Results tagged “aaroncromie”

Once in a while, you'll hear the Philadelphia Theatre Company criticized for "playing it safe"—choosing plays or casting actors that will fill seats, and sacrificing quality in the process. I will neither agree nor disagree with that statement, but I will pose this question: if PTC always plays it safe, how can you explain The Happiness Lecture?

Director/Theater-founder Meghann Williams

There's something about a French farce that has real staying power - not in that the play stays with you for days after you see it, but more in that these are plays that have been around for 350 years and are still, somehow, funny. Sure, there's always the risk that farce can delve into shtick, if the running gags run on too long or if too many people get hit in the face by...

The prime rib was cold, the asparagus was undercooked, the salad was limp, the red wine was chilled, the cosmopolitans were made from what could only have been Kool-Aid... And yet nobody seemed to care for very long. It was Philadelphia theatre's biggest night, and all those in attendance were there to celebrate, not to complain. (Well, except for us. We were okay with complaining. We were also there as critics.) The actors were (for the most part) well-dressed, the bar was open, people were still talking Phillies, and there was much schmoozing to be done. It was the 2007 Barrymore Awards (the Tonys of Philadelphia), and Phillyist was there, cheering on the winners. And the losers. We can't very well jeer them, as they're all far more talented than we can ever hope to be. Nobody who won was expecting an award or had anything prepared (or so they claimed), but that's okay: the evening went relatively smoothly, and the evening clocked in at a little under three hours long.

. I knew most of the music, so I just kind of took for granted that I'd actually seen the show. But I was wrong, so somehow, my first-ever viewing of the longest-running musical in history was performed by puppets.

Roald Dahl is, hands-down, one of my favorite writers. And not just because he wrote . Thirteen years later, I found I didn't remember much of it, so sitting through the Arden's staged adaptation was like a delightful refresher course.

(Ankit Dogra Productions) (No future performances).

. It's a show that we know quite well and we felt that we were in a good position to be tough critics if that's what was required of us.