Jamie Roderick

The Sabbath Girl: A New Musical

August 1, 2024

When was the last time you saw a new play in which you cared about the characters and wanted them to end up together? "The Sabbath Girl: A New Musical" is that kind of show. A delightful and charming rom-com adapted by Cary Gitter from his 2020 play of the same name, "The Sabbath Girl" brings together two unlikely people from very different worlds, both at crossroads in their lives. With sensitive performances by Marilyn Caserta and Max Wolkowitz, lovely music by Neil Berg, graceful and emotional lyrics by Berg and Gittter, and a poignant story, The Sabbath Girl is a must-see this summer. [more]

Empire

July 16, 2024

In "Empire," Caroline Sherman and Robert Hull attempt to tell a very big story but are unable to bring this unwieldy tale into suitable shape. The time traveling framework is both unnecessary and obtrusive. Both the historic characters and the fictional ones are underwritten and there are too many names to keep straight. While the music is catchy, the lyrics are often too unsophisticated and repetitious to make their mark. The cluttered setting and the busy staging don’t help to tell the story. "Empire" is an ambitious but unsuccessful musical which is defeated by its very form. [more]

Scarlett Dreams

April 26, 2024

A good deal of fun is had by Brian Pacelli’s projection design which is shown on the modern and chic living room/dining room set by Christopher and Justin Swader. It takes us to the virtual reality world inhabited by Scarlett and later Kevin: forests, deserts, jungles, icescapes which change at the drop of a hat. It also lets us keep track of Kevin’s progress with fitness data and the success of the RealFit apps as to the number of new users. Emily Rebholz has created an attractive collection of clothes in monochromatic colors for these fitness-oriented people. The lighting by Jamie Roderick enhances the set and projections by changing the mood each time we find we are projected somewhere else. [more]

Stalker

April 2, 2024

Peter Brynolf and Jonas Ljung, two coolly elegant Swedes—who wrote the show with Edward Af Sillén (also the show’s director)—perform one mind-boggling feat after another, fed by information culled from the audience. The two performers also speak of their own lives, although why they have to describe themselves as “two heterosexuals” is questionable. [more]

Make Me Gorgeous!

November 25, 2023

As Kenneth/Kate Marlowe, Wade McCollum not only becomes the character but inhabits it. Required to act as narrator as well as performer in both male and female attire, McCollum is totally convincing. His personal charm and rapport with the audience also makes this a pleasurable experience. Make Me Gorgeous! is an unusual biographical show as the details of Kenneth Marlowe’s story will likely be unfamiliar to most theatergoers who will also be entertained by the musical portions of the evening. [more]

20 Seconds: A Play with Music

September 26, 2023

Sweitzer inhabits over a dozen characters in this play entitled "20 Seconds: A Play with Music," albeit two of them are him when young and him telling us the story now…two people he knows intimately. He is never so broad as to suggest caricature. His female characters are vibrant and flesh-and-blood enough for you to suspend disbelief that you aren’t actually seeing his mom Kathy, and Erdean, and Ms. Ruth, the fleabag hotel manager, and Denise, the girl next door, and finally his creation, Vivian Delgrosso, a drag homage to the Italian women his mom’s age. He brings the same depth to his male characters, with the masterpiece being his sadistic, yet eventually repentant father Tom. [more]

The Gospel According to Heather

June 24, 2023

"The Gospel According to Heather," with book, music, and lyrics by Paul Gordon, is a story about a teenager's struggles with fitting in with her contemporaries, finding a boyfriend, and dealing with the supernatural powers which she seems to have acquired after finding a Roman coin in a fish. On the surface, this show appears to be a coming-of-age tale with music, but it is much more: it is a cleverly done and, at times, pointed commentary on the socio-political nature of contemporary America, and of religion. [more]

¡Americano!

May 12, 2022

Tony Valdovinos who grew up in Phoenix, Arizona, was 18 before he found out that he was an undocumented immigrant. The new musical "¡Americano!" is based on the true story of his life and challenges. Impassioned and spirited with an animated cast that seems to be living their roles rather than acting them, the show is a superior musical entertainment. Staged with vigor and energy by Michael Barnard, artistic director of The Phoenix Theatre Company where the show premiered in 2020, and choreographer Sergio Mejia, ¡Americano! is both moving and entertaining, moving along with the speed of an express train with never a minute wasted in its urgent storytelling. [more]

Disney’s Winnie the Pooh: The New Musical Stage Adaptation

November 5, 2021

The question arises who is the intended audience. The 60-minute show is too slow for young children and too repetitious for adults. Possibly this is meant for the nostalgia crowd of which there are apparently legions. The thin story line is a watered-down version of the original A.A. Milne stories that inspired the animated films Winnie the Pooh and the Honey Tree, Winnie the Pooh and the Blustery Day as well as a tale of Tigger’s infamous bouncing. All of the famous characters put in an appearance: easily frightened Piglet, gloomy Eeyore, cranky Rabbit, wise Owl, energetic Tigger, maternal Kanga and curious Roo. Christopher Robin (played alternately by Kaydn Kuioka, Max Lamberg, and Cooper Lantz) spends the day at school but is reunited with Winnie the Pooh just before the final curtain. Surprisingly, he does not have a British accent. [more]

Emojiland: The Musical

January 29, 2020

Smiling Faces, Skull, Princess, Pile of Poo and other notable emojis cavorting around might have made for a peppy contained sophisticated children’s show. The creators of "Emojiland: The Musical" however, have opted for a full-length treatment that sputters out by intermission as not much has happened and then we come back for more anemic hijinks. The meager plot involves a software update, a firewall, a virus, betrayals and some romantic complications all taking place in a smartphone fantasyland. [more]

Caesar and Cleopatra

October 7, 2019

When the Gingold Theatrical Group’s revival of Bernard Shaw’s epic "Caesar and Cleopatra" begins, the characters are wearing white contemporary clothes and sitting on what looks like an excavation site which might give one pause. Like David Staller’s revival of "Heartbreak House" last year, his Caesar and Cleopatra tries to give this 1898 play a more contemporary relevance, but unlike Heartbreak House which pointlessly updated that play to W.W. II rather than the usual W.W. I setting, this modern approach works extremely well and proves to be quite charming. [more]

Accidentally Brave

March 26, 2019

“Everything is copy” was Nora Ephron’s maxim about the potential of all of one’s life experiences to be fashioned into narrative material if one has the cachet to be paid attention to. Actress Maddie Corman sure has a lot of copy as well the affluence and connections to get it out there in "Accidentally Brave," her 90 minute self-written solo show. It’s profanity-laden therapeutic storytelling with high production values succeeding as inspirational entertainment for those with an affinity for her upscale sensibility. [more]

We Are the Tigers

February 21, 2019

The show’s talented mastermind is Preston Max Allen. Mr. Allen’s rollicking score is a pounding collection of catchy pop and showtune melodies matched with sharp lyrics. Allen’s well-crafted book is comical, suspenseful and problematic. However, there’s too much of it. The characters are all cleverly fleshed out, the milieu is authentically rendered, but the rambling structure is a drag. [more]

SKIN

January 25, 2019

Broken Box Mime Theater’s SKIN is a collection of short plays loosely centered around its one-word title. The pieces run the gamut in terms of subject matter, approach and tone. Or course, many theatergoers may have an implicit bias against the very idea of mime. This is understandable if unfair. Mime has long been viewed by many, in the U.S. anyway, as little more than pretentious preening and outsized gesturing by grimacing folks in clown makeup. More often than not, it’s seen as a joke. But this show has a fun, cool, buoyant vibe that reminds audiences that the genre needn’t be just a punchline, but something that can actually pack a punch. [more]

Midnight at The Never Get

October 12, 2018

Mark Sonnenblick’s exceptional book is an accomplished mixture of prodigious research, well-drawn characters and adept if misguided construction. It skillfully dramatizes the gay experience of living in New York City in the 1960’s with all its glory and despair. The Checkerboard, Julius, The Village Vanguard, The Blue Angel, The Bon Soir and Cafe Wha? are among the legendary venues mentioned. The Stonewall Riots, organized crime’s control of gay bars and routine arrests of gay men are cited. [more]

Red Roses, Green Gold

October 30, 2017

The score is comprised of Jerry Garcia & Robert Hunter’s Grateful Dead music and lyrics with additional music and lyrics by Phil Lesh, Mickey Hart, Bob Weir, and Bill Kreutzmann. It’s all an engaging patchwork well-realized by Jeff Chimenti’s polished musical supervision and arrangements. Though it’s wonderful experiencing such spirited renditions of Grateful Dead classics such as “Truckin,” “Casey Jones,” “Alabama Getaway” and “A Touch of Grey” by the talented ensemble, "Red Roses, Green Gold" doesn’t really cohere into a satisfying work of musical theater. [more]

Afterglow

August 17, 2017

Having a background in dance accounts for Gelman’s mesmerizing staging that is filled with finely choreographed sequences. Characters take showers onstage with actual water cascading on their nude bodies and there are stylized, brief simulations of sex that are suggestively erotic. Numerous, arresting tableaus silently emit significance. The actors all give bold, brave and intense performances that transcend stereotypes. [more]

See Reverse

February 22, 2017

Presented by the acclaimed Broken Box Mime Theater, "See Reverse" consists of ten short pieces with some even shorter vignettes sometimes in between. Lasting close to two hours with an intermission, it’s a lot of mime. [more]

The Big Broadcast on East 53RD

February 14, 2017

Rounding out the cast are Alexis Bronkovic as Ruth--Penny’s best friend--and Bill Tatum, who plays Ray’s boss. Once again, the driving motivation behind nearly every character is nowhere to be found. It seems that simply for the sake of creating a play about fake news, Brukenfeld opted to fill his script with lifeless characters that don’t question anything and are content to believe that Ray is dead. The performances across the board are unsympathetic and played mind-bogglingly straightforward. For what it’s worth, the actors do all that they can with the material at hand, turning in acceptable performances given the circumstances. [more]

Liberty: A Monumental New Musical

July 13, 2016

The production team uses most of the same people who were involved with the show’s 2014 run at Theater 80 St. Marks as well as four of the eight actors. Directing again, Evan Pappas keeps the show moving along, but some of the characterizations are allowed to descend into caricature and the waiting game for the money to be raised becomes a bit wearisome. Shapiro, now two years older, is charming as Liberty and has a sweet voice but it fails to project in this venue. Emma Rosenthal is impassioned as Emma Lazarus, caught between her liberal beliefs and her family’s conservative leanings. [more]

The Woodsman

February 15, 2016

The forest setting by Ortiz seems to envelop the audience as does the sound design which is created by the actors in tandem with violinist Naomi Florin who plays Edward W. Hardy’s melancholy original score throughout the evening. The impressive Bunraku-style puppets are the work of Ortiz who seems to be a one-man theater corporation able to do everything required himself including his co-direction with Claire Karpen. The only wrinkle is that at times it is a bit confusing as to what is happening since after the opening prologue there is no dialogue and some of the mime is ambiguous. However, the show with folk-style backwoods costumes by Molly Seidel and atmospheric lighting by Catherine Clark & Jamie Roderick is always theatrical, always hypnotic. [more]