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Theater Review | 'Beasley’s Christmas Party': A Curious Journalist Noses Around His Intriguing Neighbor, and Romance Ensues

Posted: December 17th, 2008, 4:36am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

“Beasley’s Christmas Party,” a charming adaptation of a Booth Tarkington story, is told with such a light touch that you might overlook its contrivances.

Theater Review | 'The Truth About Santa': A Satire Deconstructs an Unsaintly St. Nick

Posted: December 9th, 2008, 5:34pm GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

If you cringe at the ads for “White Christmas” on Broadway, then have I got a jolly good time for you.

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Theater Review | 'Black Monk': That Russian Romantic Kid’s Got Talent

Posted: December 9th, 2008, 4:50am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

If nothing else, “The Black Monk” answers a question that regular theatergoers may have wondered: is there anything that Austin Pendleton can’t do?

Theater Review | 'Super Vision': Pulling the Plug on Digital Bonding

Posted: November 21st, 2008, 4:58am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

“Super Vision” is an audacious meditation on the erosion of privacy.

Theater Review | 'Jester of Tonga': A King Becomes the Fool in a South Seas Scandal

Posted: November 21st, 2008, 4:53am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

The whimsical “Jester of Tonga” is a rare example of puppet theater about bad investments.

Theater Review | 'Cato': Leadership and Honor, Noble and Not So

Posted: October 24th, 2008, 4:29am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

Joseph Addison’s rich play, which receives a rare and powerful staging by Jim Simpson, is more than just a historical curiosity.

Theater Review | 'Fault Lines': The Things You Learn at a Bar: Guys, Friendship, Its Strains and Surprises

Posted: October 2nd, 2008, 1:33pm GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

Stephen Belber’s enjoyable if flawed “Fault Lines” is part of a genre about vaguely homoerotic male friendship in which the towel-slapping banter usually hides much deeper divides.

Theater Review | 'Southern Promises': Lives of Bondage Ruled by Whims and Whips

Posted: September 18th, 2008, 5:01am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

Playwrights generally tiptoe around the subject of race. Thomas Bradshaw stomps.

Theater Review | 'Anger/Nation': Moral Righteousness Meets Down and Dirty

Posted: September 17th, 2008, 4:39am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

“Anger/Nation” maintains Radiohole’s trademark aesthetic: down and dirty, shameless and proudly debauched.

A Serious Voice Amid the Giddy Fringe

Posted: August 13th, 2008, 3:14am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

The Traverse Theater, one of the 278 locations of the Edinburgh Festival Fringe, clearly stands apart from the festival.

Dockside Contender Coulda Had a Sad End

Posted: August 11th, 2008, 3:46am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

A new British production of the stage adaptation of the film “On the Waterfront” is playing at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe.

Theater Review | 'Prisoner of the Crown': A Court Full of Chaos, a Trial Crammed With Questions

Posted: May 28th, 2008, 4:25am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

Richard F. Stockton, the author of “Prisoner of the Crown,” doesn’t entirely know how to boil a wealth of material down to a play.

Theater Review | 'Artefacts': A Family and an Iraqi Vase, All of a Piece Yet Separate

Posted: May 28th, 2008, 4:24am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

“Artefacts,” the compelling bullet of a play in this year’s Brits Off Broadway festival, takes place on a smoky stage in the round that has the dark, hazy look of a bad dream.

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Theater Review | Marathon 2008, Series B: Big Bangs Don’t Always Require Long Fuses

Posted: May 28th, 2008, 4:23am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

The second installment of Marathon 2008 at the Ensemble Studio Theater is lively and diverse.

Theater Review | 'Democracy in America': Performance Art for Sale, Like Elections

Posted: April 5th, 2008, 3:30am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

“Democracy in America” is a cunning satire of contemporary politics that transforms selling out into performance art.

Theater Review | 'Hello Failure': Wives With Lifelines Leagues Under the Sea

Posted: March 19th, 2008, 2:35am GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

Kristen Kosmas’s “Hello Failure” is the kind of literary play in which the actors seem secondary to the words.

Theater Review | 'The Scariest ': Stage Frights

Posted: March 10th, 2008, 9:15pm GMT by By JASON ZINOMAN

The title of this shrewdly produced series of nine spooky short plays raises a question: Who is the scariest of “The Scariest”?