New York Stage Review

“Worthy themes about families, friendships, and aging that might be crafted into several plays are more squandered than explored through the blithely anything goes-style format Haddad utilizes for Good Time Charlie.”

“On the other hand, a neatly resonant encounter has compellingly taken place.”

“There are some genuine moments of brilliance, such as Edith’s slam poem, ‘Yeast of Edith.’”

“For all this expertise and some solid acting, a preview performance the other evening was not as striking as might be expected.”

“How well does O’Reilly bring O’Neill’s angry (gorilla-like?) opus to the stage? Moderately well.”

“Stretches of Udofia’s complex, often lyrical, modern-day drama escaped me entirely.”

“Despite their frequently nasty talk – the playwright churns up some surprisingly funny invective – the characters are not degenerates so much as pathetic in their self-loathing loneliness.”

“School Girls; Or, The African Mean Girls Play has lost none of its sharp comic bite.”

“School Girls is uproarious, affecting, human, and sympathetic, too.”

“It’s all a little exhausting, frankly, and indicative of how the performer tries too hard to inject frenetic energy and audience participation into his moving tale.”

“The truly crucial point is that this early in the 2026-27 season, a production setting a high bar has already arrived.”

“Much of this sad but true U.S. history—accompanied by TED talk–style timeline graphics presenting years such as 1776, 1619, and 1492—likely will prove familiar to the adult demographic who attend productions at TFANA.”

“If you do know The Cherry Orchard, you’ll be delighted by the way Stone has molded Chekhov’s characters.”

“Newcomers to the play will discover not a bittersweet study in aristocratic stasis so much as a melodrama about the family business.”

“Beyond their dubious humor, these overextended one-acts intend to comment seriously upon women being forced to submit to misguided patriarchal authority.”

“Doing so, he memorializes his late friend honorably.”

“The substance of the show proves less important than its style, with Smith proving mesmerizing in his smooth, beat poetry-style delivery of the elliptical text.”

“For the most part, Ireland smoothly works such observations, reflections and statistics on domestic violence into the text.”

“But if it's well done—and Ford/Hill, co-created by Elizabeth Marvel and Lee Sunday Evans, certainly is—it's undeniably captivating.”

“Far from a classic itself, Garry Starr may not be for everyone, but at just over an hour, you can’t quite write it off.”

“Possibly not since Puppetry of the Penis has an Off Broadway show aroused such naked laughter.”

“It turns out to be a superbly staged ghost story that has audience members alternately screaming in terror and laughing in delight.”

“Paranormal Activity can be marketed as a nightmare entertainment for the whole darned family.”

“Sadly (and not in a good way), The Real Ivanov does not resonate.”

“The production is one of the best ever unfurled there.”

“Unfortunately, she’s ill-equipped for it, not only because she’s significantly older than the part calls for, something that proves highly distracting, but also because her vocally grating, one-note performance sucks the energy out of the evening.”

“Unfortunately, she’s ill-equipped for it, not only because she’s significantly older than the part calls for, something that proves highly distracting, but also because her vocally grating, one-note performance sucks the energy out of the evening.”

“Though it centers on trailblazing (and rather threatening) technology, Disruption is a pretty by-the-numbers play.”

“But does something persuasive result from all the highbrow cogitating? Not necessarily.”

“You couldn’t ask for a better way to hear this glorious score.”

“By almost every measure, the concert lives up to the challenge, delivering both the promised spectacle and the heartfelt humanity at its core.”

“(Incidentally, David Zinn’s set design, from the crucifix to the statues to the baptismal font, could not be more accurate.) When we first meet Paul and Michael, they’re talking about saints, and as any Catholic—lapsed, devout, or C&E—knows, that means they’re choosing confirmation names.”

“It’s safe to say that Broad Strokes is the funniest show you’ll ever see about a near-death experience.”

“A curious visual decision, perhaps, but Cohen’s humorous matters of life or death certainly deserve some other-worldly grandeur.”

“Their latest collaboration yields The Saviors, yet another compelling drama and fine production that deserve a longer existence.”

“It does provide the opportunity for this indelible experience of watching two terrific, well-known actors performing their hearts out practically within arm’s reach.”

“Shifters may be a very small play but it strikes a symphony of resonant chords.”

“But while The Whoopi Monologues serves as a showcase for its five performers much as it did for its creator, the divvying up reduces rather than enhances its impact.”

“Young (Purlie Victorious, Purpose) is flawless, whether discussing the Anne Frank house in Amsterdam, eyes full of wonder, or describing the airplane meal.”

“The confidence and ebullience of the production’s excellent 13-member ensemble succeed in making Giulia certainly play like a hit show.”

“With Zimmerman’s expert direction, Giulia: The Poison Queen of Palermo has that magical stage chemistry that fuses disparate elements into a work of undeniable beauty.”

“For its latest annual summertime offering of performances free to the public, Classical Theatre of Harlem delivers a solid open-air revival of Othello at the Amphitheatre in Marcus Garvey Park.”

“This is a play that has a lot to say and entertainingly makes it go down easy.”

“You’ll want to stay in this world as long as possible.”

“Now that it’s arrived, it deserves to stick around way past the summer.”

“That said, Dad Don’t Read This is highly entertaining and Smith impresses as a playwright ready to break through.”

“In Erica Murray's tender and touching drama The Loved Ones at Irish Rep, Plunkett is playing the bundled-up, buttoned-up Nell.”

“Stephen Brown-Fried adapts and directs the rarely produced Shakespeare works outstandingly, with a stunning 16-member NAATCO cast.”

“Indeed, the enterprise has to be declared entertaining, even if not thoroughly polished to a high gloss.”

“Spectators who know or care relatively little about the last century may find the play to be a static, talky experience despite the excellent performances and staging.”

“Are You Now or Have You Ever Been remains a powerful distillation of an historical record of a shameful time in American history.”

“And in the best moments, when it all comes together, it can take your breath away.”

“That said, to my old-school taste, the ambitious A Woman Among Women registers mostly as a terribly talky, at times even tedious, theater exercise that fails to engage pity or any emotion other than occasional confusion.”

“And while I applaud the effort, the work falls well short of its ambitions.”

“But Guildford’s Copperfield is dull as tarnished brass: the laughs are labored, the sparkle is incidental, and there is little indication of what puts the Dickens in Dickens.”

“Fans of Mann and Marjok, as well as theatergoers truly interested in viewing fresh, vital, new works of music drama should try to get a ticket to this compelling production.”

“Caswell’s unfocused and not always credible play attempts with too little success to incorporate all those plots and more.”

“At that point, a choir of several dozen singers enters and the music takes over, swallowing the room with a sense of communal reverie.”

“The night I was there chuckling and occasionally laughing out loud boasted, in proper alphabetical order, Scott Absit, Mario Cantone, Jeff Hiller, Jackie Hoffman, Christopher Jackson, Ben Mankiewicz, Andrea Martin, Nia Vardalos, Rita Wilson, Pack himself, and Reyfel herself.”

“The ensemble brightly animates the characters.”

“But while the play is distinctly Wilderian in its style and themes, it comes across today like a rambling, disjointed mess that only periodically sparks to life.”

“Combine a keenly wrought puzzle of a play, masterfully understated direction by Jack Serio, and an astonishing performance by Quincy Tyler Bernstine, and you have a remarkable evening at Studio Seaview.”

“Running 110 minutes without an intermission, the evening adds up to less than the sum of its parts. But as a showcase for its trio of talented actors, it works beautifully.”

“The playwright’s gifts for quirky characterizations and off-kilter dialogue are on ample display in the sensitive staging by Ian Rickson that showcases Strong’s emotional expressiveness.”

“Lacking the stylistic finesse to give depth to its surface banalities, The Receptionist mostly makes you feel as if you’ve been put on a lengthy hold.”

“Tucker’s Othello is a bell-ringing winner and, to mix metaphors, a lengthy feather in Bedlam’s cap.”

“After a while, his performance becomes plodding, and his replication of Rosemary’s Yankee-accented voice is not persuasive.”

“Of course, Hamlet remains fascinating all by its 426-year-old self and as somebody remarks, the play’s the thing, and the National Theatre capably serves it here.”

“While recognizing how a great deal of ingenuity and skill goes into making Kenrex an impressive achievement of sorts, I must admit to not much liking the show.”

“Holden and Stambollouian are authoritatively present, and that’s plenty.”

“Too much of the score, though, feels forgettable, one pop ballad bleeding into another and too redolent of the sort of bombastic power ballads that hair bands routinely pumped out in the nineties (much of it also has the feeling of Christian rock).”

“And while none are fatal, there are enough to keep The Lost Boys from achieving that one thing vampires and Broadway musicals desire more than anything else – eternal life.”

“What it mostly seems to lack is a reason for being.”

“His turn as Bynum is a performance for the ages, and one that elevates every actor in his orbit.”

“As directed with relatively sure hands by Lonny Price and Matt Cowart and choreographed by Jennifer Rias, the enthusiastic cast rises—and perhaps rises above—the script’s middlingly enthralling script.”

“But there's no longer a place for Abie's Irish Rose or Getting Gertie's Garter on our legitimate stages, and I have no qualms about nominating The Rocky Horror Show to join them as a theater history relic.”

“And that's okay, which is the best word to describe Roundabout's okay show; it's the steak dinner you already know without the sizzle.”

“Diehard fans of the Bette Midler/Barbara Hershey movie melodrama should be well satisfied, tissues in hand; much audible sobbing could be heard at a recent matinee.”

“Here, the playwright takes a simple conceit and mines it for hilarious social satire featuring a gallery of memorable characters played by a top-flight cast.”

“Top-notch comedy and covetable home decor—all in a tidy 100-minute package.”

“We need it, and Schmigadoon! supplies it.”

“Innocence is not an easy, relaxing night at the opera.”

“This adorably dizzy show is anchored by Alex Brightman at his snarky best, whose disbelieving character, Josh, represents every straight man who can’t appreciate musicals but still owns a toy light saber.”

“Thankfully, O’Hara and Byrne are so wonderful—and so wonderfully matched—that there’s no getting annoyed with either of them.”

“Director Scott Ellis tends to rush the pace of the comedy, when taking a bit more leisure about it might make Coward’s already clipped dialogue easier to appreciate. His staging takes surprisingly little advantage of the expansive set and its deluxe furnishings. The program notes that Coward revised...”

“Proof, 25 years later, pulls us in and grips us in a manner that might surprise even the author.”

“And so will everyone else who comes to see this stunning revival.”

“But despite its good intentions and powerful true-life story, The Fear of 13 fails to galvanize.”

“Affecting a slightly bent and not entirely confident gait, Brody—who bears no resemblance to the bald Yarris of the documentary—can’t be faulted in the least for his portrayal.”

“In accordance with the stylized nature of expressionist theater, director Scott Elliott cultivates a cool, slightly bizarre quality to his well-acted, seamlessly staged production.”

“Fortunately, Murphy’s dynamic, muscular choreography and the solid story he tells so inventively through both his staging and its arresting visuals prove to be positive takeaways.”

“Instead, I disappointedly report that Titanique—narrated by uncanny Dion lookalike Mindelle as an arch diva—is my idea of lowbrow entertainment at its just about lowest.”

“As an easygoing satire of the film’s silly Rose-Jack-Cal romantic plot, Titanique succeeds at being even sillier, but at least it offers a happy ending.”

“The last undeniable Death of a Salesman irony for this revival: Once again Arthur Milller’s monumental script proves deathless.”

“You have a revival of Arthur Miller's Death of a Salesman that represents a highlight of the theater season.”

“Trip Cullman directs this gem of a play with the precision of a jeweler’s blade.”

“It appears to me that Cats: The Jellicle Ball may become one of those legendary Broadway shows that someday you will tell others you were lucky enough to see.”

“With its expert cast firing on all cylinders, the Pulitzer Prize-nominated Becky Shaw sends laughter rocketing throughout the audience with its scathing portrayal of social mores being blown to smithereens.”

“And while it may be unfair to compare them, those of us who know the film well are likely to feel the play falls short of expectations.”

“The moment ironically served to demonstrate that this Afternoon ultimately feels like a musicalization of the film minus the musical numbers.”