef High School, Marco Ramirez has been a talent worth watching. He was named a Presidential Scholar in the Arts in 2001; by the ...

Child's play(s)
City Theatre's Summer Shorts Festival has pulled up stakes and headed north, landing this week at the Broward Center ....

Sun-Sentinel

Jack Zink: Urban Theatre & Entertainment Festival kicks off in Fort Lauderdale and Miami
The first-ever Urban Theatre & Entertainment Festival in 2006 barely registered a blip on South Florida's cultural radar but that's changing as the second one approaches.

GableStage troupe sheds new light on Shining City

Theater review: New Vista Theatre's 'Hello Muddah, Hello Fadduh!'

Theater Review: Musical comedy 'Pete 'n' Keely' hasn't found its groove yet

Sarasota Herald-Tribune

Capital was designed for theater

Chase the bad news with madcap silliness
Gas prices got you down? Stock market worries keeping you awake at night? Take two hours to see "The Mystery of Irma Vep" at Florida Studio Theatre and laugh your woes away.

St. Petersburg Times

'Jesus Christ Superstar' fails to inspire

Atlanta Journal-Constitution ATLArts Blog

Center Theatre's 'Jewtopia'

'Oklahoma!' rolls into Fox

Atlanta Creative Loafing

Hedwig and the Angry Inch: Wigging out
Actor's Express musical grapples with an identity crisis

Charlotte Creative Loafing

Mile High musings
Denver hosts performing arts convention