Performing Arts Reviews:
2008–2022

Scott Morfee Jean Doumanian Tom Wirtshafter Ted Snowdon Eagle Productions Dena Hammerstein/Pam Pariseau The Weinstein Company Burnt umber Productions present OUR TOWN by Thornton Wilder. at the BARROW STREET THEATRE, New York. This award winning Off-Broadway production of OUR TOWN is playing in the Barrow Street Theatre which is part of a local community centre called Greenwich House. “Since the beginning, Greenwich House has been a pioneer social service agency and committed to the arts as a dynamic stimulus for cultural enrichment and individual growth.” To buy one’s ticket at the theatre, one clambers past prams and strollers, women with…

Elton John and David Furnish, Barbara Manocherian, Richard Willis, Tom Smedes, Carole L. Haber / Chase Mishkin, Ostar, Anthony Barrile, Michael Palitz, Bob Boyett, James Spry/ Catherine Schreiber, Probo Productions and Roy Furman in association with NAKED ANGELS present NEXT FALL by Geoffrey Nauffts at The Helen Hayes Theatre, New York. The relationship between an atheist, Adam(Patrick Breen) and his Christian boyfriend, Luke(Patrick Heusinger) forms the central dilemma in this light weight play. What was interesting for me was the possible clash of the value systems that these two men might have. However, ultimately it is treated in a relatively…

ENRON by 30 year old English writer, Lucy Prebble, traces the trajectory of that company, “Enron from its heady early days with Kenneth L. Lay as its avuncular founder to its rise with Jeffrey K. Skilling as a seductive division head who eventually became chief executive, to its demise when various schemes by the chief financial officer, Andrew S. Farstow, and others to disguise the company’s massive debts unraveled.” [1]. From the epilogue to the play first performed in July 2009, almost a year after the Global financial Crisis of September, 2008, (dealt with in the David Hare play THE…

Australian Chamber Orchestra (ACO) present Tour Four ROMANTIC SYMPHONY at Angel Place, Sydney. The first piece presented in this concert was by contemporary composer Jonny Greenwood. Most of us would recognize Mr Greenwood as the lead guitarist of the band Radiohead. Mr Greenwood is, however,no stranger to classical music, early influences have included Messiaen, Penderecki and Ligeti and he started out as a viola player. He “has been building a career as an orchestral composer, both in film soundtracks (BODYSONG, NORWEGIAN WOOD, THERE WILL BE BLOOD) and through an ongoing association with the BBC Concert Orchestra. From a BBC Orchestra’s…

    Stella Green productions in partnership with Darlinghurst Theatre Company presents BEDROOM FARCE by Alan Ayckbourn. BEDROOM FARCE by Alan Ayckbourn give us four couples and three bedrooms. The three bedrooms are presented simultaneously on stage (Set Designer, Tom Bannerman) and the action flows in and out from one to the other. On the left is Ernest (John Turnbull) and Delia’s (Jeanie Drynan) comfortable bedroom in their large Victorian house. In the middle bedroom, Malcolm (Adam Cleland) and Kate (Lizzie Mitchell) are happily nest building in their newly acquired brick terrace house. And in the right bedroom are Jan…

  Melbourne Theatre Company presents RICHARD III by William Shakespeare at the Sumner Theatre, Melbourne. This is my third meeting with the Duke of Gloucester- Richard III in the last couple of years. Firstly, the extraordinary one hour ‘reduction’ created by Pamela Rabe and Benedict Andrews, to serve that Director’s particular agenda for his vision of the great cycle of the historic rivalry between the Houses of York and Lancaster in the Sydney Theatre Company’s THE WAR OF THE ROSES, based on Shakespeare’s eight plays, where The Duke was played as a petulant brat- “a monstrous clown” cavorting in a…