All stories by Erik Haagensen on BroadwayStars

Monday, May 25, 2015

NY Fringe Festival Review: 'Miss Magnolia Beaumont Goes to Provincetown' by Erik Haagensen

Original, inventive, as touching as it is funny, actor-writer Joe Hutcheson's 90-minute one-man show is rich, wise, and deeply human.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Möbius by Erik Haagensen

Michael López Sáenz's new play raises intriguing questions, but right now he's clearly not prepared to explore the answers.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Just in Time: The Judy Holliday Story by Erik Haagensen

Writer-director Bob Sloan's biographical play about Judy Holliday is hagiographic entertainment that skates lightly across the surface of its subject's life.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

The Twentieth-Century Way by Erik Haagensen

Before you can play with reality, you have to establish one, something Tom Jacobson's "The Twentieth-Century Way" never does.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Platinum by Erik Haagensen

Trying to refashion a flop musical into something that works is a dicey business at best. One thing is essential: The material, however flawed, must have intrinsic quality. "Platinum," at it…

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

The Pig, the Farmer, and the Artist by Erik Haagensen

Composer-librettist David Chesky takes no prisoners as he goes after the state of American art and culture with a rapier in his largely delightful satiric comic opera.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Missionary Position by Erik Haagensen

Writer-actor Steven Fales' second installment of his "Mormon Trilogy" left me wondering if this unquestionably interesting story of growing up a gay Mormon really needs three shows to tell i…

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Open Heart by Erik Haagensen

For the most part, Joe Salvatore's "verbatim interview play" about open relationships among gay men is engrossing and illuminating.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Veritas by Erik Haagensen

tan Richardson's new play, based on the true story of a Harvard witch hunt undertaken against a group of gay students (and one tutor) in the spring of 1920, packs quite a punch.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

A Separate Peace by Erik Haagensen

Though adapter-performer Brian Foyster's work in the one-man stage adaptation of John Knowles' 1960 novel is never less than intelligent and always tasteful, the end result diminishes its so…

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Wife to James Whelan by Erik Haagensen

Teresa Deevy's long-lost play is a worthy addition to Ireland's dramatic literature and shows Deevy to have had a singular, perceptive ear for the dialogue of ordinary people.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

When Last We Flew by Erik Haagensen

If you think there's no fresh way left to tell a gay coming-out tale, then you haven't seen Harrison David Rivers' exhilarating new play.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Dear Harvey by Erik Haagensen

Dear Harvey does play as if the idea were to create an educational piece for students, but author Patricia Loughrey's interviews and intimate reminiscences with Milk's family and colleagues …

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

When Lilacs Last by Erik Haagensen

Writer-director Tony Devaney Morinelli's play began life at a private high school. In the Fringe it is being put forward as a professional production. It's not.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

The Cradle Will Rock by Erik Haagensen

The 73-year-old "The Cradle Will Rock " retains every drop of its passion as it slices mercilessly at the dark heart of untrammeled American capitalism, even if director Larry Marshall's pro…

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

The Awesome Dance by Erik Haagensen

When you find yourself repeatedly checking your watch during a 75-minute intermissionless show, something's not working.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

NY Review: 'Me, Myself & I' by Erik Haagensen

Edward Albee's "Me, Myself & I" is a not-to-be-missed serving of delicious existential vaudeville and a ferociously comic foray into the realm of the absurd.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

The Sensational Josephine Baker by Erik Haagensen

Once Cheryl Howard the writer catches up to Cheryl Howard the actor, this one-woman musical bio of Josephine Baker is almost certain to be special.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Exit/Entrance by Erik Haagensen

Aidan Matthews' "Exit/Entrance," originally produced at Dublin's Abbey Theatre in 1990, is getting its belated American premiere thanks to Origin Theatre Company and the First Irish Festival.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Cabaret Review: 'An Evening With Paulo Szot' by Erik Haagensen

Acclaimed opera singer and Tony-winning musical theater actor Paulo Szot is sticking his toe into the cabaret waters at Café Carlyle.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

A Home Across the Ocean by Erik Haagensen

Cody Daigle's ambitious and well-meaning new play "A Home Across the Ocean" has talent and a fresh story, but it is ultimately undone by predictability, naiveté, and sentimentality.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

NY Review: 'The Little Foxes' by Erik Haagensen

Director Ivo van Hove's deconstruction of Lillian Hellman's sturdy melodrama comes off as an acting exercise that would probably be very helpful somewhere around the middle of rehearsals.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Hue & Cry by Erik Haagensen

Irish playwright Deirdre Kinahan is making a vivid New York debut with the tightly written two-hander "Hue & Cry." This imaginative account of two cousins meeting on the eve of a fam…

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

The Drunkard by Erik Haagensen

W.H. Smith's 1844 "The Drunkard" is a seminal play in American social and theatrical history. It was the nation's most popular drama until the advent of "Uncle Tom's Cabin."

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Regional Review: 'We Have Always Lived in the Castle' by Erik Haagensen

Unwilling to be an opera and afraid to be a musical, Adam Bock and Todd Almond's adaptation of this classic Shirley Jackson novel never gathers sufficient force.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

NY Review: 'Brief Encounter' by Erik Haagensen

Work as imaginative and wholly successful as "Brief Encounter" doesn't come along every day. It was an exhilarating reminder of why I fell in love with the theater in the first place.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

NY Review: 'The Pitmen Painters' by Erik Haagensen

Lee Hall's "The Pitmen Painters" is a bit like the art made by its characters: Whatever it lacks in technique it more than makes up for in expression.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Office Hours by Erik Haagensen

"Office Hours" is by turns amusing and pointed and yet also forced and thin. The play is a too-gentle lament for the loss of classics-based education.

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

NY Review: 'Mrs. Warren's Profession' by Erik Haagensen

George Bernard Shaw's infamous play on the subject of female prostitution may be 117 years old, but its ideas still feel decidedly modern in director Doug Hughes' largely crackling productio…

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

NY Review: 'Driving Miss Daisy' by Erik Haagensen

It seemed like such a good idea on paper: Vanessa Redgrave and James Earl Jones in "Driving Miss Daisy." Plenty of laughs are landed, but the primal power of this intimate meditation on race…

SOURCE: Backstage at 05:58PM

Au revoir, blog virginity. by Erik Haagensen

A Little ‘Evening' Music

SOURCE: backstage.blogs.com at 05:58PM

All that Chat

2023-2024 BROADWAY SEASON
May 30, 2023: Grey House - Lyceum Theatre
Jun 26, 2023: Just For Us - Hudson Theatre
Jul 24, 2023: The Cottage - Hayes Theater
Nov 16, 2023: Spamalot - St. James Theatre
Dec 18, 2023: Appropriate - Hayes Theater
Mar 07, 2024: Doubt - Todd Haimes Theatre
Apr 14, 2024: Lempicka - Longacre Theatre
Apr 17, 2024: The Wiz - Marquis Theatre
Apr 18, 2024: Suffs - Music Box Theatre
Apr 25, 2024: Mother Play - Hayes Theater
Jun 10, 2024: The Drama Desk Awards