Theater

Hearing Michael R. Jackson, the Pulitzer- and Tony-winning playwright of “A Strange Loop,” speak about soap operas is like getting lost in a Wikipedia wormhole. With nary a pause, he rolls through the details of characters’ yearslong arcs, including every stolen identity, forbidden romance and vicious backstabbing — literal and figurative. He’s amassed decades of … Read more

This is a review of the production of “Lunch Box” that ran in 2019 as part of Clubbed Thumb’s Summerworks Festival. A full production of the show is now onstage, courtesy of the Play Company, at 122CC Theater in Manhattan through April 15. In Sarah Einspanier’s “Lunch Bunch,” the trim, compassionate comedy that opens Clubbed … Read more

The butterflies enter first, quivering gaily atop their sticks. Then a giraffe pokes her head in. A goat gambols. A hyena cackles. One zebra runs on. Then another. An orangutan swings through while her baby reposes on a branch nearby. Above, monkeys and meerkats chitter. In the first act of “Life of Pi,” a menagerie … Read more

Some books lend themselves to stage adaptation more than others, and the experimental theater company Complicité has a strong track record of turning awkward novels into plays. The British troupe, led by the director Simon McBurney, has already created acclaimed productions from Mikhail Bulgakov’s “The Master and Margarita” and Max Porter’s “Grief Is the Thing … Read more

On a recent afternoon, the actor Greg Tannahill sat perched atop a London rooftop, one leg extended, one arm outthrust. A pair of carpenters would then whisk Tannahill from his rooftop and into a nursery. And then out of it. And then back in again. A window frame would come free. Tannahill, now jerked upside … Read more

When Shayok Misha Chowdhury wrote the character of Shou for his new bilingual play, “Public Obscenities,” about a couple who interviews queer locals in Kolkata, India, he was “super worried” about casting the role. The performer would not only need to be of the appropriate gender but also a Bangla speaker with the right “linguistic … Read more