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Selling your soul to be a rap star.
By Kevin Phinney
If you liked WET's retrofuturistic '80s MTV tribute Robopop! two years ago, you'll be eager to see this welding of horror movie and hard-core... More >>
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A comedy legend reminisces.
By Kevin Phinney
Not many people love Groucho Marx as I do. Yet it's easy to imagine that a dwindling number of comedy fans remember him (1890–1977), his... More >>
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Seattle Opera presents a tearjerker in two venues at once.
By Gavin Borchert
Jumping on the opera-in-movie-theaters bandwagon, Seattle Opera decided charity begins at home, live-streaming Saturday's McCaw Hall... More >>
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Extrapolating on a 1959 classic.
By Margaret Friedman
Lorraine Hansberry's iconic 1959 play A Raisin in the Sun ends with the African-American Younger family facing an uncertain future as pioneers in... More >>
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The 5th is back in top form with this period piece.
By Gavin Borchert
Beethoven had Wellington's Victory, the Beatles Magical Mystery Tour, and the 5th Avenue Theatre, in February, an overthought, intermittently... More >>
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Not everyone can become a great artist, but a great artist can come from anywhere.
By Margaret Friedman
Lee Hall's endearing hit about English coal miners during the 1930s and '40s who get turned on to art—a true story—is like watching... More >>
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Redneck misery, inspired by Shakespeare.
By Margaret Friedman
Plays within plays are usually designed to make somebody see the error of his or her ways. As Hamlet stages the pantomime to guilt Gertrude and... More >>
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Gay romance gone bad.
By Kevin Phinney
Let it be said one more time that I'm gay. I mention it only so you won't label me a homophobe for not liking ReAct's staging of Chay Yew's... More >>
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Balanchine strips down while Stowell gets zesty and fecund.
By Sandra Kurtz
George Balanchine famously liked to tinker with his prior work, and he returned to 1928's Apollo, one of his earliest creations for the Ballets... More >>
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Dowdy dialogue straight out of the playwright's primer.
By Kevin Phinney
This "new" musical comedy has been around since 2009, and it was most recently staged in New Jersey under the direction of Frasier's David Hyde... More >>
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This world-premiere musical never seems anything but authentic.
By Kevin Phinney
First Date is a gossamer confection of a new musical, easily several notches above last year's co-production by the Fifth and ACT, the... More >>
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An androgynous romp through Restoration theater.
By Margaret Friedman
Smart, silly, and sexy, Liz Duffy Adams' pseudo-Restoration comedy is based, very loosely, on the life of Aphra Behn (1640–1689),... More >>
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In which C.S. Lewis helps Siggy settle the God issue.
By Margaret Friedman
Imagined encounters between famous historical figures are a popular gimmick for playwrights both serious (Michael Frayn's Copenhagen, about Bohr,... More >>
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A bathroom as a metaphor for baggage.
By Kevin Phinney
Ennui's a bitch in Jessica Hatlo's new play. Its central conceit—based on actual events—is a heroine so terrified of real life that... More >>
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After giving a rave to Mike Daisey's Apple take-down last year, a critic reconsiders his opinion.
By Kevin Phinney
“This is Daisey at the top of his volcanic form—indignant, irate, and harder to ignore than the weather.”
Gee, what sap wrote... More >>
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Learning Seattle's codes.
By Kevin Phinney
Sometimes you can have it both ways. S.P. Miskowski's Emerald City is both a narrow, niche play about Seattle's eccentricities (and delusions of... More >>
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Showing off a company's versatility.
By Sandra Kurtz
Peter Boal is fond of saying that he wants audiences to know how many different kinds of dance Pacific Northwest Ballet can do, and he's been... More >>
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Just go see this bleak Beckett two-hander.
By Margaret Friedman
First of all, this is a terrific production of one of Samuel Beckett's most accessible plays, first performed in 1961. If you've never heard of... More >>
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The lead is exceptional, the script isn't.
By Brent Aronowitz
The Rise and Fall of Little Voice is produced infrequently, likely because it demands a young actress capable of imitating an array of... More >>
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Stunning stunts and hilarious harassment.
By Erika Hobart
Mexico meets Moulin Rouge!. TZZ's new production features a cast rowdier than a pack of college kids on spring break in Cancún. The... More >>
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A tale of two painters.
By Margaret Friedman
In 1958, the moody, already-huge abstract painter Mark Rothko was commissioned to paint four large canvases for NYC's new fat-cat culinary mecca... More >>
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In this mythic opera, the tenor bears the heaviest Burden.
By Gavin Borchert
The only real dramaturgical flaw in Gluck's otherwise thoughtfully plotted Orphée et Eurydice is the same one that mars any retelling of... More >>
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Seattle Shakes gets everything right.
By Kevin Phinney
The more things change, the more they don't. In a world where an all-male panel can advise a congressional committee on contraception and a... More >>
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Contradictions and shadowy truths in Nick Garrison's flawless performance.
By Kevin Phinney
The phrase "a clear choice" becomes a public mantra every election cycle, because politicians understand that America likes its alternatives writ... More >>
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We have some issues with it.
By Gavin Borchert
Three major flaws in the 5th's otherwise vigorous production of the Rodgers and Hammerstein classic:
1) Many cast members do a terrible job with... More >>
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Get tipsy before seeing Cocktails at the Centre of the Earth.
By Kevin Phinney
Set in four different bar scenes, Simon Astor's very retro shoestring extravaganza Cocktails at the Centre of the Earth is equal parts musical... More >>
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PNB dancers tear up the stage in this Spanish holiday.
By Sandra Kurtz
For opera, it's La Bohème. At the symphony, it's probably Beethoven's Ninth. Every art form has a surefire work in its repertory—and... More >>
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A new song cycle remembers the Wobblies.
By Gavin Borchert
Seattle composer Wayne Horvitz's latest musical tribute to America's labor movement is much more intimate than his 2004 Joe Hill, written for... More >>
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Two actors play two couples: one with spawn, one without.
By Margaret Friedman
Warning: Children may cause exhaustion, sexual deprivation, and marital stress. It's not a terribly new insight, and Daniel Goldfarb's cautionary... More >>
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A matriarch's slow fade.
By Margaret Friedman
Bill Cain's autobiographical play about caring for his mother during her last six months of life is both a miracle and a mess. Despite defying... More >>
