HIGH by Matthew Lombardo is a messy and sordid contrivance about the psychotherapy of a nineteen year old gay junkie, the miscast and misdirected (by Rob Ruggiero) Evan Jonigkeit, who gives us a caricature rather than a character in an embarrassingly stereotypical performance with an almost Southern accent that came and went. Kathleen Turner stars as the straight-talking nun therapist, and although she starts out rather wooden, she picks up steam as the jokes and expletives emerge. She knows how to hit a punchline, and that sustains the play. Stephen Kunken is fine as a priest-- totally believable. The very interesting set by David Gallo is a series of movable panels, some if it majestic. Costumes by Jess Goldstein are appropriately stark, and John Lasiter’s lighting is fine. The play does show the best part of the Catholic Church in which the clergy genuinely tries to help people. Turner is worth seeing, although, for me, the play sputtered out in its conclusion.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

HOW TO SUCCED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING, music and lyrics by Frank Loesser, book by Abe Burrows, Jack Weinstock and Willie Gilbert, is an old fashioned musical with new fashioned flair in design (great multi-level set by Derek McLane), costumes (Catherine Zuber) and some of the most innovative choreography in town (by Rob Ashford who also directed). The leading role of an ambitious young man trying to climb the corporate ladder requires a star, and Daniel Radcliffe is one. He’s adorable, with a pleasant voice and lots of charm. And he’s done his homework— really studied dance for years so that his wild dance near the end is a showstopper. John Laroquette is a powerful adversary, nicely balancing Radcliffe’s energy and persona. With songs like “I Believe in You” and “Been a Long Day,” and the foot-stomper “Brotherhood of Man,” and a Broadway cast of singers and dancers athletically executing Ashford’s innovations, this is a good-hearted supremely entertaining Broadway musical.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

ANYTHING GOES, book by P.G. Wodehouse, Guy Bolton, Howard Lindsay & Russell Crouse, new book by Timothy Crouse & John Weidman, with lovely song after lovely song by Cole Porter, gives us romantic fol-de-rol on an ocean liner among the (mostly) upper clahsses. The cast is merely superb: a radiant Sutton Foster, the delightful, fey, John McMartin, a very comic Joel Gray (he and Foster are a great Vaudeville team), brash-voiced Jessica Stone as comic relief, romantic leads Colin Donnell and Laura Osnes who look great and sing nicely, and a hilarious British farceur, a great entertainer new to American audiences, Adam Godley as a Count with an elastic body. The super dancing (created by director/choreographer Kathleen Marshall), which takes various genre-turns, includes graceful ballroom and very masculine tap ala Gene Kelly, really cooks as they dazzle us with footwork. The design (set by Derek McLane, stylish costumes by Martin Pakeldinaz) is clean and graceful, and lighting by Peter Kaczorowski enhances everything. It’s an old fashioned musical that is more entertaining than most of the new fashioned ones.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

THE BOOK OF MORMON by Trey Parker, Robert Lopez and Matt Stone is a jolly, rollicking, mocking, in song and dance, of the missionary obligation of young Mormon men in their white shirts and narrow ties as they go to the corners of the world to win converts. It’s a fantastical trip with lots of tapdancing, on Scott Pask’s imaginative set, costumed creatively by Ann Roth, that pushes the taste boundaries of stage possibility beyond belief in its use of scatological language and idea. As the two protagonists, Andrew Rannells (clean-cut, straight arrow) and Josh Gad (chubby, funny, translating the Mormon legend of Joseph Smith into Ugandan myth) interact with a foreign culture, it is brilliant and hilarious. Nikki M. James shines as a Ugandan beauty. Under Casey Nicholaw and Trey Parker’s snappy direction, with choreography by Nicholaw, there is an innocence, a sense of playful fun, about the show that transcends its lack of discretion. This is a great contemporary comedy that would have been impossible to mount just a few years ago. It will win many awards. Don’t bring the kids.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

Based on the movie, CATCH ME IF YOU CAN, book by Terrence McNally, Music by Marc Shaiman, lyrics by Scott Whittman and Marc Shaiman, is a showy, old-fashioned musical, right out of Ziegfeld, chorus girls and all, and for an ancient reviewer it is a pleasure to see these gorgeous, long-legged women dance, sing, and create high-jinks. The fun costumes by William Ivey Long go from glamour to cartoon to feathered fans, the set by David Rockwell, feels like a Hollywood musical with the big band upstage, ramps and twirls. Aaron Tveit plays the charming super con man Frank Abagnale, Jr, with ease and flair; Norbert Leo Butz, in a strong, but weird characterization, plays his FBI pursuer. Butz seems to have put on weight, and believably limps in most of the play. Then he does a spectacularly adept comic dance number, and then back to limping. Why not. He sings so well though, that basically it doesn’t matter. Tom Wopat, another real singer, shines as Frank’s dissolute father, and so do Rachel de Benedet as his mother and Kerry Butler as the love interest. The cheery choreography is by Jerry Mitchell, and director Jack O’Brien gives it all rhythm, pace and verve. It’s all good natured fun, beautifully constructed, and a good time was had by all.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

THE MOTHERFUCKER WITH THE HAT by Stephen Adly Guirgis, intensely directed like a runaway downhill sled by Anna D. Shapiro, gives us colorful, uneducated working class people hollering their street vernacular with throat-scraping intensity. Addicts, criminals, lots of sturm and drang. It’s a fascinating anthropological study, as if behind glass, of another species, with genuine comic sparks. Bobby Cannavale and Elizabeth Rodriguez are the primo couple who yell their love and hate, and although each tended to stay on one level, they certainly are interesting. Chris Rock brings a quieter charm to his role as sponsor (and betrayer) of Cannavale, and the beautiful Annabella Sciorra gives a feminine strength to her role as Rock’s lady. Yul Vazques, totally real as the practical gay compadre, steals the show.

Although the play is mostly people swimming in their troubles and drowning in them, and some extended scenes could be trimmed a tad, as directed by Rob Ashford, it is interesting to watch, without empathizing with anyone on stage. As with other of Guirgis’s plays, like “Our Lady of 121st St., in which I once played the priest, the resolution really isn’t. But it’s okay—it’s fascinating in its own way.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

GHETTO KLOWN, written and performed by John Leguizamo, is a simple and very complex piece of first rate Theatre. It’s his Latin coming of age story— both in life and Showbusiness— the growth and development of an actor- and he pops like popcorn all over the stage.

He walks, he talks, he dances,

He flips, he flops, he prances

as he shows us dozens of characters and skewers egotistical showbiz celebs he has worked with. His impressions are spot on.

Excitingly illustrated by film, motion and still, (projections by Aaron Gonzalez) on Happy Masee’s set that suggests a myriad of places, Leguizamo’s range as a performer is dazzling. It is masterfully directed by Fisher Stevens, with active lighting by Jen Schriever. The choreography is terrific, and grows in complexity as the show progresses, finishing with a dance peak near the end. This is a poignant, universal story filled with the foibles of life for a man of great charm and great ambition and, thankfully, a super talent. It’s a wonderful, moving, gripping, delightful entertainment filled with profound insights.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

PRICILLA QUEEN OF THE DESEERT, with book by Stephan Elliott and Allan Scott, based on the movie, is a spectacular entertainment that uses familiar songs from Madonna, Willy Nelson and others as its simple plot unfolds: a drag queen (Will Swensen) wants to visit his biological son in the middle of Australia. He is accompanied by two of his compatriots— the marvelous, totally womanly Tony Sheldon and his dynamite sidekick and jumping jack Nick Adams. The major setpiece is the bus they travel in, an enchanted vehicle created by set designer Brian Thompson that surprises and delights as it changes and evolves into magical effervescences in colors and lights. PQD is a Chippendale/Village People world with half-naked muscular men or macho cowboys dancing, leaping and rippling. The fabulous, lavish costumes by Tim Chappel and Lizzy Gardiner become more and more outrageous as the show progresses. The director Simon Phillips, aided and abetted by choreographer Ross Coleman, production Supervisor Jerry Mitchell, and lighting designer Nick Schlieper shamelessly tries to dazzle us, and does in all dimensions. What a show!

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

I was asked to review ARCADIA by Tom Stoppard and went to a performance. Now I love Stoppard— I starred in his “Travesties” for a sizable run in Los Angeles in 1984, and found new, sometimes profound inferences each week. I saw and loved the first production of ARCADIA when I was the theatre critic for WNEW radio. Unfortunately, for this current production, I have to agree with the critic for the New York Times who suggested that we read the play before going to it because of the incomprehensibility of the words spoken by the actors. Stoppard’s ideas, the juxtaposition between 1809 and today in mathematical ideas is fascinating, but the actors need to let the words come out at a rate and level to enhance meaning, not obscure it. I felt very frustrated, and left at intermission. I blame the director David Leveaux for not guiding the performances into clarity. I’m going to the Drama Bookshop today and buy a copy of the play.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

WONDER WOMAN, written and performed by Cyndi Freeman, well directed by David Drake, is a charming piece about her lifelong relationship with the comicbook character, filled with autobiographical stories about her adventures with her family and about the life of her breasts. Freeman has a vivid comedic personality, and her story is absolutely delightful, including her seque into Burlesque, with a final super strip to the skimpiest Wonder Woman costume on earth. She’s a fearless, charismatic real entertainer with a twinkle in her eye.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

BEFORE GOD WAS INVENTED, written and directed by Lissa Moira, with music by Richard West and lyrics by Moira, is a far-out ritualistic piece in action and sound (often incomprehensible due to assumed accents and invented language-- words like “omma tamma alla tomma”; phrases like “We all time make with ears him to hear.”). I felt I was watching a spectacle in a foreign country. Moira has a wild imagination in this play about primitives which takes a shot at the transition from a Matriarchal society to a Masculine-dominated one: from warm and nurturing to combative (fine fight choreography by Jiggers Turner) with many commandments. Women dance and sing while waiting for the demented men to arrive. There is shadow shtupping behind a curtain, and a kind of “Flower Child” philosophy—“Let’s share everybody,” so here a little lesbianism can sneak in. The costumes and scenic design by David “Zen” Mansley are clever, and work well as do the terrific animal-head masks by Lytza Colon as the women dance an animal ritual and the lighting and sound design by William Giraldo.

The play is a strong attempt by Moira to communicate a vision with a mixture of levels of performance— all carried out earnestly by well-meaning performers. The beautiful Chelsey Clime, a real singer, is outstanding in the cast. There is lots of well-staged Sturm and Drang, and the physical action kept my interest. West’s ritualistic songs are quite lovely, and fit well with Moira’s lyrics. Judicious trimming of monologues would help the play’s theatricality, but Moira, a true original, does strongly carry out her vision.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

The revival of THAT CHAMPIONSHIP SEASON by Jason Miller, nicely directed by Gregory Mosher, is an interesting flashback to another time, 1972, with its priorities, prejudices, politics, views of society, by a group of thirty-eight year old men who won a basketball tournament twenty years earlier, and that was the high point of their lives. It did engage me from start to finish, as these losers try to recapture lost glory. For me, one of the most interesting aspects of this well written, well designed (by Michael Yeargan) production is that it gives us is a fascinating example of one of the major unexplainable foibles of the Acting profession: some actors have stage presence, some have film presence, some TV presence, some have it in life but not in any of the media, some have it anywhere any place. The following is not a criticism, just a personal observation: Jason Patric and Chris Noth have stage charisma, Kiefer Sutherland, who shines on TV, doesn’t— he’s present, acts well, but is basically invisible. Jim Gaffigan holds his own, and Brian Cox, as the coach is a bit “over the top” for me as he pushes for attention but, for me, isolates himself— especially near the final climax. But you know what we say: ”Give ‘em a strong finish, they think they saw a good show.” It is a good show, and we do empathize with these ole boys as they slide into the less than vivid life of middle-age.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

TRAPPED-- two one acts: in THE INVISIBLE MISS WHITNEY by Darlene Troiana, a madwoman in confinement muses on her being invisible. It is well-performed by the dynamic, very attractive Patricia Dodd who lends a ”Chaillot” tone to the monologue. In AS DIRECTED, written and performed by Dawn Sofia, the actress totally inhabits the character of a harassed personal secretary. She is funny, and ultimately quite moving. Directed by Michael Beckett, the two plays are in widely diverging tones— the first is stylized and presentational, the second is literal and real. The first SHOWS the character in a very strong performance, the second IS the character. Both plays work, each in its own style, and it is an interesting contrast with both works engaging and entertaining the audience.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

MOTHER OF GOD by Michele A. Miller is a work in progress— a fanciful cartoon version of the Nativity story with 3 Stooges sound effects: beeps and rimshots, that can offend anyone without a sense of humor, Jews or Christians. Well staged, with lots of zip and action by Melody Brooks, the settings, designed by Meganne George, slides and video shot by Rafael Jordan, which are projected on a cyclorama, are terrific, and create a changing atmosphere that enhances everything. It is partly vaudeville, part actual Theatre, especially in the second half when things get more serious. I think this is a really good version to begin with, and I’d like to see how it develops, and how it works when it is tightened up and with the final cast selections. I don’t want to nit-pick, but I do think that in actuality Joseph, a carpenter, was a strong attractive young man rather than a doddering old one. I particularly liked Keona Welch as a lovely Mary, and Karin de la Penha and Marisa Petsakos as family members. Brooks entertains us with an innovative and unusual view of a well-known event. Thru March 26th. 866/811-4111.

ROLLO BRETWICK

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

GOOD PEOPLE by David Lindsay-Abaire, now on Broadway, gives smart people great room for conjecture as it demonstrates the beauty of Ambiguity. People stood around in front of the theatre after the show debating “He did!......”, She did!......”, “Why wouldn’t she?” “Why wouldn’t he?” Great fun after seeing a domestic Dramady snappily directed by Daniel Sullivan with a top notch cast including Frances McDormand as the working class woman who loses her job, Tate Donovan as her former lover who climbed his way into the upper middle class, the beautiful Renee Elise Goldsberry as his wife, the sparkling Estelle Parsons, Patrick Carroll and Becky Ann Baker. With a magical swift-change set by John Lee Beatty, appropriate lighting by Pat Collins and costumes by David Zinn, GOOD PEOPLE is a welcome taste of GOOD THEATRE. The dialogue clicks, the performances bounce, and once again Lindsay-Abaire provokes and entertains.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

Jonathan Bank’s Mint Theatre Company gives us another gem, a fascinating antique of a play, first performed in 1909: WHAT THE PUBLIC WANTS, about a newspaperman and a giant publishing company. The struggle, Art vs Commerce, is still on today, and the comtemporary resonances are clear. As usual with The Mint, all of the elements are top level: acting, directing (by Matthew Arbour) design (Roger Hanna), costumes (Erin Murphy) lighting (Marcus Doshi) for this totally engaging production.

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

SPY GARBO by Sheila Schwartz is a flashback to the 30’s and 40’s with Franco of Spain (Steven Rattazzi), the British triple agent Kim Philby (Chad Hoeppner), and Wilhelm Canaris (Steven Hauck) the German officer who opposed Hitler, all in a kind of suspended limbo as their own pasts and the past events of the world are projected on an immense curved background. Visually it’s a stunning accomplishment— a breathtaking pastiche of filmed images of Hitler and his world with thousands of participants in the newsreels and home movies edited into an amazing running commentary on the spoken words of the principals. Aye-- there’s the rub: the words. Rattazzi is an actor with a strong persona and voice, good physicality, and an almost incomprehensible accent as it (and most of the spoken words in the play) are over-amplified in the echoing chamber of the 3D Art & Technology Center. I found much of the talk about good and evil, the speechifying, even by the more clearly spoken Hauck and Hoeppner to be ultimately less than engaging. SPY GARBO seems to be a well-intentioned, well-researched work that ends up as a confusing mish-mash in some of the talk, with the best historical visual montage in town. We even get images of a stunning Mata Hari on film whom I think (by reading deep into the program) is played by the gorgeous Kate Moran. It’s produced, with a classy touch, by Aaron Louis and Diane Morrison, directed by Kevin Cunningham, and costumes by Clint Ramos, lighting by Laura Mroczkowsi and music by Aldo Perez are all well done and fit the ninety minute play nicely. The brilliant visuals are by Jeff Morey, Peter Norrman and Aaron Harrow. Long may they wave!

RICHMOND SHEPARD

Performing Arts INSIDER and lively-arts.com

FRIDGID FESTIVAL:

PRETTY & PAPI— created and performed by Leah James Abel, Rebecca Houlihan & Olivia Hallie Lehrman is a lively, surreal, very entertaining Performance Art pastiche on dating performed by three talented comediennes, two of them, Lehrman and Abel, with advanced circus/gymnastic skills. Starting with a silent comedy of old people dating, the versatile performers give us scenes of lives, high and lowdown, some spoken, some in gibberish, some with full-blown absurdity as they transform into dogs, babies, gymnasts, and interact improvisationaly with the audience. PRETTY & PAPI is a totally engaging comedy montage of vivid characters, in stylized comedic costumes, full of laughs and surprises, nimbly directed by Sayda Trujillo, with lively music by Fingers DelRay.

YEAR OF THE SLUT is written and performed by the lively, talented Jennifer Lieberman, who has a strong persona and a gift for playing many characters, male and female, of different accents, physicalities and ages as she takes us through the saga of her sexual adventures. Dance, showing her physical grace, and poetry float in and out in this humor-sprinkled performance as we recognize universality in her stories. Well paced by director Louis b. Crocco, Lieberman engages us throughout her show, and gives us a dessert at the end: she dances to a poem she wrote, and the event climbs to a higher level of unique artistic expression. More!

A KIND KIND MAN by Catherine Weingarten, directed by Zach Stasz, gives us an odd encounter between a fourteen year old girl (Tali Custer) selling toothpaste door to door (for $50 a tube— an immediate reality-bender) and a middle-aged neurotic man (Jeffrey Coyne) which segues into a surreal bondage event ultimately involving his wife (Victoria Guthrie). The acting is all quite good, and Weingarten is a very creative, imaginative young writer with signs of wit and originality poking through. For me it is weirdly uncomfortable for too long, but is almost saved by the end cute climax/solution.