OMG Spring Theater 2018 - Too Much Theater, Never Enough Time

Happy spring, theaterloving friends! Our beautiful Minnesota spring may be filled with car-murdering potholes and banks of dirty, semi-melted snow, but it is also filled with a ton of amazing theater!

Here's what we're looking forward in particular:

As One - Skylark Opera Theatre at North Garden Theater

One of the beautiful things about having this blog is having the opportunity to share when a show is truly outstanding and needs to be seen. The blog works much better than standing on the street corner shouting at passersby. (I think. I haven't really tried that yet.)

Friends, go see As One at Skylark Opera. Now at North Garden Theater (St. Paul! Represent!) only through Sunday, March 25.

Two Mile Hollow - Theater Mu and Mixed Blood Theatre

Dear theatergoing friends,

We here at Minnesota Theater Love owe you an apology. Due to a number of contributing factors, including a trip to the Big City, we didn't see Two Mile Hollow until its final weekend. 

We did not use our voice and our platform to broadcast the news of this play and production far and wide, and for that, we are truly sorry. 

School of Rock National Tour at the Orpheum Theatre

The touring production of School of Rock starts with a recorded announcement from the show's composer, Andrew Lloyd Webber, answering the obvious question about this show: Are the kids on stage really playing their instruments? The answer is an emphatic "Yes"!

It's easy to see why this is spelled out in the beginning. Once these young performers get to rocking out, it would be easy to believe that the sound is actually being made by adult professionals in the orchestra pit. These kids can play!

Theo Mitchell-Penner (Lawrence).
© Matthew Murphy.

Letter from New York - February 2018

TKTS. 78 degrees on February 21.
COME ON!

After an absence of WAY too long (although we did some great theater last time--Hamil-something springs to mind), we returned to NYC to see as much theater as we could in five days.

Let's GO!

Indecent at Guthrie Theater

Indecent plays through March 24 on the Wurtele Thrust Stage at the Guthrie Theater. Recently on Broadway and written by Paula Vogel, here's the story from the Big G's website:

Inspired by the 1923 Broadway debut of Sholem Asch’s The God of Vengeance – a play that follows a Jewish brothel owner and the lesbian romance between his daughter and a prostitute – Indecent charts the journey of a drama upheld as a groundbreaking piece of Jewish literature by some, and an act of obscenity by others. An ensemble of seven actors and three musicians portrays more than 40 roles to shed light on one of the most fascinating scandals in theater history.

Indecent tells a really interesting story and the production has some really lovely elements. I wish I liked the play more. Running one hour and fifty minutes, it's one of the few times I wished a play was longer. Despite some great performances from Ben Cherry and Gisela Chipe, as well as a bunch of Guthrie regulars, and a lovely musical accompaniment by Spencer Chandler, Lisa Gutkin and Pat O'Keefe, the play ultimately left me cold.

The play covers a large span of history and many countries but could have used a bit more depth in its character development, particularly in the character of Sholem Asch. Also, the play whips back and forth in time incredibly quickly, which is fine and clearly denoted, but the "break in time" vignettes are a bit puzzling.

Indecent got rave reviews on Broadway--although Jesse Green at Vulture had a few issues with the play that I completely agree with--and from our fellow theater bloggers. Check out their reviews on the Twin Cities Theater Bloggers blog!