A Touch of the Poet [B-]

This is a good performance of a good play. To my mind, it's a great 15 minute play, preceded by a mediocre 2 hour and 30 minute prologue. The last 15 minutes of this show is wonderful. It's interesting, insightful, moving; and it gives you a chance to marvel at the beautiful wording of O'Neill. The rest of the show is worded nicely too, but it move along slowly, and I found my mind wandering - admittedly, the author has a lot of background to build up before he can loose those final 15 minutes on us. All in all, I found it quite a worthwhile evening.

Bach at Leipsig [B]

The critics seem to think less of this show than I do. In fact, I'm tempted to give it a B+. I can only conclude that there aren't many who like both thought provoking theatre and silly comedy - especially at the same time. All the critics think the author models himself after Stoppard, but I think he's 20% Stoppard, 50% himself, and 30% after the movie "Airplane". If you can balance the silly (and yes, often intentionally repetitive) jokes mixed in with a little real plot, I think you'll like this one despite the critics.

Third [B+]

I liked this show. I find it to be an interesting thought experiment about likeable people in an interesting confrontational situation. It's well acted, pleasant to watch, and occasionally thought-provoking. What more could you ask?

A Mother, A Daughter, A Gun [D]

Dodger Stages

This one's pretty awful. It's a few funny jokes strung together by a confused, uninteresting plot. It has a few fine actors in it, but they miss the mark (maybe the author left them no mark to hit). The father's pretty good, and his scenes are 'bearable'.

Sweeney Todd [B]

Eugene O'Neill Theatre
Disclosure: I have actually invested in this show, so my review may be biased.

Despite the disclosure, I think I liked this show less than the mainstream reviewers. I enjoyed it. I found the lyrics quite amusing. Technically, I felt that the show was quite well done. Given all that, it just didn't "thrill" me. It was a very pleasant evening of theatre, but I was hoping for even more.

A Soldier's Play [C+]

This is a revival of the play that won the Pulitzer Prize in 1982. It's about the murder of a black officer in a black training camp in the South during World War II. The play is largely well done, but Tye Diggs (the star) largely seems to be just going through the motions. He's a skillful enough actor that he still carries of most of his scenes, but the play just lacks emotional impact, and I think much of that is his doing.

Ashley Montana Goes Ashore in the Caicos [C]

I didn't love this show, but I can imagine that some will. It's a "Saturday Night Live" style comedy/satire of modern life. For me, it suffered from 'little girl with the curl...' syndrome: when it was good it was very, very good, but when it was bad it was.... boring.

In the Continuum [B]

Primary Stages
This is a good show about women and AIDS. It does a nice job making it's point(s) by comparing and contrasting the lives of two women who discover they are HIV positive: one living in Africa, the other living in L.A. The two actresses play dozens of roles - mostly successfully. This one's thought-provoking and upsetting on many levels.