Fantastic performances, powerful writing. 30 years ago when this play had its pre-Broadway tryout at the University of Virginia, I wrote a review for the University Journal. (I just sent an email to the U.Va. library in the hopes of tracking down that review.) Director Marya Sea Kaminski, who consistently introduces herself as someone who…
In September 1999, I was blogging about What makes a play worth seeing twice, according to Tom Stoppard The then-unrealistic expectations of voice-recognition software A critique of the “information wants to be free” mantra A Microsoft exec who predicted that digital publication would eclipse print publication within a decade How marketers are pushing your buttons…
Me: I need to post the opening lecture for my online Shakespeare class. Also me: I should compose it in blank verse. Me (glares in iambic pentameter): Also me: O for a Canvas of fire, to surpass The farthest distance of instruction. SHU tech is cool, but can a Macbook hold A seminar discussion? Can…
I saw my first Food for Groundlings show this weekend. It won’t be my last. I see a lot of theater, and am used to seeing professionals here or there stutter or jump a line. But the actors in Othello at CCAC Sunday night really impressed me with their mastery of Shakespeare’s verbiage. Desdemona in…
So looking forward to seeing her in this! Oct 18 – 27, 2019 at The Theatre Factory (Trafford, Pa.)
Happy Independence Day, fellow Americans. “Saltpeter, John!!!”
The girl (blue skirt and pigtails), who just finished her junior year of homeschooling last week, is in the dance ensemble for this professional production of “Beauty and the Beast,” which opens tonight (in a sold-out show) at the St. Vincent Summer Theatre. I spent a few summers doing PR for the Heritage Repertory Theater…
The girl and I were thrilled to catch Quantum Theatre’s outdoor production of King Lear. The smell of a storm in the air, gusting wind, piped-in industrial sounds (metallic groans and rumbles) and the knowledge that the only reason we were able to get tickets was this was a special add-on performance to make up…
My wife is directing Arthur Miller’s The Crucible. Opening night is tonight. Geyer Performing Arts Center.
The show runs tonight at 8 and Sunday at 2:30. One could argue that this production’s perpetually upbeat, fast-paced tone robs the play of its melancholic undertones; many of the more contemplative moments are brushed past or played for comedy, and Feste’s sorrowful songs, set by Monica Stephenson and Gil Teixeira to music for solo…
In his review, Greg Kerestan, who must have have gotten a pretty good education somewhere, manages to work in references to the Wind in the Willows, Charles Nelson Reilly, and Caddyshack. The cast is uniformly excellent, but the greatest burdens fall upon the leading players of the two sections of the show. Bouncing back and…
Kudos to Prime Stage for a Twelfth Night that truly sings. Stage director Andy Kirtland has created a lovely adaptation of Shakespeare’s 1601 comedy. A vibrant intimacy connects the players and audience, supporting a wonderful production that’s superbly enjoyable for both those who know this play and for anyone experiencing Shakespeare for the first time. Kirtland transports an ensemble…
My daughter can hardly stop talking about how much she loves this show and the people who are putting it on. Only four more chances to see Twelfth Night this weekend!
PICT PROUD: She’s appeared on our stage in “Jayne Eyre,” “The Merchant of Venice”, “Oliver Twist” and “Great Expectations.” Not once, not twice but three times she’s won the Shakespeare monologue contest at Pittsburgh Public Theater. Now she is starring in Twelfth Night at Prime Stage. We are so proud of Carolyn Jerz! —PICT Classic…
Daughter: (is sad her “first day in the theatre” post got fewer likes than her “felt cute” post) Me: (makes this meme)
Why is Shakespeare’s comedy Twelfth Night enjoying a new wave of popularity? Perhaps real life has become so bizarre that no contemporary comedy can match it, so we have to go back 417 years to find one. Anyhow, the play has been turning up on schedules regularly, and now Pittsburgh’s Prime Stage Theatre is doing Twelfth Night. This comedy…
For Carolyn Jerz, who plays Viola in Prime Stage Theatre’s production of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night, the Bard runs in her blood. “My dad is an English professor at Seton Hill University and he teaches a Shakespeare class,” she says. “So from a very young age he would just tell me whatever his students were learning in…
Looking forward to seeing this! Set in the colorful world of Portugal and enhanced by traditional Portuguese fado music, “Twelfth Night” follows Viola as she disguises herself as a page boy to find her twin brother, but finds herself at the center of a love triangle, Prime Stage says. The oft-quoted line, “If music be…
I’ve never been all too keen on Shakespeare authorship conspiracy theories, and I find students often get distracted by their belief that the default way to get the “right answer” about literature is to look for connections between the author’s life and the author’s work. For example, I was disinterested in “Shakespeare in Love” because…