The music is sharp and sassy. The dance numbers jump and jive.
But it’s the stories of Zora Neale Hurston that make “Spunk” come alive in the new California Shakespeare Theater production.
George C. Wolfe’s adaptation of three tales by the great Harlem Renaissance author is driven by the blues, and the pulsing, finger-popping twang of Chic Street Man’s score serves the production well. Read More
There’s magic, onstage and off, in the new California Shakespeare Theater production of “The Tempest.” Shakespeare’s late-life romance takes place on an enchanted island, and it feels right at home in the Orinda theater’s beautiful outdoor setting. Read More
Poetry or piety? For the title character of George Bernard Shaw’s “Candida,” it’s an eminently theatrical question.
Asked to choose between two men — the charismatic preacher she married and the much younger poet who worships her — Candida emerges as one of the playwright’s most compelling creations. Read More
The stage looks like a garage band’s rehearsal room. The performers could be Gap ad models. And the story is so 21st century.Just when you thought there was nothing new under the Shakespearean sun, along comes “The Verona Project.” Amanda Dehnert’s new theater piece reimagines Shakespeare’s “The Two Gentlemen of Verona” in bracingly contemporary terms. Read More
In “Titus Andronicus,” revenge doesn’t just mean an eye for an eye. Tongues, hands, heads and lives are sacrificed in Shakespeare’s grisly tragedy set during the final days of the Roman Empire. Read More
The laughter was flowing on opening night of “Much Ado About Nothing.” So were a few tears, in the darker moments of the splendid new California Shakespeare Theater production of Shakespeare’s autumnal comedy.
Balance is always the challenge in “Much Ado”; audiences who laugh their way through Act 1 are often surprised by the somber tone of Act 2. Read More
