Ron Canada

Pay the Writer

August 24, 2023

Directed by Karen Carpenter, "Pay the Writer" by best-selling novelist Tawni O’Dell is slick and superficial but entertaining and engrossing. The play about the 45 year friendship between an ultimately successful gay literary agent and an unknown African American novelist who becomes celebrated and wealthy plays like a novel or mini-series with its 13 scenes and many two-character encounters but is ultimately satisfying by the time it reaches its denouement. The high powered cast plays it to the hilt, belying the fact that the characters are superficial and stereotyped, which, of course, doesn’t make it untrue. Some of the play is extremely funny with one-liners worth repeating. [more]

runboyrun & In Old Age

October 9, 2019

Despite the fine writing and acting, these two plays do not stand alone: we are given no backstory to understand the context for these relationships in the longer saga; both plays dealing with a character’s depression, they are too similar in the theme of being haunted by the past; and thirdly, as they are basically two-character plays, both are too long for the limited story and plot lines they contain. Unlike the first two plays, these use two different directors (Loretta Greco for "runboyrun," and Awoye Timpo for "In Old Age"), ironically making them seem quite similar in style. [more]

Network

December 21, 2018

Director Ivo Van Hove’s stage version of the Paddy Chayefsky cult film "Network" gives Bryan Cranston the role of a lifetime as Howard Beale, the UBS news commentator who has a nervous breakdown on air and then becomes a media messiah. The high tech production designed by long-time van Hove associate Jan Versweyveld with video design by Tal Yarden is riveting throughout its two hour intermission-less running time by putting the audience in the news studio and making us complicit in the action. [more]

Spin Off

September 25, 2018

Considering the repetitiveness of the material and the fancifulness of the play, Megan McQueen as Rosie Ramirez and Kevin Rico Angulo as Det. Jimmy Marks make a great deal more of their characters than is in the writing, while the rest of the actors in underwritten roles do quite a bit less. Both attractive performers, they make us care about their characters though not much is happening. It is to be hoped that they find more substantial roles soon that will showcase their talents. [more]