All stories by Rob Weinert-Kendt on BroadwayStars

Wednesday, April 24, 2019

A Set as ‘Intense’ as the Stories the ‘Constitution’ Tells by Rob Weinert-Kendt

It was one thing to deliver lectures in American Legion halls as a teenager. It’s another to stand on a Broadway stage flanked by the photos of 163 staring men.

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 12:24PM
Sunday, January 27, 2019

Julia and Paul and Some Guy Named Bradley by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Actors Paul Rudd, Julia Roberts and Bradley Cooper appear onstage during curtain call at the opening night of “Three Days of Rain” at the Bernard B. Jacobs Theatre on April 19, 2006 in N…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 03:04AM
Friday, January 18, 2019

Flash in a Pan: 'Lestat' by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Rob Harvila's much-discussed recent article on the meaning and value of harsh criticism in the age of social media got me thinking back to my days as a more or less full-time critic in New Y…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 11:18AM
Monday, December 17, 2018

I Love Him But It Embarrasses Me by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Galt MacDermot.It doesn't actually embarrass me to love Galt MacDermot, the composer of Hair and Two Gentlemen of Verona, whose death was just announced--I'm just using this opportunity to e…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:12PM
Tuesday, November 20, 2018

From the Review Files: Tarzan, or the Review That Got Me Fired by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Long story short: I was the last regular critic employed by the ticket-concierge site Broadway.com, for whom I reviewed the 2005-06 season (highlights included Sweeney Todd, Bridge & Tun…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 03:32PM
Tuesday, October 2, 2018

An ‘Intoxicating’ Singer, Whether It’s Green Day or ‘Oklahoma!’ by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Still waiting for her signature role, the versatile Rebecca Naomi Jones is changing things up in a stripped-down new staging of the musical classic.

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 04:54PM
Tuesday, September 11, 2018

Plunder My Songbook, Bob Dylan Said. So He Did. by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Conor McPherson discusses digging deep into the Dylan catalog for his Depression-era play with music, “Girl From the North Country.”

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 10:48AM
Wednesday, March 21, 2018

Making Magic Out of Thin Air by Rob Weinert-Kendt

How do married clowns make wordless wizardry with balloons, umbrellas, packing peanuts and fabric? Turn on those electric fans.

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 11:21AM
Sunday, November 26, 2017

Review Files: Sarah Jones's Bridge & Tunnel by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Sarah Jones in Bridge & Tunnel. (Photo by Paul Kolnik)Broadway.com, Feb. 1, 2006Bridge & TunnelReviewed by Rob KendtIf the Tonys had an ensemble award, Sarah Jones would be an odds-o…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 04:12AM
Tuesday, November 21, 2017

The Review Files, Sondheim Edition by Rob Weinert-Kendt

From The Sondheim Review, December 2011Bittersweet HomecomingBy Rob Weinert-KendtThe perfect Follies, it should be admitted by even its most fervent acolytes, does not exist, and may in fact…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 01:54AM
Monday, September 4, 2017

Gotta 'Like It' by Rob Weinert-Kendt

The 1950 Broadway production of As You Like It, with Katherine Hepburn as Rosalind/Ganymede. Tonight I'm taking my eight-year-old son to see his first Shakespeare: Public Works' adaptat…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 05:54PM
Friday, August 25, 2017

Old School Throwback by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Zilah Mendoza in Electricidad at the Mark Taper Forum, 2005. (Photo by Craig Schwartz)Luis Alfaro has been retrofitting Greek tragedy to L.A.'s Latinx gang culture for many years now, and by…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 04:42PM
Wednesday, July 19, 2017

Martin Landau on Acting by Rob Weinert-Kendt

I had the pleasure of interviewing the late, great Martin Landau back in 2005 for the shortlived magazine Moving Pictures. Here's my story in its entirety.Martin Landau has been places,…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 03:06AM
Thursday, May 4, 2017

'Monsoon' Overflow by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Vishal Bhardwaj.One of the joys of reporting on the upcoming Monsoon Wedding musical, apart from the chance to chat over chai with one of my idols, director Mira Nair, was that everyone invo…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 03:36PM
Wednesday, May 3, 2017

‘Monsoon Wedding’ Lifted Moods Onscreen. How About Onstage? by Rob Weinert-Kendt

A musical based on the popular 2002 film will debut at Berkeley Repertory Theater in California. It has Broadway ambitions.

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 05:31PM
Monday, April 17, 2017

Next! by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Orville Mendoza at Stephen Sondheim's piano.I first saw Orville Mendoza in the lead role of Sweeney Todd at East West Players in 1994; I later had the distinct joy of reviewing him…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 01:12AM
Thursday, April 6, 2017

Big Sister's Clothes by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Patrick Wilson and Amanda Peet in Barefoot in the Park. (Photo by Carol Rosegg)Amanda Peet recently contributed this funny, lightly harrowing essay about the weird contortions she put hersel…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:48PM
Friday, March 10, 2017

An Open Letter to Both Sides by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Dear New York theater friends who think this L.A. 99-seat thing sounds like B.S. and a clear-cut case of exploitation that Equity has every good reason to shut down: I might not go so far as…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:06AM
Thursday, March 9, 2017

TBT: 'Sweeney' Stripped Naked by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Michael Cerveris, Patti LuPone, Manoel Felciano, and Donna Lynne Champlin in "Sweeney Todd" (photo by Paul Kolnik)It's hardly controversial that Sweeney Todd is Sondheim's masterpiece (and, …

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:03PM
Thursday, December 8, 2016

TBT: Weeden's Othello, OSF's Company by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Derrick Lee Weeden and Anthony Heald in Othello at Oregon Shakespeare Festival, 1999. (Photo by David Coooper)I'm about to take in New York Theatre Workshop's new production of Othello,…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 11:06AM
Wednesday, September 21, 2016

A Goat and Two Lizards by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Patrick J. Adams, Cynthia Mace, Brian Kerwin, and James Eckhouse in The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? at the Mark Taper Forum in 2005.I've seen a fair amount of Edward Albee's work in my time, ind…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 03:04AM
Wednesday, August 31, 2016

How Sondheim Writes by Rob Weinert-Kendt

The hoariest question songwriters get asked is: Which comes first, the words or the music? Stephen Sondheim’s answer has always been: the dramatic situation. (With all apologies to Merrily…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 02:44PM
Friday, June 3, 2016

The Stew Files by Rob Weinert-Kendt

I first saw Stew performing in the mid-1990s with a band improbably named Crazy Sound All-Stars at a place called Onyx Echo in Los Feliz; I was invited by a college friend, Carey Fosse, who …

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 01:12PM
Wednesday, May 18, 2016

What’s New for Stew? A Blues Fable Told in Story and Song by Rob Weinert-Kendt

In his new show, “The Total Bent,” the music is always the play, and vice versa.

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 05:51PM
Friday, April 29, 2016

Kelli O’Hara and Victoria Clark on Opera, Joy and Showing Off by Rob Weinert-Kendt

The moving interview between two dear friends and “Mothers.”

SOURCE: Playbill at 11:28AM
Monday, April 11, 2016

Dangerous Nerves: Laurie Metcalf by Rob Weinert-Kendt

This interview originally appeared in the April 12, 2001 issue of Back Stage West."How's my light?" asked Laurie Metcalf as the cover photo for this story was being taken, and then she reali…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 09:56PM
Thursday, January 21, 2016

‘The Body of an American’ Visits Battle Zones of the Field and the Heart by Rob Weinert-Kendt

The poet-playwright Dan O’Brien has a collaborative bond with the former war photographer Paul Watson, manifested in “The Body of an American.”

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 10:34AM
Thursday, January 14, 2016

From the Review Vaults: Mother Courage and Her Children by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Mother Courage and Her Children: Alexandria Wailes, Streep, Geoffrey Arend, and Frederick Weller. (photo by Michal Daniel)Improbably, Brecht's Mother Courage is in the news--the theatre news…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 05:56PM
Wednesday, January 6, 2016

Snapshot: Lauren Gunderson on ‘I and You,’ a Play With an Explosive Twist by Rob Weinert-Kendt

The playwright talks about her incentive for injecting a cathartic surprise into the play, which centers on two teenagers bonding over poetry homework.

SOURCE: The New York Times Subscription at 02:13PM
Friday, December 18, 2015

From the Review Vaults: "Fiddler" with Harvey & Rosie by Rob Weinert-Kendt

photo by Sara Krulwich for The New York TimesThis excellent piece by my colleague Eric Grode, looking back at 50 years of Fiddler memories as the musical's newest revival readies for its ope…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 11:15AM
Monday, July 13, 2015

How Bent Made Gay History by Rob Weinert-Kendt

Tom Bell and Ian McKellen in the London premiere of Bent, 1979.A major revival of Martin Sherman's play Bent begins performances on July 15 at the Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles, directed b…

SOURCE: The Wicked Stage at 07:50AM

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