drama

North by Northwest at Toni Rembe Theater

A.C.T.’s North by Northwest (playing at Toni Rembe Theater, San Francisco) feels like a production whose theatrical ingenuity outpaces its storytelling: an accomplished cast, inventive stagecraft, and considerable comic energy, but an uneven relationship with Hitchcock’s suspense. Whether that sounds entertaining or frustrating depends on how much you enjoy seeing a familiar thriller turned into playful physical theater. . . Plot and ending spoilers follow.…

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Uncle Vanya at Berkeley Rep

Inna purchased tickets to Berkeley Rep's new production of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya. We were pleasantly surprised and have not been to Berkeley Rep for a long time. Berkeley itself was also cleaner than when I last visited. . We really enjoyed this dramatic performance, and Hugh Bonneville's acting was excellent (as expected). . . . Here are more details about Uncle Vanya (courtesy of Perplexity…

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Review: To Kill a Mockingbird at Golden Gate Theater

For my birthday, Inna pre-purchased tickets to the To Kill a Mockingbird performance by Aaron Sorkin at Golden Gate Theater for 7:30pm. . . . . We started our walk to the theater from the Clift Royal Sonesta Hotel at around 7:00pm. It was a sketchy part of town with lots of homeless everywhere. We arrived around 7:20, and Inna picked up her tickets at…

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Review: “Les Liaisons Dangereuses” on Broadway

How does Les Liaisons Dangereuses on Broadway compare to the famous movie Dangerous Liaisons (starring Glenn Close, John Malkovich, and Michelle Pfeiffer)? . . . . . . Having never read the book by Pierre Choderlos de Laclos (and only seen the movie), I was not sure what to expect. I had nothing to fear. The Broadway adaptation of the book was mostly accurate and…

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Review: “Outside Mullingar”, TheatreWorks

. . The rain pours down in steady streams, shrouding in the gloom the Irish countryside of "Outside Mullingar," a recent play by John Patrick Shanley that opened on October 5, 2016, at the Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts.. . . The play premiered at Broadway's Samuel J. Friedman Theatre on January 23, 2014, and closed on March 16, 2014. This was my…

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Review: Disgraced at Berkeley Rep

I have been relatively disappointed with the past few productions at Berkeley Rep, so I had reasonably low expectations coming into seeing "Disgraced" - a play I knew very little about. . . . . . Cast. Isaac: J. Anthony Crane. Abe: Behzad Dabu. Emily: Nisi Sturgis. Amir: Bernard White. Jory: Zakiya Young. . Wikipedia describes it as follows:. . Disgraced is a 2012 play…

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Review: Emma at Lucille Packard Theater

. Today, we saw a musical version of Jane Austen's Emma in the Lucille Packard Theater. The music and lyrics were written by Paul Gordon. The stage was beautifully designed.. . Miss Emma Woodhouse, played by Lianne Marie Dobbs, acted delightfully as the ingenue matchmaker, whose initial success in matchmaking is overshadowed by her later failures. Although obsessed with romance, Emma is clueless about her…

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