KPFA - Bay Area Theater

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The Cook” by Eduardo Machado, at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through October 11, 2026.       TEXT OF REVIEW: Over the past seventy years, Cuba has gone through a remarkable series of changes. First there was the Batista coup overthrowing the 1940 Constitution, leading to the corruption and repression of the mafia years. Then came the Cuban revolution, with its promise of democracy and freedom. Then Castro’s socialist government offering free medical care education, along with censorship and repression. Then came the blockade, shortages and eventually a loosening. Some of those changes are evident in Eduardo Machado’’s heartfelt and emotionally rewarding play, originally produced in 2003, The Cook, now at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through October 11th. Gladys has been a cook in a very wealthy Havana home since she was thirteen. It is the end of December 1958, and she and her boyfriend Carlos, the family chauffeur and an avid Communist, are presenting a New Years Eve party for Havana’s elite, when suddenly her mistress, Adria, announces that she and her husband are immediately leaving the country, going into exile. Batista has fled, the revolution has been won. But they’ll be back, she says, and Gladys must keep the house safe for their return. The play takes us through two more eras in Cuba’s history, as seen through Gladys’ eyes and the eyes of others as they cope with the country’s changing economic and social landscape. For playwright Eduardo Machado, it was the food and a conversation with a real life Gladys that inspired him to sit down and write about Cuba through the lens of this one person and one kitchen. Gladys in the play is no communist, barely a revolutionary. Adria, she thinks, is her friend, not merely her employer. And while others are excited to be free of tyranny, it is her world that’s been thrown upside down. Revolutions have emotional consequences, some obvious, some subtle, and some, ultimately, eye-opening. Homophobia, misogyny and racism play their own roles after Castro comes to power. Not everything changes. The Cook is anchored in superb performances, particularly that of Yesenia Iglesias as Gladys, Gisela Chipe in a double role, and Daniel Duque-Estrada as Carlos. The gorgeous scenic design is by Tanya Orellano. The Cook operates on many levels, from the personal to the political, It’s often moving and always informative, and is a welcome addition to the Bay Area theatre scene. The Cook by Eduardo Machado, directed by David Mendizabel, (Mend-di-ZA-bel) plays at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through October 11th. For more information you can go to berkeley rep.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The Cook” at Berkeley Rep Peets Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The White Chip” by Sean Daniels, directed by Lance Gardner, at Marin Theatre through September 20, 2026.               TEXT OF REVIEW: We live in a world of addiction. Drugs, tobacco, overeating, even mindless scrolling. But the granddaddy of all addictions, going back millennia, is of course alcoholism. It’s been a long time since the drunken comedy of people like W.C. Fields or even Dean Martin, and the serious stuff, about actual alcoholism, is always very serious. So it’s a surprise and maybe a shock to see a comedy about the subject, The White Chip by Sean Daniels, now at Marin Theatre through September 20th, which tells a largely autobiographical story about a young theatre director who is, until he isn’t, a very functioning drunk. The White Chip sets itself up as a memory play, with Steven, our narrator, telling us how he first meets alcohol as a teenager, how the drinking continues ,while work afterward as a theatre director and artistic director collide with his growing love of the bottle. The White Chip itself refers to a poker-chip given at AA meetings to those who first show up, or to those coming back after a relapse. A new beginning, they say, a fresh start. And over the course of the play, Steven McAlister gets a lot of them. One of the primary methods of overcoming alcohol is to trust in a higher power. But what if you’re an atheist? What if religion makes you run in the opposite direction, as it does for the ex-Mormon Steven? How can you get better if the only cure is another addiction, an addiction to world of wishes and prayers? Ben Clark is pitch-perfect as Steven, narrator and participant in his life story. Two castmates play all the characters around him, Lyndsy Kail taking all the women’s roles, most affecting as Steven’s mother , and Danny Shae all the male roles, often escaping his usual Bay Area typecasting. The narration is serious and sardonic, always self-aware, and the action and dialogue reflect the fact that, as the playwright himself once noted, the antics of alcoholics can often be silly and sidesplittingly funny. There’s hilarity in the tragedy. The White Chip feels so real, and Sean Daniels is so truthful in his writing, that the play could be triggering for those who have beaten addiction. And while many of us have never been in Steven’s shoes, we’ve all witnessed Stevens in our lives. No matter who you are, this is a production that hits very close to home. The White Chip by Sean Daniels, directed by Lance Gardner, plays at Marin Theatre through September 20th. For more information you can go to marintheatre.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The White Chip” at Marin Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “R.O.I. (Return on Investment) by Aaron Loeb, directed by Jonathan Moscone, a San Francisco Playhouse production at Creativity Theatre.       TEXT OF REVIEW: Back just a few short years ago, despite the warning dystopias of Skynet in the Terminator films and HAL in 2001, most believed technology had the power to turn this planet into a utopia. That was especially true since the tech titans seemed so idealistic. Elon Musk and his electric cars, Jeff Bezos and the Washington Post, the optimism of Steve Jobs. But times have changed. How does the horror of monopoly capitalism engage with the sunniness of a brighter tomorrow? These are heavy questions, which are subsumed inside the interpersonal power struggles that make up the bulk of the funny and profound World Premiere play, ROI, Return on Investment by Aaron Loeb, directed by Jonathan Moscone, now a San Francisco Playhouse production at the Creativity Theatre through September 5th. The Montrose Fund links investors with technology projects, and May Lee, the protege of the Fund’s founder, Paul Montrose, thinks she’s found her golden goose. It’s a young biotech genius named Willa McGovern, who explains she’s found the way to map individual genetic signs that point directly to cancer and alzheimers, and to then engineer genetic changes to cure both maladies. And Willa is the real deal. Over the course of the play we follow the three over a period of months and years as they weave their own scenarios and objectives, sometimes in tandem but often putting their individual priorities first. Which creates the kind of conflict that makes for thrilling theatre. Anthony Fusco has a field day as the gadget and toy happy Paul, Sharon Shao gives her all as the idealistic and snarky May, and Lauren English plays it both ways as the enigmatic Willa, the three-person chemistry sparking laughs and sometimes shocks as they play off each other. Also mention should be made of the excellent set design, lighting and sound. Issues involving ethics, late stage capitalism, the power of the internet, the joy and horror of technology, its toys and surveillance mechanisms all rise inside the show, usually yielding more questions than answers. There’s always subtext behind the laughs. R.O.I. turns sober in its last scenes, a common trait of comedies these days, and it’s possible to argue with the resolution. But it’s the best new comedy to emerge from the Bay Area since the pandemic, and well worth seeing. R.O.I., Return On Investment by Aaron Loeb, directed by Jonathan Moscone, a San Francisco Playhouse production, plays at the Creativity Theatre through September 5th. For more information, go to sfplayhouse.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “R.O.I. (Return on Investment)” at San Francisco Playhouse Creativity Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “Orpheus Descending” by Tennessee Williams, at Oakland Theatre Project through August 23, 2026.         Text of Review: Over the course of his career, Tennessee Williams wrote thirty full length plays and a host of one-acts. Yet looking at the list of plays produced by local and regional theaters, you’d think he only wrote The Glass Menagerie and A Streetcar Named Desire. While it’s true there was a fall off in quality after 1965, and some of the early works were sketchy, there’s still quite a roster of plays that hardly ever get revived outside of New York. So it’s a kind of gift that Orpheus Descending is now playing at Oakland Theatre Project through August 23rd. The play has a curious and confusing history. A rewrite of one of Williams’ early plays, Battle of Angels, Orpheus Descending opened on Broadway in 1957 in the midst of Williams’ most creative period. It received mixed to negative reviews, and closed quickly, later becoming a Brando film titled The Fugitive Kind, which had no relationship to a same-titled early Williams play, and was later revived on Broadway in 1989 with Vanessa Redgrave, which was filmed but isn’t available streaming. Orpheus Descending opens in a dry goods store in a small white town in the South in the 1950s when Val, a drifter whose car has broken down, comes into the emporium and throws everyone in the town into turmoil, particularly Lady, wife of the store’s ill-tempered invalid owner. A romance, doomed of course, ensues. We do have to wait to meet them after a long expository duet from two lesser characters that Williams should have cut seventy years ago. O rpheus Descending is, as one critic noted for a recent revival, pure over the top Southern Gothic, verging on fantasy and brain rattling hysteria. It’s both Williams at his best, and at his most histrionic. This production, directed by Will Detlefsen, shows the play at its best through some of the actors, particularly Natalie Pasquinelli as Carol and Lisa Ramirez in the role of Lady. But we never understand Val’s attraction to Lady and the play suffers from the theatre’s configuration, forcing actors to shout from across the horizontal space, turning the play often into a one-note yelling spree. And some directorial choices that sounded good in theory just don’t work. But in a world of half-baked world premieres and undeserved Pulitzers, any Tennessee Williams is a treat, and when this production works, and it does work here and there, and when Williams is on a roll, it’s theatre as its meant to be seen. Orpheus Descending plays at Oakland Theatre Project through August 23rd. For more information go to oakland theatreproject. org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “Orpheus Descending” at Oakland Theatre Project appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews the musical “Hairspray” directed by Bill English, at San Francisco Playhouse through September 12, 2026.           Text of Review: The Golden Age of the Broadway musical faded in the sixties, the age of Sondheim and the pop opera died before the new century, and since then, the Great White Way has atrophied into a world of corporate jukeboxes, pointless renderings of hit movies, little shows that could, and hits that never close. And then there’s 2003’s Hairspray, now in a fine production at San Francisco Playhouse through September 12th. It’s not as if the show vanished; it pops up frequently in community theaters these days, filling in the gaps between the spelling bee Audrey II, Hedwig and a host of Sondheims. But without a Broadway revival, Hairspray never inserted itself into the canon. And it should, particularly now. John Waters’ most mainstream film from 1988 was a tribute to the outsiders, outcasts and freaks he grew up with in Baltimore, those very people inhabiting his earlier films, notably his muse, the drag superstar Divine, Harris Glen Milstead, cast as Edna Turnblad, mother of the full figured Tracy Turnblad. The film was a love letter to the way song and dance could overcome racism, body-shaming and all the biases that had control of America in 1962. Hairspray, the musical, with tuneful and memorable songs by Marc Shaiman, stayed true to the politics, and kept memories of Divine alive by always casting Edna in drag, first with Harvey Fierstein and later John Travolta. Hairspray was the sweetest of all John Waters films, and that sweetness is reflected in the musical itself, and particularly in this production. It’s seen here in the superb performance of Ella Ruth Francis, who embodies Tracy with as much joy, energy and voice as any performer in the role on Broadway or off. She is Tracy Turnblad . Other standouts include Jordan Covington as Seaweed, whose body movement in every scene is a joy to behold. And there’s Jeanine Anderson as a gospel voiced Motormouth Maybelle and Alison Ewing as the amusingly villainous Velma Van Tussle. Jonathan Chisolm as Edna takes a backseat during most of the show, only stepping out in the final scenes. The casting of Edna may have once been a tribute to Divine, but today there’s a political subtext that enhances the show’s theme of inclusion. One caveat: the decibel level toward the end is a bit off the charts, so be forewarned. But mostly it’s just a grand night in the theatre, a musical to enjoy and savor. Hairspray, directed by Bill English, plays at San Francisco Playhouse through September 12th. For more information, you can go to sfplayhouse.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA.     The post Review: “Hairspray” at San Francisco Playhouse appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The Employee Dhama Handbook: a world premiere play by Geetha Reddy at TheatreWorks Lucie Stern Theatre in Palo Alto through August 2, 2026.       TEXT OF REVIEW Discrimination comes at you in many ways. Racial bigotry. Religious fanaticism. Gender and disabled bias. Homophobia. Fat-shaming, agism. The list lengthens as you expand to other cultures. There’s the whole tribal thing too. Then there’s the caste system from India. Banned in 1950, it still lives on under the surface.Explaining caste in detail takes too long, but some jobs simply can’t go to members of one caste or another. The Brahmin are on top; Dalits at the bottom. But has the system spread to America, and if it has, how does it manifest? That question, and the relationship of that particular bias to the caste system of corporations lies at the heart of The Employee Dharma Handbook, a new play by Geetha Reddy, at TheatreWorks in Palo Alto through August 2nd. The focus is on a handful of workers at a fictional aerospace company; they’re building a rocket to Jupiter, and if it all works out, the whole crew will become rich. But Leela, a young Indian scientist born in the U.S., has just been passed over by her boss, Khrish, for an important promotion that instead went to another Indian, Baasu, who himself understands it should have gone to Leela. If this isn’t resolved, there is no team. Enter Val, the black HR director, no stranger to bias herself, investigating the matter. Was the problem Leela’s gender? Or something else? Khrish is Brahmin,. So is Baasu. Leela is not. No, no, says Khrish, it’s not like that at all. But maybe it is. The Employee Dharma Handbook often doesn’t know what kind of play it wants to be. Serious critique? Farce? Comedy-drama? The capitalism and caste dichotomy unclear. The comedy not as funny as it needs to be. As a world premiere it needs work. But the elements are there. Each character, at one point or other, becomes facilitator, accuser, victim, winner and loser. The cast handles the role switching well, particularly Kathryn Smith-McGlynn as Val and Kunal Dudhecker as Baasu. As the relationships twist and turn, we see a playwright at the top of her game.. There comes a point toward the end where The Employee Dharma Handbook goes off the rails, and in order to make a point, the characters become pawns of the playwright. Still, the play is often a thoughtful, funny, and very original ride with hopefully a bright future. The Employee Dharma Handbook by Geetha Reddy plays at TheatreWorks Lucie Stern Theatre in Palo Alto, and for more information, you can go to theatre works.org. Im Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA.   The post Review: “The Employee Dharma Handbook” at TheatreWorks Palo Alto appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The Lunchbox” at Berkeley Rep‘s Roda Theatre through July 5, 2026.             TEXT OF REVIEW The golden age of the Broadway musical died over a half century ago. The post-golden age of Sondheim and the rock opera faded before the new century. Since then, we’ve had corporate movie adaptations, jukebox junk and an increasing number of parody meta-musicals. But good and great shows do slip through the cracks. Hamilton, certainly, but also Fun Home, Next to Normal, Suffs and others. It’s quite possible that another gem eventually to hit New York, is currently at Berkeley Rep’s Roda Theatre through July 5th, and that’s The Lunchbox, created by the team of Ritesh Batra and The Lazours. Based on a 2013 film of the same name, The Lunchbox is about one of those one in a million chance meetings that change people and the direction of their lives. Mumbai, or Bombay as it was known, has a complex system in which business people’s hot lunches are delivered from home to workplace in the middle of the day via a phalanx of what are known as dabbawallahs. Despite millions of people and a gigantic metropolis, this system is incredibly accurate with spectacular on-time deliveries. But there are screwups. One day, a young wife, Ila, sends her lunch canister to her husband’s office — the canisters have multiple smaller bowls — which never arrives. Somehow, it winds up on the desk of Sajaan, an older widower on the verge of retirement.He sends back a note. She responds. He’s decades older, she’s married with a daughter; romance may not be in the cards, but connection is. What makes The Lunch Box work so well is both its familiarity with musical theater tropes and its differences. You can hear a bit of Sondheim in the way music and lyrics meld to further the story, but there’s also the very distinctive sound of South Asian melody, harmony, instruments and rhythm, punctuated by Bollywood style ensemble dances. The result is organic, it feels right. The Lunchbox unites the two art forms into one, with the spectacle never overwhelming the delicacy of the story, songs, or performances, all of which, by the way, are very, very good, as is the gorgeous set design. The show is kind of a miracle, code-switching in a way that feels wholly original, while maintaining the sensibility and sensitivity of its source material. A note of caution: The Lunch Box is a soufflé. Any attempt to fix it, to make it more big ticket-friendly, could kill it. The show is perfect as it is. The Lunchbox plays at Berkeley Rep’s Roda Theatre through July 5th. For more information you can to go berkeleyrep.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The Lunchbox” at Berkeley Rep Roda Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Woinsky reviews “Dracula, A Feminist Revenge Fantasy, Really: by Kate Hamill at San Francisco Playhouse through June 27, 2026.           TEXT OF REVIEW According to Google’s unreliable AI, nobody beats Dracula as the single most portrayed literary character in film history, with over two hundred direct adaptations, parodies and crossover appearances. You can add the hundreds of theatrical versions floating around as well. Due to a screw-up in the 19th Century, Dracula has always been in the public domain in the United States. There’s also the whole vampire thing too, Vlad Tepes, Anne Rice, the Lost Boys. In 2020, following a flurry of Jane Austen adaptations, playwright Kate Hamill chose to take a bite out of Bram Stoker, and thus we have Dracula, A Feminist Revenge Fantasy, Really … yes, that’s the title, which now runs at San Francisco Playhouse through June 27th. This Dracula hews to the beats of the Stoker novel, and at the same time turns it upside down. Dracula is not merely a monster, he’s the archetype of toxic masculinity, particularly as muscularly and scarily performed by Johnny Moreno. Renfield, or rather Mrs. Renfield, the fly-eating comic lunatic, played here in an indelible performance by Stacy Ross, is the night’s most tragic victim, the rejected female child, yearning for daddy to take her back. After a brief prologue the show opens at the doors of Dracula’s castle in Transylvania, where estate agent Jonathan Harker, in a physical performance by James Aaron Oh that runs from torment to slapstick, meets up with the titular vampire, and his vampire wives, who are themselves victims of a misogynist society. Then we move on to the main story involving Jonathan’s Wife Mina, an engaging Sharon Shao, and her friend Lucy, a feisty Nemma Adeni, she’s a proto-feminist planning to marry for security, certainly not love. And her fiancé, the staid anti-feminist Dr. Seward of the asylum, a deliberately stiff Josh Schell. And then we meet Dr. Van Helsing, in a cowboy hat, played with gusto by Susi Damilano, and all the elements fall in place. It’s to director Bill English’s credit that Dracula stays most of the time on a tightrope between Victorian melodrama, horror and camp. The laughter is uneasy, the pathos over the top, and the violence pretty graphic. This Dracula doesn’t shy away from its bloody roots. While the subject may be fear and the subtext dealing with the evils of traditional masculinity, this is a fearless production with an impeccable cast. If you don’t mind the viscera. Dracula, A Feminist Revenge Fantasy Really by Kate Hamill plays at San Francisco Playhouse through June 27th. For more information, you can go to sfplayhouse.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “Dracula, A Feminist Revenge Fantasy, Really” at San Francisco Playhouse appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “Pictures from Home” at Marin Theatre through May 31, 2026           TEXT OF REVIEW Acclaimed photographer Larry Sultan based his career on capturing life as lived through his art, and what better notion than collating photos of his own family and home growing up in Sherman Oaks in Southern California during the middle of the twentieth century. This collection of snapshots became a book published in 1992, which was then adapted for the stage as “Pictures from Home”, which plays at Marin Theatre through May 31st. In this memory play, Larry, who died in 2009, tells the story of his visits to his parents while preparing the book, as the three, parents and son, comment on the pictures and bicker with one another. Irving Sultan, a retired salesman, is no Willy Loman. He sold well and retired well-off, always ready to explain exactly what makes a great salesman, often to Larry’s chagrin. Jean Sultan, ever acerbic, puts up with her husband’s toxic masculinity, refusing to take his bullying and having a life of her own. Always seemingly on the verge of divorce, they will stay together until the end. What makes Pictures from Home work so well in this Marin Theatre production — the show began off broadway with in 2023 with a cast that included Nathan Lane — is the truthfulness, in the dialogue, in all three performances, and in the direction of Jonathan Moscone. There’s no heightened speech, no pregnant theatrical pauses. These are real people sounding like a family, dysfunctional maybe, but real. The performances by Victor Talmadge as Irving and Susan Koozin as Jean are so truthful that even if they’re not your actual parents or grandparents, they still sound like them in their sparring and quarrelling. Dan Cantor, as the narrator and son, physically a dead ringer for the real Larry, pulls off his double duties without a hitch. Pictures from Home can at times be painful to watch. These people are maybe too real for comfort. Do you really want to spend an evening with relatives like these, didn’t you move as far away from them as possible? Our memories create golden ages where such squabbles and power plays don’t exist. Which is why Larry Sultan’s photos have such resonance. His photos were more credible than the memories he retained, which is why his books and exhibitions work so well. This play mirrors that credibility. With truthfulness in short supply these days in social media and in news reports, finding it in a memory play is all the more special. Pictures from Home by Sharr White, directed by Jonathan Moscone, plays at Marin Theatre through May 31st. For more information you can go to marintheatre.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “Pictures from Home’ at Marin Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews the national touring company production of  “Hell’s Kitchen” at the Orpheum Theater in San Francisco.           FULL TEXT: Following the release of her debut album in 2001, Songs in A Minor, singer songwriter Alicia Keys became an instant superstar, a position firmed up by a series of successful albums and Grammy Awards over the course of the next decade. So it is not surprising that a jukebox musical would at some point emerge. And thus we have Hells Kitchen, which runs at the Orpheum Theatre through May 24th. Most jukebox shows fall into two categories: a history of the performer’s career, with the songbook performed in the order the songs were recorded, with occasional numbers shoehorned into the story, or an original story retconned to make the songs fit the plot. Hells Kitchen presents new songs and shoehorned ones in a sanitized autobiography. The show focuses on Alicia Keys’ life at the age of seventeen, as she and her single mom reside in a high-rise inthe gentrifying neighborhood west of Times Square. She fights with her mom over an older boy and winds up learning piano from an elderly woman living in the building’s public room. The low stakes — who didn’t fight with their parents at that age? means there’s minimal forward movement. Despite the piano lessons, we never learn of Ali’s talent, nor her ambitions. The songs themselves, well it’s hard to follow lyrics distorted by melisma and drowned out by orchestration. The reconstructed old songs are unrecognizable, and the new ones have no center. Many songs start small and turn into a cacophany, with random dancers performing aerobics disguised as choreography. This may work at a Demi Lovato concert, or a Warriors Halftime Show, but doesn’t quite fly inside a stage musical. There are pleasures, most notably in the work of Kennedy Caughell as Jersey, Ali’s mother, Desmond Sean Elliott as Davis, Ali’s dad, and most notably, Roz White as Miss Liza Jane, the pianist who teaches Ali how to be a musician. And while Alicia Keys isn’t there to perform them, her songs all work within her own specific musical ballpark. It’s Alicia Keys without Alicia Keys, one supposes. Ultimately, none of the complaints matter. The show ran two years on Broadway, over 750 performances. Costing 22 million dollars to produce, the show made back only 60% of its capitalization. This tour is an attempt to make up the difference, and judging by the ovation opening night at the Orpheum, it just might. Hells Kitchen runs at the Orpheum through May 24th. For more information, go to atgtickets.com. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “Alicia Keys’ Hells Kitchen” at the Orpheum in San Francisco appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews the Royal Shakespeare Company touring production of “Hamnet” at ACT Toni Rembe (Geary) Theatre through May 24, 2026.         Text of Review: In November 2025, a film adaptation of the 2020 Maggie O’Farrell novel Hamnet hit the screens of America. Four months later, Jessie Buckley won an Oscar for the role of Agnes Hathaway, wife of William Shakespeare, and mother of their three children. But back in April 2023, the same month that Chloe Zao was contracted to co-author and direct the screenplay of Hamnet, a stage adaptation of the novel made its premiere under the auspices of the Royal Shakespeare Company at their home, the Swan Theatre in Stratford-on-Avon in England. And it’s a touring production by that same company that is now at ACT’s Toni Rembe Theatre through May 24th. From a purely academic viewpoint, it’s fascinating to examine the differences between the two adaptations. The same high points exist in both, sometimes the dialogue even matches. The characters are mostly the same, though the film’s Will, played by Paul Mescal, is warmer and more family oriented than Rory Alexander’s Will on stage. The line from late in the film, “you weren’t here” for instance, now has a resonance because the on stage Will often is not there, spending more time in London than his family would like, and Agnes complains. Agnes’s ugly relationship with her stepmother Joan is fleshed out in the play, as is the turbulent relationship between Will and his father, played on stage by the scene-stealing Nigel Barrett. Act One of the play takes twenty minutes on film. The film zooms into the family surrounding Shakespeare’s  young son. The play tells a more broader story, how Shakespeare became Shakespeare. Jessie Buckley’s Agnes is someone we deeply care about, almost a modern woman dropped five hundred years into the past. Kemi-Bo Jacobs’ Agnes on stage is extremely difficult. There’s a reason why it takes a while for the other characters to warm up to her. She’s often loud and angry, with an annoying cadence in her voice. It’s almost no wonder that Will wants to spend so much time in London. Which is likely the more authentic performance? One other thing: the film nails the ending. The play, not so much. But then again, here we have a top-notch British production, the kind you’d only see in Stratford-on-Avon or maybe the West End, in person, with a massive gorgeous set, and actors who have been studying Shakespeare since infancy. People travel to England for productions like this, whatever their flaws. And now it’s right at your front door. The Royal Shakespeare Company and Neal Street productions Hamnet plays at ACT’s Toni Rembe Theatre through May 24th. For more information go to act-sf.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “Hamnet” at ACT Toni Rembe (Geary) Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews the musical “Come from Away” at TheatreWorks Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts through May 10, 2026.       Text of Review: Works of art age in different ways. Chekhov’s plays, for example, were written and performed as contemporary pieces. Now their dachas and threadbare aristocrats are artifacts of history, though the universal truths remain. And nobody in their right mind would today produce Milk and Honey, Jerry Herman’s ode to Zionism. So what to make of the hit musical, “Come from Away,” which made its Broadway debut less than ten years ago, and is now in a regional production at TheatreWorks Mountain View venue through May 10th? The show tells the story of how the town of Gander Newfoundland became the temporary home of thousands of travelers forced to land there in the wake of the tragedy of 9/11, when United States airspace was closed. The town and surrounding burgs all came alive with hospitality, proving that Canadians and Americans were all one family, and a family takes care of its own. A tale of comradery in the midst of tragedy. A happy play involving 9/11? Yes, it was possible because that day and its aftermath was still the defining moment in the lives of American adults living in 2017. There was the before, there was the after. “Come from Away” did not need to stress the feeling. Everyone in the audience knew it. It was in the pit of their stomachs and had been for over a decade. But that was then. In 2020 came the lockdown, a new before and after. And then came Trump Two and yet another before and after. A now coarser world where amiability just doesn’t hold much sway. That sick feeling over the towers? Gone, now we doomscroll and hope tomorrow there will be a planet. And “Come from Away”? The show feels too light, too negiligible for its own good, with a hole at its emotional core. This staging, which reflects the original, avoids images of the towers coming down, apparently too traumatic for audiences a decade ago watching a feel-good musical. Maybe it’s time to rethink the presentation. Also, looking at waterfalls and domestic squabbles?  Who cares? And graciousness isn’t going to stop Stephen Miller. Today, of course, would Canada even let the planes land? The damage wrought by the current regime goes on and on. The acting, the singing, the choreography, on that level this production is first rate. It’s all quite lovely. But the depth that keeps Chekhov alive is absent. This “Come from Away” is gorgeous, but the show itself is an empty footnote. Come from Away plays at Mountain View Center for the Performing Arts through May 10th. For more information you can go to theatreworks.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theater for KPFA. The post Review: “Come from Away” at TheatreWorks Mountain View appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The Monsters” by Ngozi Anyanwu at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through May 3, 2026. West Coast Premiere.           TEXT OF REVIEW: (minor differences between the text and the recorded review). Putting aside solo performances, the heart of the theatrical experience usually lies in the interaction between two characters, no matter the size of the cast. Obviously, several characters in plays can interact with each other at once, but the most intense scenes are usually one on on. When these interchanges work well, we talk about the chemistry between actors. When they don’t, it becomes obvious. One actor is listening and responding, the other pretending, and the audience knows it. Here’s the thing, though. None of it quite works the same way in film or TV. There are multiple takes, cross-cutting. Confrontations might even be recorded separately and put together in post-production. It feels real, but too often it isn’t. Only in live theatre, happening in real time, can we see the the meeting in real time, in front of us. And that’s the key to why The Monsters by Ngozi Anyanwu, now at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through May 3rd works so well. Big is a fighter in the world of Mixed Martial Arts, which has grown into a major sports competition and combines various disciplines which can, at times, seem almost balletic. Lil, whose real name is Josephine, shows up after one of his bouts, and after some back and forth, reveals she’s the younger half-sister he abandoned in his late teens to go out in the world and find himself. It’s awkward. They’d been close when she was at the start of her middle childhood, and then he was gone. Gradually, he will now feel the pull of family, as will she. But it will take time, and effort on both their parts. This is a play about siblings, about the restrictions inherent upon black people growing up in mixed and broken families, with the physicality of the competition serving as metaphor for their growing relationship, as attitudes and situations shift between the two. The playwright herself, Ngozi Anyanwu plays Lil, spunky, irreverent, and Sullivan Jones more than matches her as Big, in both his physicality and his emotional truthfulness. Their interplay, their moments of quiet, of fun, of anger, and of confrontation, can only reach its apex in live theatre. The playwright notes that quote here are big political things happening in the world, I think the way to engage politically is by humanizing people, and that starts at home. I’m always trying to make sure people feel seen. In The Monsters, both through the play’s script, through the direction of Tamilla Woodward, and through the often raw and honest acting, these characters and their need for connection is clearly and satisfyingly seen. The Monsters by Ngozi Anyanwu plays at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through May 3rd. For more information you can go to Berkeley.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The Monsters” at Berkeley Rep Peets Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “Flex” by Candice Jones, at San Francisco Playhouse through May 2, 2026.           TEXT OF REVIEW: Film and TV audiences love sports stories, groups of disparate people thrown together striving to work as one to achieve their goal, usually to win the big game. From Major League to Ted Lasso to The Sandlot, we are entranced by how the characters grow and mature, and hopefully, in the end, they will become heroes. Sports stories in live theatre are few and far between, most likely because you can’t really show the games. And sports stories about girls, black girls in particular? They’re nowhere to be found, except in the play Flex by Candice Jones, having its West Coast premiere at San Francisco Playhouse through May 2nd. Flex tries the impossible: to actually show the game, or at least some facsimile. The stage has basketball hoops at both ends, the one stage right in a playground, and stage left at a gym. We’re in a small town in Arkansas in 1998, a team of five high school girls, all black, as is their coach, are just good enough to win a regional championship. We zero in on Starra Jones, played with hip-hop swagger by Santeon Brown, the best athlete on the stage. In the opening sequence, all five are pregnant, only they’re not. It’s a test to see how they would play with big bellies because small town girls always become pregnant and are forced to leave the team. But we soon learn one of them, April, actually is pregnant. She wants to play, but the coach says no. The championship is important because scouts will be there, there will be scholarships available and who knows, maybe the newly founded WNBA could be in someone’s future, and Starra, willing to stretch ethics to get ahead, wants to be the one they see. But maybe it’s Sidney who’s the best on the team, and maybe Starra needs to figure out a way to take the spotlight. April, for her part, isn’t sure she wants to keep the baby. The religious Cherisse meanwhile, is uncomfortable with her sexuality. Each girl has her own secrets. Flex – named after the team’s signature five-person shoot around play – is set on basketball courts, and much of the play occurs on the court. This works in conception, but not always in practice. The bouncing ball muffles the dialogue, and the road to the championship becomes a McGuffin only the girls care about. It’s in the non-basketball scenes that the play really comes alive, and where the actors really shine, and its those scenes that makes Flex worth seeing. Flex by Candrice Jones, directed by Margo Hall, plays at San Francisco Playhouse through May 2nd. For more information, you can go to SFPlayhouse.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “Flex” at San Francisco Playhouse appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews :”The Goat, or Who is Sylvia?” by Edward Albee at Shotgun Players Ashby Stage through April 28, 2026.                 TEXT OF REVIEW: (some wording is different in the recording) Edward Albee’s reputation beyond theatre junkies mostly rests on one play, his masterpiece, Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf.  While that play shows off his caustic wit to great effect, it’s perhaps one of the least absurdist of his plays. And Edward Albee, over all, is one of the greatest of absurdist playwrights, in plays ranging from his early masterpiece, The Zoo Story, to Tiny Alice and Seascape. The Goat, or Who Is Sylvia? , which won the Tony Award for Best New Play in 2002, excels in both strains. Absurdist and deeply weird, it also contains some of Albee’s most cutting wit, all elements in full display in Shotgun Players current production, which runs through April 28th at the Ashby Stage. In this production, directed by Kevin Clarke, the play opens on a bare stage. Later we will learn where we are. That separation from reality, while likely guided by financial concerns, also separates us somewhat from the reality the characters are facing, in a way accentuating the strange events to follow. A happily married couple with a gay teen aged son they adore, Martin and his wife Stevie  are preparing themselves for a TV interview, conducted by Martin’s best friend.  Martin, though, is having memory issues. It’s his fiftieth birthday, and no, he doesn’t have early onset alzheimers. We will learn soon enough that he is severely distracted by something, and we will also learn, soon enough, why.  Albee himself stated that The play is about love, and loss, the limits of our tolerance and who, indeed, we really are.”  As with so many of Albee’s plays, It’s hard to put a finger on what this play is: comedy, tragedy, an experiment in believability? Is it Albee’s response to the homophobia he experienced throughout his life? On another level, all that hardly matters in a production that is utterly riveting from start to finish. Erin Mei-Ling Stuart is pitch perfect as Stevie. Granted, she’s the one with the best lines, but she takes it to the max. It’s hard to imagine a better performance in the role, on Broadway or elsewhere. William Giammona, as Martin has a tougher task, onstage at almost every moment, he must make every comment real, every response real, and happily he’s up to the task. The two other members of the cast, Joel Ochoa as their son Billy and Kevin Singer as Martin’s friend Ross, help make every scene compelling. All in all, it’s an exhilarating night in the theatre. The Goat, or Where Is Sylvia plays at Shotgun Players Ashby Stage through April 28th . For more information you can go to shotgunplayers.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The Goat, or Who is Sylvia?” at Shotgun Players Ashby Stage appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “Assassins” by Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman, at Oakland Theatre Project extended to April 12, 2026.         TEXT OF REVIEW: When Stephen Sondheim and John Weidman’s Assassins first opened in 1990, the show focused on the relationship between America’s gun culture and the need to be seen. Looking at presidential assassins and would-be assassins, we see desperate people finding all kinds of excuses to rationalize their actions. Today, mass shooters don’t care about being seen, and obviously neither do the masked thugs of ICE. But Assassins still speaks to us in different ways, as is evident in the production now at Oakland Theatre Project through April 5th. As Oakland Theatre Project’s Executive Artistic Director Michael Socrates Moran says , Assassins was always a work of experimental theatre, so why not experiment further and turn a show, which usually features eight actors, into a one-person tour de force, signifying modern day loneliness and desperation. He notes that we’ve all become separated from the community experience, constantly checking our phones, watching films at home, shopping without going to a shop. Those solo experiences breed the same disconnection that gave rise to these would be and actual assassins. In addition, there’s a line in the show, about returning America to what it was, which resonates deeply with Trump’s entire movement, as if MAGA itself is now a single-focused assassin. A concept musical, Assassins takes place in an imaginary early 20th Century fair midway, filled with games, rides and hawkers. Each assassin is there, together and alone. Taking us from John Wilkes Booth past the Reagan and Ford would-be killers, and then back to Lee Harvey Oswald. In this production, that all rests on the shoulders of Adam Kuve Niemann, who plays all the assassins and all the minor characters. He sings the choral songs and the duets, switching back and forth, and he’s phenomenal. The operative mood of the country as performed here though, isn’t loneliness, it’s anger, an anger that explodes in the songs, emphasizing the atonality of the music, which matches the madness and despair of the characters. It is the seething and explosive anger of today’s America, and it turns Assassins into something very contemporary. Where this Assassins is less successful is during the scenes between the songs. Some work well enough, others, with overlapping dialogue, stop the show dead in its tracks, as do the long pauses that give the actor time to breathe and regroup. But when Assassins does work, which is most of the time, the results are revelatory and why ultimately, this Assassins is unforgettable. Assassins plays at Flax Art and Design through April 5th. For more information you can go to oaklandtheatreproject.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA.   The post Review: “Assassins” at Oakland Theatre Project appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “All My Sons” by Arthur Miller, at Berkeley Rep Roda Theatre through March 22, 2026.               TEXT OF REVIEW Great plays stay relevant, no matter the time or setting, or even subject matter. It could be a castle in Denmark in medieval times, a diner in Pittsburgh’s Hill District in the 1960s, a cramped Chicago apartment in the 1950s, a shabby dacha in Tsarist Russia, or even Central Park during the AIDS crisis. Or it could be 1947, Just after World War II, in the backyard of a house in an Ohio town, as is the case with “All My Sons” by Arthur Miller, the classic play that gave the playwright his first success in the theatre, and is now seen in a brilliant and unforgettable production at Berkeley Rep through March 22nd. Joe Keller is the successful owner of an appliance company, having made his money on government contracts during the war years, it’s the American dream come true. Joe’s wife Kate refuses to believe their son Larry died three years ago after being reporting missing in action. Their other son Chris came back from the war changed, along with a sense of ethics that is heartening and sometimes terrifying. Into their lives and the lives of their neighbors returns their former neighbor Annie Deever, who had been Larry’s girlfriend but now has changed her focus to Chris, who wants to marry her. All My Sons touches on so many relevant issues today. The horror of war, the immorality of capitalism, government pressure on business, and the emptiness of the American dream. The play delves into father-son relationships, the nature of grief, the personal effect of war, of ambition, and most emphatically  the places where ethics and love run up against each other as if enemies. Though the plot’s outlines are based on a real news story, the play’s stance toward capitalism and corruption brought Miller to the attention of HUAC. Corruption and Republican politics have a long and sordid history. Leading the cast are Jimmy Smits and his real life partner Wanda de Jesus as Joe and Kate, their chemistry visible and dynamic in every scene they’re together, two top performers at the peak of their powers. One can single out every other actor in the cast as well and It’s a dream ensemble. Director David MendizAbal has styled this as the story of a Puerto Rican family, leading to a cast largely consisting of people of color. Puerto Ricans were a visible group in Ohio at the time, also seeking the American Dream. It adds a new wrinkle, and it works. This memorable production of All My Sons only runs through March 22nd.  It is must-see theatre. For more information you can go to berkeleyrep.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA.   The post Review: “All My Sons” at Berkeley Rep Roda Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

Photo: Teresa Castracane KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “Paranormal Activity” at ACT Toni Rembe (Geary) Theatre through March 22, 2026.             TEXT OF REVIEW In real life, we hate being scared, but in a theatre or on TV, there’s nothing quite like it.  The slow burn of suspense, the shock of horror. Ghosts, demons, and the old cliché, things that go bump in the night. On television and film, there’s Amityville, The Exorcist, Stranger Things, a long list of Stephen King adaptations, and they date back to the earliest days of the silents.  And CGI makes everything real. It’s a bit different live on a stage. We suspend our disbelief, but we’re in a community with the actors, we’re seeing effects live as they happen, all with the question, How exactly did they do THAT? Which is a question asked multiple times in the entertaining if often incoherent and vapid play, Paranormal Activity, now at ACT’s Toni Rembe Theatre through March 22nd. The curtain rises on a two-tiered set. Downstairs, the kitchen, dining and living room areas, with a staircase that takes us to a bedroom on one side, a bathroom on the other, and a third door to an unseen room. We’re in England, near London perhaps, A young couple, Louise and James, have recently moved overseas from Chicago.  He has a tight relationship with his mother, with whom his closeness is revealed in the opening moments via a phone call. Mom is religious, he’s now an atheist. Lou seems okay, now that she’s on anti-depressants. She does believe in ghosts, though and we will shortly find out why. Horror has a long history in theatre, the modern era peaking with The Cat and the Canary in 1927 and Dracula shortly after. Then there’s the old days, Hamlet’s ghost,  and MacBeth’s three witches. More recently, we have Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows, and Conor McPherson’s Shining City. Paranormal Activity exploits all that, switching gears from laughter to horror, from sudden shocks to dawning awareness, augmented by a sound design that soothes, relaxes and suddenly startles. There’s also the chemistry between the very good Cher Alvarez and Travis A. Knight as the young couple, we fear for them, and us. If one isn’t drawn into the couple’s issues, the slow build can become too slow, and the shocks too infrequent.. But should you buy into it, and can handle the sound and lighting, not to mention the story’s senselessness or massive plot holes. Paranormal Activity is a fun night in the theatre, certainly more fun than the real horrors going on in Washington, Gaza, and elsewhere. Paranormal Activity plays at ACT’s Toni Rembe Theatre through March 22nd. For more information you can go to act-sf.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA.               The post Review: “Paranormal Activity” at ACT Toni Rembe Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “M. Butterfly” at San Francisco Playhouse through March 14, 2026.               TEXT OF REVIEW (minor changes were made during recording and editing): M. Butterfly Back in 1964, a French Diplomat in China became infatuated with a singer from the Beijing Opera. When they met, the singer, now wearing men’s clothing, said she was a woman presenting as a man. They embarked on an affair that began in China and ended several years later in Paris, where it turned out the diplomat was passing secret information to his lover. He later said he never knew that the singer was really a man. That story caught the public’s eye, and not long afterward, first time playwright David Henry Hwang used that story to create a play,which launched the career of B.D. Wong and later became a film with Jeremy Irons. And now a production of M. Butterfly is at San Francisco Playhouse through March 14th. Of course, times change. When first produced on Broadway in 1988, gender roles outside of the gay community were rigid, and the East was still somehow viewed as exotic in the United States. But change was already happening. Ten years earlier, Edward Said had redefined the term “orientalism” to describe, now quoting from Google, a Western system of representation that depicts the “East as static, exotic, and inferior to justify Western imperialism and domination.” On top of that, gender fluidity hit the zeitgeist. While David Henry Hwang did update the play in 2017, it turns out there was no need, as we see and hear in the original 1988 version. The show opens. We are in a prison cell where Rene, a former French diplomat, is serving out a sentence of treason. Mocked and reviled, he tries to explain exactly what happened and why, and how his uncontrollable obsession with the opera singer Song led to his ruin. The prison is real, and metaphorical. Rene is trapped in his fantasy and in his understandings, most of which are wrong and foolhardy. Unfolding as a subtext is an examination of gender roles, of myths about the east, and of sexuality in general, as well as of the lies we tell ourselves, the lies we tell others, and the strictures society and governments put on all of us. The production’s secret weapon are its two leads. Dean Lillard as Rene and Edric Young as Song are both brilliant, with a palpable connection, and repulsion. They are assisted by a superb cast in other roles, and mention must also be made of the gorgeous set design, lighting and costumes. This M. Butterfly is a sumptuous feast of theatre, for both the eyes, the intellect and the emotion. M Butterfly plays at San Francisco Playhouse through March 14th. For more information you can go to sfplayhouse.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “M. Butterfly” at San Francisco Playhouse appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews the national touring company of “The Notebook, the Musical” at ATG Orpheum Theatre through March 1, 2025.       TEXT OF REVIEW Towards the end of the twentieth century, as the corporate world eyed the record-breaking receipts of shows like Cats and Les Miz, it became clear that if you could turn any IP, intellectual property, into a musical, a new stream of profits would come a-calling. Its also true that producers have always been searching for properties that might sing, and often it’s a labor of love. So is “The Notebook: The Musical”, now in a national tour at the Orpheum theatre through March 1st  a labor of love, or just another brand name for Broadway’s corporate class to exploit for profit? Based on the weepy best-seller by Nicholas Sparks and the 2004 film with Ryan Gosling and Gena Rowlands, among others, The Notebook on Broadway presented theatregoers with a free box of tissues at each performance. The show received mixed reviews and closed after nine months, in December, 2024, before embarking on this tour, hoping to make back its investment. Noah Calhoun, an older man, is in a nursing home visiting his wife, Allie, whose memory has been ripped out of her by Alzneimers. The only way to get her to remember is by reading his notebook diary of their life together. She had promised him, at the time of her diagnosis, that if he does that, she’ll come back to him. So we embark on their love story, as two couples play Noah and Allie at seventeen and again at twenty seven, while old Noah reads to old Allie. But back to the weepie business. Much of  the show is saccharine and manipulative, particularly in the flashbacks focusing on parental meddling and class distinctions. And if Allie only focused on the songs, she’d never get her memory back. But there is much more going on here, and inside The Notebook: The Musical is a much better show than the producers were able to promote. It’s a show about loss, loss of memory, loss of mobility, loss of health. In that sense, the creators have focused on musical theatre as metaphor, with body movement and dance and snippets of dialogue and song representing the swirl going on in Allie’s mind as she attempts to find meaning inside the chaos. Along that path, the strongest elements are the performances of Beau Gravitte and Sharon Catherine Brown, who shine in their scenes, and take the show into places other musicals haven’t attempted, and why ultimately, The Notebook works far better than it should. The Notebook: The Musical plays at San Francisco’s Orpheum Theatre through March 1st. For more information you can go to broadwaysf.com, which takes you to an agttickets site. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The Notebook, the Musical” at the Orpheum appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The Mountaintop” at Oakland Theatre Project through Feb. 15, 2026.       TEXT OF REVIEW: In late 2008, it felt as if we’d entered a new world. The Republicans were out of office, people of color were being appointed to key positions in business and government, and a black man had just been elected president. Martin Luther King’s dream seemingly had come true. Stories of his infidelities had come to light two decades earlier, and he’d been shown to have, as they say, feet of clay. He was no longer a god, but he was a hero. And Obama’s election had proven it. And in June 2009, The Mountaintop, a play by Katori Hall, about the last evening in the life of Martin Luther King, premiered in a small theatre in London, later moving to the West End, and coming to Broadway two years later. Now, under a very different national circumstance, The Mountaintop can be seen in an Oakland Theatre Project production, which runs through February 15th, this coming weekend. We are in Dr. King’s room at the Lorraine Hotel in Memphis, just after his sermon, I’ve Been to the Mountaintop. Rain pounds the windows, lightning flashes, lights go on and off. He’s sent his assistant out looking for cigarettes and he’s waiting impatiently. He calls room service for coffee. A maid quickly appears. They chat, flirt, and then things take a surprising turn. In this staging, King’s motel room is also his tomb. We are not quite in the real world. But Dr. King, as performed brilliantly by William Thomas Hodgson, feels definitely real, as does Sam Jackson as Camae, the maid. Also real is the intimacy of the theatre, especially during the play’s various moments of crisis, when the audience feels like part of the production. The times are very different now than back in 2009. As the co-director of the production Michael Socrates Moran writes in the program, today It may very well be that the fate of our democracy hinges on the capacity of citizens to engage in non-violent resistance against armed federal paramilitary troops. He goes on to say that, Dr. King’s worldview stands as a bastion for radical humanization not only in the face of fascism, but also in the face of a status quo that privileges peace over justice, equality and freedom. In 2026, Dr. King’s mountaintop feels even further away than it did nearly sixty years ago, and what felt triumphant then takes on an irony nobody could have expected. But the play’s focus on King’s humanity and the humanity of his message still remains, as does the power of theater in this formidable production The Mountaintop plays at Oakland Theatre Project through February 15th. For more information, you can go to oaklandtheatreproject.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “The Mountaintop” at Oakland Theatre Project appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “The Cherry Orchard” by Anton Chekhov at Marin Theatre through February 22, 2026.           TEXT OF REVIEW (differs slightly from final edit for time). ​​​​​For centuries, serfs had no power in Russia. They weren’t quite slaves, but they also were not free. It was a feudal society, run by a powerful nobility ruled by an all-powerful Tsar. Due to societal and economic advances, that all changed in 1861 when Alexander the second freed the serfs. Even though their economic status shifted, and a new middle class was born, the old nobility carried on as before, eventually finding themselves in poverty. The great playwright Anton Chekhov wrote about these newly impoverished aristocrats, first in Uncle Vanya, and then later in his final play, The Cherry Orchard, which runs in a new production at Marin Theatre through February 22nd. The spendthrift Madame Lyubov has returned to her country estate with her two daughters, having bankrupted the family while in Paris. The estate itself is now up for auction, and the only way to save it is to sell the land to make way for a vacation home development. That means destroying the fabled cherry orchard, once a key element of the family’s inheritance. The production uses a 1993 translation by Paul Schmidt, which underlines the parallels to today’s world, of which there are several, while maintaining a style that makes clear this is a translation. The characters never use contractions, such as won’t, can’t or weren’t. This combination of the modern and the archaic creates a distance, which is translated by director Carey Perloff into a heightened form of acting, most successful in the comic segments and less so in the pathos. At times the production almost feels like a musical, say, A Little Night Music, with Lyubov substituting for Desiree Armfeldt. Carey Perloff has assembled a who’s who cast of Bay Area actors. Liz Sklar leads the cast as Madame Lyubov, ever the diva, and Anthony Fusco matches her as her brother Gayev, both showing the befuddlement befitting two souls who can’t wrap their heads around their predicament. Then there’s the comic brilliance of Danny Scheie as the neighbor Pishchik and Jomar Tagatac as the family clerk. Rounding out the Bay Area names are Leontyne Mbele-Mbong as the circus born governess and Marin Theatre artistic director Lance Gardner as Lopatkin, the serf turned businessman.. In an age when the theatrical canon is often reviled, and a time when the plays of Checkov, Ibsen and Shaw are often confined to high school, college, and community stages, creating a professional production can be a great risk. But at Marin Theatre, it’s a risk well worth taking. The Cherry Orchard by Anton Chekhov, directed by Carey Perloff, plays at Marin Theatre through February 22. More more information, you can go to marintheatre.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA.   The post Review: “The Cherry Orchard” at Marin Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews “How Shakespeare Changed My Life” at Berkeley Rep Peets Theatre through March 1, 2026.           TEXT OF REVIEW You’re just a kid. You’re Black .Your teachers think you’re stupid, a hopeless fat boy. At home, your mom tossed out your junkie dad. Mom herself is ice cold, and when you’re sixteen, Mom throws you out on the street. You’re homeless, destitute, and you love Shakespeare. That’s the start of the world premiere one person play, How Shakespeare Saved My Life, written and performed by Jacob Ming-Trent, now at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through March 1st. The play is billed as semi-autobiographical, and it’s unclear what the relationship is between Jacob the character and Jacob the playwright performer. The real Jacob, for example, was already on stage at age eleven, and was admitted to acting school in New York at the age of seventeen, before developing a career in Hollywood. It shouldn’t matter, but in retrospect, it does. The story, at least, feels real, and Jacob Ming-Trent has the acting chops to make it so, to grab an audience and to keep them. When the play works, it works wonders. The basic idea is that Shakespeare himself was an urban artist, in his own lifetime no different than Tupac or Biggie or the Wu-Tang Clan. Famous lines from the plays are easily incorporated into the dialogue, and each takes on new meaning and resonance. The Elizabethan poet meets the street. Jacob Ming-Trent has an innate ability to create empathy, an empathy that expands via the brilliant immersive staging of director Tony Taccone. When the lights, the sound, the acting and the script all work in tandem, the result can be stunning, as witness the character Jacob’s discovery of James Baldwin, or his scenes with his dad. The theater shakes, the images flashed behind the actor never stop. But not everything does work. Phone dialogues with God through an old fashioned telephone fall flat, as does a sequence in a jail cell with an individual of uncertain gender. Some Shakespearean monologues go on too long, and the play itself does not stick the landing, leaving the audience wondering how the play’s Jacob became the stage’s Jacob. Audience participation, so successful earlier, now dissipates in a final, unearned test. But as a world premiere, some of these issues can be corrected going forward and there is enough here, and Jacob Ming-Trent is talented enough, to find solutions to these and other problematic elements. How Shakespeare Saved My Life is a work in progress, but even so, it’s a diamond in the rough. How Shakespeare Saved My Life plays at Berkeley Rep’s Peets Theatre through March 1st. For more information you can go to berkeleyrep.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area Theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “How Shakespeare Changed My Life” at Berkeley Rep Peets Theatre appeared first on KPFA.

KPFA Theatre Critic Richard Wolinsky reviews the Streetcar Project’s production of  “A Streetcar Named Desire” by Tennessee Williams at ACT Toni Rembe Theatre through February 1, 2026.           TEXT OF REVIEW (some changes were made during recording and cuts for timing were made for radio). ​​​​​The greatest of plays often allow for multiple interpretations. We see that all the time in Shakespeare. We see it in Arthur Miller, in the musicals of Rodgers and Hammerstein, even in August Wilson. And of course we see it in Tennessee Williams. Most interpretations of Williams’ second play, A Streetcar Named Desire, are inhibited by the famous movie, which catapulted Marlon Brando to fame. It’s hard to see Blanche Dubois beyond Vivien Leigh’s faded Southern belle, and it’s even harder to see the crude Stanley Kowalski past Brando’s scream of “Stella!” But those interpretations, however close to Williams’ wishes, obscure the play’s lyricism and more to the point, his greatest creation, Blanche Dubois. This production by The Streetcar Project, now at ACT’s Toni Rembe Theatre through February 1st, which has played in a variety of site-specific spaces, changes the paradigms, first by removing all props and sets, and second by discardmg the characters’ accents, particularly that of Blanche Dubois, played by project co-creator, Lucy Owen. In addition, the full text has been restored. In this production, the stage area is fully open, bounded on three sides by two rows of audience members on folding chairs. Characters wander on and off stage, their voices carry but their bodies are sometimes hard to find.. it can feel like a reading, a radio play, but not always, and not in Act Two. What this shows now is that Streetcar is clearly Blanche’s play. Whether with her sister, Stella, beautifully embodied by Heather Lind – their sisterhood is palpable, or with Mitch, Stanley’s friend who falls for Blanche, played by James Russell as a product of his era, or with the brutal Stanley, performed by Brad Koed, who never quite escapes Brando. Without the accent, without the affectations, Lucy Owen’s Blanche is revealed as brilliant, incisive, misunderstood and wronged. Her lies are no longer signs of weakness; they’re not delusional; they’re necessary for her survival, and the survival of her pride. It’s a fascinating interpretation, which Williams’ poetic dialogue om;y amplifies. She’s caught in the trap of her times, and it’s brought her down low. While much is gained here, something is also lost. Concessions to time and place come from the sound system and from costumes, but much of the action becomes incomprehensible without visible cues and with only the four actors. The giant stage, the cavernous theatre weaken the passion between Stella and Stanley. Chemistry vanishes when characters seem a football field apart. Would such a strong Blanche break so thoroughly at the end of the play? But whatever those issues, this is a Streetcar well worth visiting in its short run, through February 1st. For more information, you can go to act-sf.org. I’m Richard Wolinsky on Bay Area theatre for KPFA. The post Review: “A Streetcar Named Desire” at ACT Toni Rembe Theatre appeared first on KPFA.