THE NORMAL HEART Through Sunday, Feb.4 Murphey School Auditorium, Raleigh www.burningcoal.org Larry Kramer’s searing 1985 drama, The Normal Heartcurrently in a compelling revival from Burning Coal Theatre Companyis an autobiographical look back in anger at the dawn of the AIDS crisis from one of its epicenters: the thriving gay culture in New York City. Historians […]
Byron Woods
Bio: Byron Woods is the INDY's theater and dance critic.Email: [email protected]: http://twitter.com/byronwoods
Posted inCulture
Theater Review: At a Time When a Small Minority of Architects Are Women, What We’re Up Against Is No Mere Period Piece
What We’re Up Against★★★★ Through Sunday, Jan. 28 Peace University’s Leggett Theatre, Raleigh You could tell the women in the audience had heard these rationalizations and runarounds before. One snorted audibly as Stu Wilson, the sexist managing architect at a prominent design firm, pontificated on women’s place in his field at the outset of Theresa […]
Posted inArt
The Hidden Link Between Tamara Kissane’s New Play, The Master Builder, and Her Artist Soapbox Podcast
THE MASTER BUILDER Jan. 18–Feb. 3, 8 p.m. Thu.–Sat., $8–$17 Mystery Brewing Company, Hillsborough www.littlegreenpig.com Helen Sullivan, known to the world as Sully, has captured the media’s attention as home designer to the rich and famous. When a late-night talk show host pushes too hard during an interview, the flamboyant architect makes a ratings splash: […]
Posted inTheater
Leaving the U.S. Sharpened Nicola Bullock’s Perspective on What the South Expects of Women, Resulting in New Dance Solo Imago
NICOLA BULLOCK: IMAGO Jan. 11–20 (8 p.m. Thu.–Sat.), $10–$12 The Fruit, Durham www.didaseason.com Sometimes, a foreign context lets you be more yourself than you would be at home. Sometimes, it gives you no other choice. Nicola Bullock, a formerly Durham-based choreographer and dancer, challenged the local status quo of dance and race in her breakthrough […]
Posted inArt
A Mix of Persuasive and Tentative Performances Mark Ward Theatre’s Production of Class-Clash Drama The Mound Builders
THE MOUND BUILDERS Through Sunday, Feb. 18 Ward Theatre, Durham www.wardtheatrecompany.com In 2016, Ward Theatre Company beat some very high odds with its first production in Durham, Jacuzzi, in which we couldn’t pick out the two students making their stage debuts among the quartet of actors. We can’t say the same of Ward Theatre’s new […]
Posted inArt
The Top Ten Plays of 2017
THE DELTA BOYS: ORLANDO (Manbites Dog Theater, Jan. 12–28) This smart, stylish take on Virginia Woolf’s novella was exceptional in all aspects, including Elsa Hoffman’s intricate metal set silhouettes, Joseph Amodei’s lighting, and Kim Black’s costume design. Even more remarkable, superlative actors Skylar Gudasz, Rajeev Rajendran, Caitlin Wells, Dale Wolf, and Emmett (then Emily) Anderson […]
Posted inArt
Design Elements Obscure Some of the Hardest Truths in ShaLeigh Dance Works’ I Promise
I Promise Closed Sunday, Dec. 17 The Fruit, Durham www.didaseason.com I didn’t expect to see less of ShaLeigh Dance Works’ I Promise on opening night than I had during a rehearsal the weekend before it opened. But Friday’s premiere at The Fruit showed the degree to which technical elements can alterand even obscurean emerging work […]
Posted inArt
Ray Dooley Resurrects Dickens the Raconteur, Not Just the Novelist, in A Christmas Carol
A CHRISTMAS CAROL Through Saturday, Dec. 23 UNC’s Kenan Theatre, Chapel Hill www.playmakersrep.org As a genial Ray Dooley stepped onstage last Thursday night, there were two distinct theatrical echoes in Kenan Theatre. The first was from 1998, the last time local audiences saw him in this one-person version of A Christmas Carol. The other was […]
Posted inCulture
Theater Review: Bare Theatre Breaks Out Stronger Stuff for Its Second Round of Drunken Shakespeare in Local Taverns
ShakesBEER 2.0: The Bard Strikes Back★★★½ Through Friday, Dec. 22 Various locations, Triangle-wide Now we know: Macbeth’s porter was off by one in his famous list. Drunkenness, the topic of his comic monologue in the Scottish Play’s second act, provokes five things, not four: nose-painting, sleep, urine, lechery—and merriment. The proof is abundant in Bare […]
Posted inArt
Sonorous Road’s Clever, Immersive Adaptation of The Gift of the Magi Succeeds in Adding New Details to a Small World
THE GIFT OF THE MAGI Through Saturday, Dec. 23 Sonorous Road Theatre, Raleigh www.sonorousroad.com The first question any stage adaptation of The Gift of The Magi must answer is how to make it an evening-length work. It would scarcely take twenty minutes to enact the three brief scenes in O. Henry’s most famous short story, […]