Reviews & Repairs

At a time when Broadway is struggling to turn a profit on new musicals, Wicked: For Good is breaking box office records. And with good reason.  At this writing, I’ve seen the movie twice. I think I could watch it 5 more times and still see something new each time. I found it gorgeously crafted, flawlessly performed, and powerfully moving. There were many times when I wanted to burst into applause in the middle of the movie. I thought it was that good. 

This is a musical about a woman who reaches after something that seems entirely frivolous  (a dress that’s fit for a princess), at the same time that it shows her deepening in substance, laying claim to an innate royalty that has nothing to do with how someone dresses.

Rumi is lead singer in a pop-superstar trio whose secret mission is to hunt and kill soul-sucking demons and eventually sing into being the Honmoon, while hiding the tell-tale patterns on her own skin that mark her as worthy of death. And the patterns are beginning to spread, just as a super-hot demon boy-ba

Aaron, Miriam, Moses and Tzipporah, with the freed Hebrews in the background, West End Production As promised, this week, I’m giving a...

Sometimes, the magic ingredient that makes a great musical is the creator’s love for the story. You can feel that love in James and the Giant Peach. It oozes through every scene (“oozes” is more apropos than “glitters” because this tale involves slithering crocodile tongues, a six-foot tall earthworm and other human-sized creepy crawlies).

Can we be courageously inclusive without risking our ability to pass on a precious, religious or cultural identity to future generations?  That’s the fundamental question that captured me as I read the libretto of Meet Me There: An Interfaith Musical. It was then pushed aside by an even more pressing question: what do we risk if we don’t practice courageous inclusivity? 

This week, I’m struck by what an incredible blessing it is to live in a place and a time that offers us both the power to make a difference and enough of the necessities of life that we can even turn our attention to entertainment and building bridges across our divides. Today, I'm celebrating that, and treasuring the hope that we can indeed make a difference at a time when domestic and international friendships are being strained.

EPIC is a gorgeous musical. I just wish its message matched. What I'm hearing is that, in order to succeed, you need to grow into the capacity to be at least somewhat ruthless. There’s also a nod to the idea that it’s unfortunate that this is how the world is set up. But that’s a problem for the uber-powerful to work through. Our job is to do what we must so we can secure what matters to us. 

The Great Gatsby explores a society running from what they lost during WWI, with parties that never end. There is a frenzy, a freneticism to drown out the confusion. Under the confetti and sparkle is a dirty floor.

I think I have a critic’s eye for what works and what doesn’t in a musical. I tend to be highly attuned to problematic messages that...

Henry Higgins ( Harry Hadden-Paton) and Eliza Dolittle (Laura Benanti) dance together. When Lerner and Loewe turned Shaw’s Pygmalion into...

My Fair Lady's famous final line I grew up on My Fair Lady . I have watched it over, and over, and over. To this day, when I feel joyous...

Jessie Mueller and Joshua Henry in Carousel. Photo by Julieta Cervantes. REVISED with your feedback. When I planned to write this week’s...

Fiona Paloma as Mary and Milo Manheim as Joseph in Journey to Bethlehem Joyous greetings to each of you this season, as we celebrate the...

It’s been 21 years since Wicked  opened on Broadway and I’ve never had the opportunity to see it. That is, until I went to Part I at the...

Jimmy Levy sings "United We Stand" in Plandemic: The Musical This week, I am visiting my daughter with a two-year-old and a two-week-old...

Mortals and gods sing modern hits in ancient Greece This week, I’m reviewing The Olympians, a new musical recently highlighted by...

Fiddler on the Roof -- National Tour Photo I’m such a big fan of happy endings, that you might wonder why Fiddler makes my list, despite...

Carriage House Theatre production of Jane Eyre the Musical Last week, I watched a local production of Jane Eyre the Musical . It was a...

The symmetry between Evan’s desperate loneliness in the opening scenes and his peaceful loneliness later, has troubling understones.