4,228 stories by "Barry"
By Samuel L. Leiter
August 7, 2025: In 1988, former screen star Ava Gardner, famed much more for her sultry glamor ("the world's most beautiful animal") than her thespian artistry (althoug…
By David Sheward
August 1, 2025: Joy, subtitled a New True Musical, Off-Broadway at the Laura Pels, is a serviceable enough product to entertain intermittently for two hours, but it's basi…
The White Room Gallery hosted an opening reception for RED CARPET, which will be on view through August 17, 2025.
July 28, 2025: The White Room Gallery, 2 Railroad Avenue in East Hampton, …
By Paulanne Simmons
July 28, 2025: Gene Wilder and Gilda Radner were only married five years. Even though he was thirteen years older, she was married to SNLÂ guitarist and bandleader G.…
Uplifting!
By Alix Cohen
July 27, 2025: We live in an Instagram, Tick-Tock driven society that makes successes of Influencers. Had Joy Mangano come up with her product a little later, she…
By Alix Cohen
July 25, 2025: Having noticed "a couple of blank squares" on his calendar, Sean Harkness shares his inner troubadour with an evening of instrumentals, songs and stories. The m…
By Samuel Leiter
July 25, 2025: The Vietnam war and the theatre have not exactly been strangers, although nowhere near as many shows, especially good ones, have taken their cue from it as …
By Paulanne Simmons
July 24, 2025: Rolling Thunder was the name of a Bob Dylan concert tour that also featured performers such as Joan Baez, Joni Mitchell and Ramblin' Jack Elliott. And it…
By David Sheward
July 24, 2025: The Glimmerglass Festival in Cooperstown, NY celebrates its 50th anniversary season with departures from traditional operatic fare. In addition to Stephen S…
By Iris Wiener
July 24, 2025: John Krasinski is not Angry Alan, despite what one might believe from the title of this (mostly) solo play; instead, Krasinski is Roger, a suburban, disillusi…
By David Sheward
July 21, 2025: Musical styles are mixed to maximum emotional effect in unusual productions in one new outdoor venue in Manhattan and at the 50th anniversary season of a lo…
By Paulanne Simmons
July 16, 2025: It has been said, with a good deal of truth, that short stories make the best screenplays. This is certainly the case with the film, The Man Who Shot Lib…
By David Sheward
July 16, 2025: Unconventional storytelling methods are on display in two Off-Broadway productions, offering brave theatergoers unusual and exciting experiences. John Krasi…
GET ME TO SF PLAYHOUSE ON TIME: MY FAIR LADY CHARMS UNION SQUARE Every summer, San Francisco Playhouse puts on a classic blockbuster musical that runs from early July into September. It's an…
A 1938 Radio Writers Room, as much refuge as employment
By Alix Cohen
July 13, 2025: Howard Edison (Dylan Smith) is new to a radio writers' room where personnel have been confederates for…
The Price of Popularity
By Alix Cohen
July 12, 2025: A splashy satire that bakes bullying, teenage suicide, and sexual assault in dark, subversive humor. Heathers has been around since th…
By David Sheward
July 11, 2025: Heathers the Musical (Off-Broadway at New World Stages) is one of many recent teen-angst tuners. Others of this new genre include Tony-winning Best Musicals …
By Samuel L. LeiterÂ
July 10, 2025: Eleven years ago, in 2014, I reviewed a show called Heathers: The Musical at New World Stages. So it wasn't very fresh in my mind when I visited its …
By Alix Cohen
July 8, 2025: On the fifth anniversary of Charles Kirsch's Backstage Babble, the young uber- fan/interviewer (250 and counting) again takes to the stage at 54Below to present…
By David Sheward
July 7, 2025: When Prince Harry of England married Meghan Markle, an African-American actress, in 2018, I was teaching high school. On the Monday morning after their royal…
By David Sheward
July 3, 2025: In a program note for her play Trophy Boys (at MCC Theater), Emmanuelle Mattana observes, "Gender is a scam but it is also a gift. Drag is radical joy and lib…
Behind every child who believes in themselves is a parent who believed first.
By Alix Cohen
June 30, 2025: Lorelei Edwards comes from a musical family. "I'm Irish/Italian. Everybody sing…
By Alix Cohen
June 28, 2025: Canada 2025 Duke, a successful, American rap artist, is questioned by an interviewer about a visit to Kabul, Afghanistan. At the insistence of his record comp…
By David Sheward
June 28, 2025: Two unconventional plays about odd romantic pairings recently opened Off-Broadway. Both attempt to tackle significant topics outside of the "boy-meets-girl"…
By Isa Goldberg
June 21, 2025: During gay pride one should experience at least one gay happening " it's a stereotypical thing to do. Such an event, Beau the Musical, performed on nativ…
