Perfectly Frankie

The birth of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons is recalled in Famous Artists’ popular musical Jersey Boys

It has to be, in Ed Sullivan’s immortal phrasing, “a really, really big shew” for the Syracuse New Times to cover one of the road productions Famous Artists brings to town. We may b

Shooting to Stardom

Losers take aim at political figures in the Redhouse’s dark musical Assassins

Nun Better

The sisterhood shines again in Nunsense, Merry-Go-Round’s season finale

The phrase “brought back by popular demand” does not appear in promotion for Merry-Go-Round Playhouse’s revival of Dan Goggin’s musical comedy Nunsense, but you can almost hear

Be Kind, Rewind

SU Drama begins its season with Stephen Sondheim’s backward musical Merrily We Roll Along

It’s the flop musical with the best legs. Stephen Sondheim’s Merrily We Roll Along closed, notoriously, after 16 poorly attended performances in 1981. That sundered the relationship betw

Nerd is the Word

Geeky students triumph in Merry-Go-Round’s musical comedy Spelling Bee

Anyone who has ever attended a public spelling bee knows it makes for gripping live theater, with elements of American Idol. Your humble reviewer gained a grounding in how wrenching the bee is by

Critics’ Choice

Theater reviewers and Agatha Christie mysteries are briskly lampooned in Appleseed’s The Real Inspector Hound

Profiles in Courage

"The horror. The horror.” Those four words are groaned at the climax of Joseph Conrad’s famous novella Heart of Darkness, set in the Congo. No friend of the Belgian administration, Conrad

They’ll Take Manhattan

Covey Theatre strikes the right sparks with Neil Simon’s romantic comedy Barefoot in the Park

At first glance the announcement looked like a mistake. What could be motivating Garrett Heater and Susan Blumer’s Covey Theatre Company to revive Neil Simon’s nearly half-century-old do

Unsentimental Journey

An aging lady travels through Texas to find herself in Hangar’s The Trip to Bountiful

For the late playwright Horton Foote (1916-2009), living long was the best revenge. In his extended career, he was in and out of fashion, and despite winning Pulitzer Prizes, that meant mostly out

The Moor, the Merrier

Two cross-dressing actors cavort amid a gloomy English estate in Cortland Repertory’s satiric The Mystery of Irma Vep

The Mystery of Irma Vep is a curious, one might even say ridiculous, mystery because just about everyone enters the theater knowing her true identity. And if you don’t know, you figure it out