Thursday, January 19, 2012

Show reviews for the week of Jan. 16

After some new reviews for Snow White Trash, Marigolds and Chad Diety we have this weeks reviews for all of the new shows that opened last week.  Their were so many that we did miss one or two but we managed to get the reviews for you.  Try not to read them all in one sitting. Pace yourself.


Snow White Trash, reviewed by Rod Stafford Hagwood, is apparetnly a great concept but not ready for prime time according to the review in the Sun Sentinel.
Oh, some magic spells for laughs are still being cast. But then, there are so many misfires that the goodwill established with the opening is quickly used up in the 75-minute, no-intermission comedy. And yes, the NC-17-rated language helps a bit, for there is something inherently funny about a fractured fairy tale with enough cussing to make a sailor blush.

The Effect Of Gammy Rays On Man-In-The-Moon Marigolds, reviewed by (NO REVIEWER LISTED), for the Art/Stage blog at the Sun Sentinel.
Palm Beach Dramaworks has dusted off the anguished tale of embittered, alcoholic Beatrice Hunsdorfer and her two daughters, giving it a well-acted production that deserves to be seen. Whether or not "The Effect of Gamma Rays" deserved the Pulitzer is debatable, but the theatrical impact of the show at the new Don and Ann Brown Theatre makes us wish Zindel, whose bibliography includes far more young-adult novels than plays, had written more for the stage.

The Elaborate Entrance Of Chad Deity, reviewed by Bill Hirschman for Florida Theater On Stage and Christine Dolen for the Miami Herald, is a knock-out!

Caldwell Theatre’s hilarious satire The Elaborate Entrance of Chad Deity sneaks a critical rabbit punch at the solar plexus of society. The milieu of “professional” wrestling should not dissuade serious theatergoers, although the faux spectacle including brief grappling bouts will entertain anyone but a killjoy. The copious comedy is laced with cutting social commentary about demagogues exploiting our prejudices about race and nationality to make money or gain power.
Now at Boca Raton’s Caldwell Theatre Company, Chad Deity is theater gold. It’s fast and flawlessly paced, insanely funny, a little sobering at the end when its message – like the play’s most defiant wrestler – kicks you in the gut. The script works on several levels at once, turning a normally quiet and observant audience into a bunch of rowdy wrestling fans who can’t stop grinning. This is a play full of physical, emotional and intellectual heft, one staged flawlessly by artistic director Clive Cholerton.




Area Stage Company, a pioneering Lincoln Road company admired for its strong productions of challenging plays, has lately carved out a niche in its larger Coral Gables home with ambitious musicals performed by conservatory students. With its new production of Snoopy! The Musical, Area is easing back into professional fare, tapping some of those talented students and a couple of pros for its blended cast.



Promethean and its house director Margaret M. Ledford, best known for thought-provoking dramas and campy summer musicals, enter new territory with an out and out comedy that requires skill and discipline. As proven by the copious laughter in the hall, they acquit themselves well.



Love, Loss, And What I Wore, reviewed by Bill Hirschman for Florida Theater On Stage, lets you know that If we are what we eat, then even more so, we must be what we wear.
The evening features five women telling 90 minutes of stories, touching and uproarious, about how everything from Birkenstock shoes to an old bathrobe provide the touchstones of the authors’ lives. It often seems less theater so much as eavesdropping on a dish-fest that lingers over coffee in a restaurant after a two-hour lunch.



Cabaret, reviewed by Bill Hirschman for Florida Theater On Stage; Hap Erstine for the Palm Beach Post; and by Christine Dolen for the Miami Herald, gives you a glimpse at 'Devine Decadence'.

With its new edgy production of Cabaret, the Maltz Jupiter Theatre takes an often thrilling left turn into adult, thought-provoking theater that this home of mainstream crowd-pleasers rarely attempts. The desperate dancing, the heedless hedonism, the gritted grin to blot out the impending end of the world are painfully recognizable. It’s resonances are deafening.
Without doing anything radical to them, the Maltz has breathed new life into such recent shows as Crazy for You and Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat. Their Cabaret is of the same high quality as those productions, but it falls far short when it comes to native inventiveness. The cast is first-rate – exceptional in some cases – but this show is best enjoyed by those who have never previously seen Cabaret.
Staged by BT McNicholl, this version of the 1966 John Kander-Fred Ebb-Joe Masteroff classic is in the style of the Tony Award-winning 1998 Broadway revival created by Sam Mendes and Rob Marshall. All of the action, both the big musical numbers and the intimate dramatic scenes, is played out in an artfully rundown space that becomes the tawdry Kit Kat Klub in early 1930s Berlin.



Jersery Boys, reviewed was loved by Phyllis Green of ENV Magazine and Beau Higgins of Broadway World: Miami.

Oh, what a night!  Thousands of cheering fans floated through the Broward Center of Performing Arts after seeing a phenomenal performance of the 2006 Tony Award winning musical “Jersey Boys”.
JERSEY BOYS demonstrates what a juke box musical can be when all the stars align just right and all the professionals are at the top of their game. The audience at the Broward Center last night received JERSEY BOYS with the wildest pandemonium, seemingly endless cheering, and simply bravo’d the show within an inch of its life.

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