This year’s Black Nativity, an annual tradition at Penumbra Theatre, takes a modern approach, hanging the nativity story on a contemporary American family. Conceived by Lou Bellamy and T. Mychael Rambo, and directed by Dominic Taylor, Black Nativity: Now’s the Time brings Mary and Joseph and the angels right into the living room of...
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The Guthrie Theater has faithfully delivered on our secret holiday wish: a fresh, new version of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, this one adapted by Crispin Whittell and directed by Artistic Director Joe Dowling. This script has a decidedly lighter and more contemporary slant, in terms of sensibilities, but the brightly rendered, familiar characters...
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The Children’s Theatre Company is among the first to roll out this year’s holiday offering with an adaptation by Philip Grecian A Christmas Story by Jean Shepherd. Grecian, with director Peter Broshius (also CTC’s artistic director) steeps us in the story’s setting with a period look, done on a very functional revolving set, costumed...
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Michael Golamco‘s amiable Cowboy Versus Samurai (Mu Performing Arts performing in the Guthrie‘s Dowling Studio, through Nov 28) is loosely based on Edmond Rostand‘s 1897 classic, Cyrano de Bergerac. Ah, but with one crucial distinction: Golamco’s letter composer, Travis, lacks Cyrano’s famously distended and ugly nose. Travis is a sweet-tempered, reasonably content Korean American,...
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For its premiere production, Freshwater Theatre remounts two (successful) comedies from the Fringe Festival: Table 12, A Play At A Wedding and An Adult Evening Of Shel Silverstein (Freshwater Theatre performing at the Minneapolis Theatre Garage, Franklin and Lyndale, through Nov 21). In Table 12 a half dozen strangers find themselves occupying a table...
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There is something about the sincerity of a Dawes performance that hits you like a punch to the gut and leaves you a little shell-shocked. Frontman Taylor Goldsmith spits out lyrics like he’s been bottling them up for years—and maybe he has, and maybe that’s why they’re so good. And if it’s not the...
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If you’ve ever “worked the phones,” been in the service industry, or brushed up against the sometimes silly arrogance of the rich and/or famous, you will so understand this play. However, Fully Committed, by Becky Mode, directed by Casey Stangl and produced by The Jungle Theater, takes no special experience at all to wonder...
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In Spring Awakening (Hennepin Theatre Trust performing at the Orpheum, tonight — Nov 7 – only) the musical creators have made a magical discovery: that the flowery 19th century text can be combined with 21st century rock music and the effect isn’t at all anachronistic or jarring. In fact, the two reinforce each other. ...
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Walking Shadow Theatre Company’s fifth season begins with the local premier of a play by Rebecca Gilman, The Crowd You’re In With. Set in present day Chicago, and played entirely on the patio behind a small apartment building, the private environment suits the intimate nature of the conversations between couples and among friends. In...
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