Kate Arrington Archives - TheaterScene.net

Kate Arrington

How Is It That We Live or Shakey Jake + Alice

February 12, 2025

In reading the script, I didn't see how the story made any sense or could have been given a reasonable life on stage. I was very wrong on both scores. The four actors of the ensemble breathe life into each of the characters, creating a compelling narrative even given the minimalist sets used. Director Hayes did a superb job blending reality with the fantastic, delivering a compelling story of love found, lost, and found again. [more]

The Wolves

December 9, 2016

The audience sits on either side of the large runway stage that set designer Laura Jellinek has arrestingly fashioned into an indoor soccer field. It’s a green vista of Astro Turf that gives the sense “…that the field goes on forever,” writes playwright Sarah DeLappe in her stage directions. [more]

Our Mother’s Brief Affair

January 25, 2016

Linda Lavin wears Anna in Richard Greenberg’s "Our Mother’s Brief Affair" like a chic couture outfit with many layers each of which reveals layers of colorful, woven cloth. There is a constant glow about her as she relates, mostly in flashbacks, the story of an illicit, but exciting affair with a stranger she met many years ago while waiting for her son, Seth (a bemused, but effective Greg Keller) to emerge from his Juilliard viola lessons. [more]

The Qualms

June 26, 2015

Norris is interested in examining issues so often argued in black and white terms by drawing out the—pun intended—shades of grey. However, while wryly entertaining and largely incisive, his new work suffers from some of the same missteps as does his aforementioned "Clybourne Park." Namely, he paints Chris—his ostensibly well-intentioned, under-informed, straight white male character—as so downright nasty that it is almost impossible to listen to any of his arguments, however logical some of them may be. While the action of the play operates under the guise of an engaging debate that includes various different perspectives, the scales are tipped and its presentation of arguments is uneven. [more]