Plan-B Theatre’s world premiere production of Debora Threedy’s Balthazar is a crown jewel of intimate chamber theater, in every measure. Directed by Cheryl Ann Cluff, the 70-minute production is gratifying in the finest sense, with Threedy’s well-grounded fanfiction take on Shakespeare’s The Merchant Of Venice, the ebullient elegance of Lily Hye Soo Dixon and Jason … Read more
PYGmalion Theatre Company has been on a golden run in recent productions stretching to last season and its latest featuring Julie Jensen’s Last Lists of My Mad Mother is stellar in every measure. Directed by Morag Shepherd, this one-act gem is carried by the perfect chamber theater ensemble chemistry of actors Reb Fleming, Tamara Howell … Read more
The trials and tribulations of neighbors, especially involving property line disputes, have been among the most widely applied tropes in practically every television sitcom series since the 1950s. Many of these scenes have followed the tenets of “Hollywood Law,” which carves out the spaces for acceptable breakaways from reality. There also have been a handful … Read more
‘Tis the season for tinsel and duplicity. Liz Lane, the Smart Housekeeping magazine’s most popular columnist, worries that the ruse she has kept up for more than a year is about to unravel at a Connecticut farm. Everything she wrote about cooking, her husband and a baby is fiction. Sensing just how close the truth … Read more
The most enduring Hollywood movies about Christmas reinforce the nostalgia about holiday celebrations, even when chaos threatens to upend plans for the perfect gathering. In 1945, as GIs began to return to the States after the long world war, American audiences welcomed the holiday madcap farce of Warner Bros.’ Christmas in Connecticut. Nearly 80 years … Read more
Some 60 years after Marie Curie died (in 1934) from a rare blood disorder caused by her work with radium and polonium, the French government had planned to move her body as well as that of her husband Pierre to the Panthéon. However, the team responsible for exhuming their coffins had to be extraordinarily cautious … Read more
What better way to celebrate the Halloween season than with the first-class productions of Ballet West’s Dracula and Pioneer Theatre Company’s The Rocky Horror Show. BALLET WEST: DRACULA By Chris Myers In 1997, choreographer Ben Stevenson chose to celebrate the centennial of Bram Stoker’s Dracula with a ballet adaptation that would not have seemed out … Read more
EDITOR’S NOTE: On Friday, Oct. 27, at 11 a.m., from the Rose Wagner Performing Arts Center, The Utah Review will live blog the world premiere of Radio Hour Episode 17: Sherlock Holmes and The Final Problem, produced by Plan-B Theatre and KUER-FM’s RadioWest program. Tune into KUER-FM 90.1 and follow The Utah Review during the … Read more
Earlier this year, playwright Morag Shepherd directed the excellent Pygmalion Theatre Company production of Debora Threedy’s Mountain Meadows, which was about historian Juanita Brooks’ search for the truth behind the Mountain Meadows massacre, one of the darkest stains in Mormon history. With news of the massacre, The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints institutionalized … Read more
Joining what has been an outstanding start for several independent and local theatrical companies this season, the Salt Lake Acting Company has scored magnificently with Sarah Shippobotham’s solo show Can I Say Yes to That Dress?, directed by Jamie Rocha Allan. Channeling herself through the character she has written as Sîan Jones, Shippobotham presents a … Read more