All tagged The New Group

FEATURE: Top 10 of 2019

By my count, I’ve attended 234 performances of theatre, dance, music, opera, and cabaret during 2019.  Out of a field that large, it’s hard to pick just ten, but nevertheless, here are my top ten (ok, eleven) favorite shows I saw in 2019.

REVIEW: Edie Falco in “The True”

In “The True”, playwright Sharr White dramatizes the 1977 Albany Mayoral primary election from a domestic, interpersonal perspective.  Edie Falco is fiercely magnetic as real life, foul-mouthed political operative Polly Noonan, but the play itself is rarely compelling and suffers from sedentary staging and unrealistic expository conversations that explain complex—and fundamentally uninteresting—political dynamics.

Roundabout revival of "Kiss Me, Kate" will play Studio 54 beginning February 14th; Sasson Gabay joins “The Band’s Visit” June 26th; jukebox musicals are courting top talent, including playwrights Lynn Nottage and Dominique Morisseau; The New Group announces its 2018-2019 season, including "Clueless: The Musical"; book recommendations and a must read letter from the Dramatists Guild

REVIEW: “Peace for Mary Frances”

“Peace for Mary Frances”, a new play by Lily Thorne, receives a world premiere production by The New Group starring Lois Smith as a fading matriarch of a very dysfunctional family, waiting to die in home hospice.  Hyper-realistic, brimming with both tedium and spasmodic explosions of family feuds, death isn’t always the most compelling experience to observe, but that turns out to be the point.