All stories by The Feminist Spectator on BroadwayStars

Monday, March 3, 2014

Academy Awards Show 2014 by The Feminist Spectator

I’ve been thinking all day about Ellen DeGeneres’s hosting of last night’s Academy Awards show broadcast, which seems to have drawn mixed reviews.  I was personally delighted by her l…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 05:59PM
Tuesday, January 21, 2014

Peggy Shaw in Ruff by The Feminist Spectator

  Peggy Shaw’s latest solo show, Ruff, explores with brutal honesty and frank clarity the physical and emotional costs of surviving a stroke.  Shaw says her 2011 stroke felt as thou…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 10:55PM
Friday, January 10, 2014

Criticism Redux Redux Redux by The Feminist Spectator

There’s a bit of a firestorm on Twitter and on line these past few days about criticism (again), prompted in part by Polly Carl’s HowlRound post, “A New Year’s Diet for the …

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 05:05PM
Wednesday, January 1, 2014

The Feminist Spectator’s Year End Round-up by The Feminist Spectator

I often begin writing blogs that for one reason or another don’t get finished.  I’m taking this New Year’s Day 2014 opportunity to spend a few words (well, more like 5,000 words!) men…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 05:09PM

What’s It All About? Bacharach Reimagined by The Feminist Spectator

I grew up on the music of Burt Bacharach and Hal David, often whether I knew it or not, singing along to scat-like sounds of Dionne Warwick in “Do You Know the Way to San José?” and la-…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 08:18AM
Monday, December 30, 2013

Inside Llewyn Davis by The Feminist Spectator

Unlike Emma Thompson in Saving Mr. Banks, Oscar Isaac plays an unlikeable character who never quite redeems himself.  The Coen brothers’ latest film is shorter on the quirky outlandishnes…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 12:12PM

In a World . . . by The Feminist Spectator

In a World, actor Lake Bell’s debut as an indy writer/director, is a wonderful, witty, madcap exploration of voice-over talent inscribed with a feminist message.  “In a world . . .” r…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 11:19AM

Saving Mr. Banks by The Feminist Spectator

Mary Poppins was the first movie I ever saw.  The moment warranted dressing up to go downtown (in Pittsburgh) to see it at a swanky theatre with my parents and my then very little sister. …

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 08:25AM
Tuesday, November 12, 2013

ASTR 2013 Distinguished Scholar Award Remarks by The Feminist Spectator

Being acknowledged by your peers for a career’s worth of work is a wonderful thing.  On November 9, at the American Society for Theatre Research (ASTR) conference in Dallas, I was hon…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 12:50PM
Wednesday, October 30, 2013

Concussion by The Feminist Spectator

It used to be that lesbian films—that peculiar underground brand made by and about and for lesbians, though not necessarily starring them—were sordid affairs.  The subcultural economy f…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 02:56PM
Tuesday, October 22, 2013

Fun Home by The Feminist Spectator

Two weeks ago, Slate ran a short piece called “Fun Home:  Is America Ready for a Musical about a Butch Lesbian?”  The article quotes collaborators Jeanine Tesori [...]

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 03:46PM
Thursday, October 17, 2013

Critical Generosity by The Feminist Spectator

And now, for a little cross-posting . . . The good folks at Imagining America have begun a new journal called Public:  Arts, Design, Humanities. It’ll be another terrific online forum…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 04:00PM
Monday, October 14, 2013

Romeo and Juliet (Classic Stage) by The Feminist Spectator

Classic Stage’s production of Shakespeare’s love story competes with the high visibility of Orlando Bloom and Condola Rashad performing on Broadway in a rendering that got respectful tho…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 12:23PM
Sunday, September 29, 2013

The Glass Menagerie by The Feminist Spectator

John Tiffany’s brilliant production of Williams’s classic boasts acting so precise and full and rich I sometimes found myself raised above the play, marveling at the skill and talent ins…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 12:05PM
Monday, September 23, 2013

Emmys 2013 by The Feminist Spectator

The 2013 Emmy Awards deserve only brief mention here.  What a tone-deaf show!  What a shame that of several of the evening’s surprising upsets, Kerry Washington didn’t take hom…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 06:43AM
Monday, September 16, 2013

Mr. Burns, a Post-Electric Play by The Feminist Spectator

Anne Washburn’s terrific new play, in an elegant, understated production directed by Steve Cosson at Playwrights Horizons, addresses a near-future dystopia in which American civilization h…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 04:12PM
Thursday, September 12, 2013

Women or Nothing by The Feminist Spectator

  What’s irksome about this play by filmmaker Ethan Coen (No Country for Old Men) at the Atlantic Theatre Company is that it’s so clearly a rough draft.  While most American playwr…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 07:02AM
Friday, August 30, 2013

Elysium by The Feminist Spectator

Neill Blomkamps’ commitment to the plight of the global 99% seems radical for a filmmaker given a block-buster budget and a chance to work with superstar Matt Damon.  The South African fi…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 09:29AM
Wednesday, August 28, 2013

Blue Jasmine by The Feminist Spectator

Blanche DuBois is an iconic character of the white male American imaginary, a damaged, even pathological figure, whose sexual and emotional pathos drives Tennessee Williams’s A Streetcar N…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 08:09AM
Friday, August 9, 2013

The Fosters, on ABC Family by The Feminist Spectator

  Teaching my course on gender, sexuality, and pop culture last spring, I encountered some of the progressive, queer-friendly narratives of the ABC Family network’s line up for th…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 01:24PM
Wednesday, August 7, 2013

The Killing, Season Three by The Feminist Spectator

The Killing‘s third season proved a terrific corrective to the flabby, rainy, interminable, “Who killed Rosie Larson?” affair of its first two.  With a taut story-line and ever-d…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 08:36PM
Thursday, July 25, 2013

I’m Getting My Act Together and Taking it on the Road by The Feminist Spectator

City Center’s new summer “Encores! Off-Center” series was inaugurated this month with Jeanine Tesori as Artistic Director.  The program is an off-shoot of the wildly popular Encores! …

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 06:47PM

Today’s guest post on Symposium . . . by The Feminist Spectator

. . . concerns Anna Deavere Smith’s presidential medal for the humanities and the model she sets for artists determined to combine politics and art.  Also mentioned are Ellen Page, An…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 02:10PM

Guest blog on Symposium: On The Killing by The Feminist Spectator

In another guest blog for Symposium Magazine, I discuss the potential of quality television for expanding roles for women artists, focusing on AMC’s series, The Killing.  More on that…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 07:44AM
Tuesday, July 23, 2013

The Heat and Melissa McCarthy by The Feminist Spectator

I’ve loved Melissa McCarthy ever since I saw her in Paul Feig’s wonderful Bridesmaids, where she stole the show with her performance as an over-sized, over-sexed-in-her-own-mind, straigh…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 02:06PM
Monday, July 22, 2013

Guest blogging on Symposium by The Feminist Spectator

  I’m guest-blogging on the Symposium Magazine site this week, in relation to my essay there on feminist pleasure in pop culture.  Today’s post addresses Kerry Washington&#…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 08:26AM
Sunday, July 21, 2013

Introducing “Symposium” and updates by The Feminist Spectator

I’ve been traveling throughout the month of July and will spend the next week or two catching up with “The Feminist Spectator.” Much to discuss, including: The Emmy Award n…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 08:19AM
Sunday, June 30, 2013

Sontag Reborn by The Feminist Spectator

  Moe Angelos and Marianne Weems of The Builders Association have created a mesmerizing new media performance from the recently published diaries of Susan Sontag. The spoken text is ada…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 09:00PM
Tuesday, June 25, 2013

Pippin by The Feminist Spectator

So here’s the thing about Diane Paulus and how she directs musicals:  She takes song-driven, narrative-lite titles like Hair and Pippin and makes them practically irresistible.  She’s …

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 08:55AM
Monday, June 17, 2013

Varia . . . Gender, Race, Outdoor Musical Theatre . . . by The Feminist Spectator

I’ve been reading around in the blogosphere, catching up on current debates and controversies.  I noted with interest Laura Linney’s remarks, on the occasion of her Crystal Award for wo…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 04:25PM
Monday, June 10, 2013

The 2013 Tony Awards Show by The Feminist Spectator

Can’t Neil Patrick Harris (NPH) be hired to host all of the televised award shows?  Good thing he’s already lined up to do the 2013 Emmy Awards in June.  If the producers of the Oscars…

SOURCE: The Feminist Spectator at 09:01AM

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