Arts and Culture (Theatre Reviews)

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Davina Grace Hill - 8/16/12

Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre’s Xanadu

Irrepressible fun!

Spoiler alert for readers not current on 1980s’ kitsch: The musical Xanadu has nothing to do with Citizen Kane or with Coleridge’s poem of the same name. The motif of creating a stately pleasure dome, however, does link all three disparate references to Xanadu. Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre ends its 2012 season irrepressibly with goofy fun. Set in 1980 — the era of leg warmers and big-hair bands — as a tongue-in-cheek theatrical send up of a...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by - 8/9/12

Dignity Players’ Shakespeare’s R&J

Four versatile boys take on Romeo and Juliet

Is Shakespeare R&J a new take on Romeo and Juliet — or a throwback to the theater before King Charles II when women were not allowed on stage and men played all the roles? Playwright Joe Calarco has reset Romeo and Juliet in a Catholic New England boarding school for boys. Reading Romeo and Juliet is forbidden. Why we never know, though the boys’ reaction may be reason enough. For Dignity Players, Director Edd Miller creates a wonderful...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Ashley Brotherton - 8/2/12

Twin Beach Players’ Kids’ Playwriting Festival

Six young winners bring their plays to life

See how kids interpret the world in the Twin Beach Players Seventh Kids’ Playwriting Festival. The festival invites kids from all over the state to write their own plays, with the six winners bringing their play to life. Winners and performers range from age seven to 19. The festival not only fosters new talent but also keeps theater alive for the younger generation, who play with iPads and Wii’s. Plays range from...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Leigh Glenn - 8/2/12

Talent Machine’s All Shook Up

Elvis lives in Talent Machine’s musical comedy

Elvis lives. You’ll find him — and his spirit — in The Talent Machine’s musical comedy All Shook Up, a compilation of two-dozen Elvis songs arranged to tell a story of rocky love. Sparks fly when Chad — a guitar-playing, motorcycle riding, leather jacketed stranger — rides into a mid-century American town where good times have been outlawed. Natalie — and all the girls — fall in love with him, and the town rocks. But there are...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Jane C. Elkin - 7/26/12

Bowie Community Theatre’s Love, Sex and the I.R.S.

This escapist comedy makes your problems insignificant by comparison

With Love, Sex and the I.R.S., Bowie Community Theatre promises “a wild farce with twists of fate, sight gags, mistaken identities and hilarious comic lines.” That’s accurate if you get your laughs from chauvinistic stereotypes, drunkenness and cross-dressing. Judging from audience reaction, Bowie Community Theatre does it darn well. This tortuous comedy of errors naïve takes us to New York City in 1985. There androgynously named Leslie...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Jane C. Elkin - 7/19/12

Stories Live and in Person

Mixed results for Infinity Theatre’s kids fare

Infinity Theatre’s second summer in Annapolis is a busy one, with not only two musicals but also two children’s plays. Stories Live and in Person, playing Saturday afternoons, is a New York revival billed as a show to introduce the fun of seeing and hearing live theater to teach appreciation of the real thing to kids so plugged in that the lines blur between private and public space. The first comedic skit is hilarious, pitting a great Shakespearean actor (Jimmy...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Davina Grace Hill - 7/19/12

Dames at Sea

Infinity Theatre delivers a ship-shape song-and-dance spectacle

Dames at Sea offers top-notch singing and tap-dancing in a lighthearted musical theater romp. This small-cast, low-key homage to the great days of 1930s’ musicals has all the requisite and appropriately named characters. From Utah the ingénue Ruby arrives backstage at a Broadway theater without a dime to her name and joins the cast of the musical on her first day in New York. She makes friends with Joan, a smart-talking dancer. A sailor, Dick, who also happens to be an...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Diana Beechener - 7/19/12

Not All Puppets Live on Sesame Street

The googly-eyed creations of Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre’s Avenue Q offer a lesson on what happens when you don’t fulfill your dreams

“If you brought your kids to this, you’re [expletive] parents!” So begins Annapolis Summer Garden Theatre’s latest production, which features puppets, songs and decidedly adult situations. It’s a show so crude, rude and politically incorrect the only thing you can do is laugh. The show follows Princeton (Colin Hood), a recent college graduate who realizes the real world isn’t as great as he imagined it. Jobless, holding...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Leigh Glenn - 7/12/12

Crank Up the Fun

Everyone’s a standout in The Talent Machine

The Talent Machine Company brought back The Talent Machine — its namesake and the original 1988 show that helped to make children’s theater a summer staple in Annapolis — to St. John’s College just in time to provide relief from the heat. The seven-to-14-year-old cast shared the message of the first show, launched by Bobbi Smith: With some talent, a lot of self-confidence and an enormous amount of work, you can make your dreams come true. ...

Article - Theatre Reviews; by Jane C. Elkin - 7/5/12

Infinity Theatre Company’s The Tall Tales of Enoch

A terrific kids’ show — no kidding

Lies. Falsehoods. Tall tales. Call them what you will, some children cling to them long after attaining the age of reason, and Infinity Theatre is to be applauded for broaching the topic with a humorous touch in founder Alan Ostroff’s original play for three to 10-year-olds, The Tall Tales of Enoch. Enoch (Lance Hayes) is just such a child, a rambunctious third-grader with super-powered imagination, nuclear-fueled energy and a likely diagnosis of attention deficit and...