Long regarded as a commentary on the nuclear panic of the Cold War, Samuel Beckett’s 1961 absurdist comedy Happy Days now seems more like a cartoon of a long, rotten marriage. Wingspan Theatre Company is doing the play right now at the Bath House. Director Susan Sargeant amps up the…
Clybourne Park is the second great major American drama about the hell of dealing with a homeowners’ association. The first was Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, Clybourne’s source material from half a century ago. Both shows are running at Dallas Theater Center (at the Wyly Theatre), sharing cast…
Outside of Dallas, too many people think there’s no great theater happening inside of Dallas. We know better. Besides the giant venues with the name of a telecommunications giant attached to them, there are a bunch of more interesting, smaller playhouses where local actors, directors and playwrights are putting new…
Magician/comedian The Amazing Johnathan comes from the magical land Las Vegas, where families’ college funds mysteriously disappear, and those with $10 in their pocket can consume more barbeque ribs than science allows. He got his start performing for spare change on street corners. Later, he joined the comedy clubs ranks…
Local fans of mainstream comedy headliners have the rare opportunity of having a choice of comedians to see this Friday, unless they have figured out some biological chemical algorithm to achieve transubstantiation, in which case HOLLER. Mr. Show and Sarah Silverman Program star Brian Posehn will be at Hyena’s Comedy…
The greasy haired, cocktail clutching comedian Neil Hamburger often gets compared to Tony Clifton, the egotistical lounge singer who served as the alter ego of the late Andy Kaufman. But that’s unfair: Hamburger’s a much crueler bastard. The self-proclaimed “King of Komedy” has an ingenious hook that most comedy club…
If you’re in Deep Ellum on Thursday, October 24, and you see a hammered dude stumbling across the street with a barstool and mic, you should know in advance that it’s not Zombie Carlin, as welcome a sight as that would be. It’s the Dallas Observer’s first-ever Comedy Crawl. We…
It does feel weird to applaud after John Wilkes Booth sings about shooting President Lincoln in the opening scene of Assassins, the 1990 Stephen Sondheim/John Weidman musical now playing at Theatre Three. But damn, actor Gregory Lush is so matinee-idol handsome as Booth, and his performance of “The Ballad of…
October may be the traditional time to watch scary movies, but there aren’t many new scary things coming to a theater near you this month, unless you count Sylvester Stallone and Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Escape Plan. The Dallas Comedy House has a worthy-sounding alternative to pretending that you wet your pants…
The tale of the retired wrestler is often a tragic one, as Grantland contributor David Shoemaker has made a career of cataloging. In a way the post-ring career of former multi-WWE champion Mick Foley serves as sort of a fairytale-type alternative scenario for those hoping to leave the business unscathed…
There’s hardly anything more enjoyable in live theater in this town than watching Kitchen Dog’s leading lady Tina Parker perform an onstage emotional meltdown. In her latest role, co-starring in Lisa D’Amour’s dark comedy Detroit, Parker is in maximum meltdown mode playing Mary, a nervous paralegal married to gangly laid-off…
Two things could happen for Jeff Swearingen at his low-budget Fun House Theatre in Plano. He’ll either get one of those MacArthur “genius grants” for his innovative and boldly un-P.C. approach to children’s theater or the parents of Plano will form an angry mob wielding torches and pitchforks and run…
Guys, admit it. Part of you thought it was kind of hot when Bugs Bunny dressed up like a woman to trick dumb ol’ Elmer Fudd. Perhaps it’s because you subconsciously felt bad for Mr. Fudd since he’s clearly lonely and in need of companionship thanks to years of inadequacy…
Austin’s comedy scene has become a big conversation. Unconventional venues have sprung up across the city, improv classes are a standard activity for young adults and events like Moontower Comedy Festival pair big names (Maria Bamford, Anthony Jeselnik, Reggie Watts, and Amy Schumer) with the best in upcoming stand-up, sketch…
As a big, important American classic, Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun deserves every bit of the respect and care it’s getting in Dallas Theater Center’s latest staging (the third in the company’s history) at the Wyly Theatre. What a beautiful production, every moment crafted for maximum impact. An…
Peter Pan not only won’t grow up, he just won’t go away. We’ve had Cathy Rigby flying around as the little green elf for about half a century on national tours. More recently Dallas Theater Center’s new musical Fly let a young boy play the role in about as depressing…
Last night, through a haze of Sunday night drinks and with the guide of show host and local comedy favorite Paul Varghese, 10 comedians took the stage at the Addison Improv with the hopes of winning the first round in the Comedy Central Up Next Talent Search. They were each…
Comedy Central is always on the lookout for the next big comedy star, and to speed up their search, they’re hosting a nationwide talent contest this fall. The Comedy Central Up Next Talent Search kicks off with the preliminary rounds, hosted by 26 participating certified clubs. One of those clubs…
Recycling is a big theme with Peter and the Starcatcher, the Tony-winning play onstage at the Winspear Opera House through September 29. This “prequel” recycles the story of Peter Pan, Wendy, the Lost Boys and Captain Hook – yeah, we’re a little tired of that crowd, too. But it puts…
Silly and surreal, Matt & Ben says out loud what some have long suspected: that Matt Damon and Ben Affleck had help writing Good Will Hunting, the script that earned them Oscars and launched them into Hollywood superstardom. How’d that screenplay fall into the laps of the barely known young…
Prolific Dallas playwright Jonathon Norton has a new one called Homeschooled, directed by Regina Washington at African American Repertory Theatre in DeSoto. At 85 minutes, it’s the right length for the play’s extended bouts of angst among three women at odds over how to teach the most violent episodes in…
Undermain Theatre is presenting the world premiere of East Coast playwright Sylvan Oswald’s Profanity, directed by Katherine Owens. The title could serve as a warning, for you will curse Undermain for choosing to produce this unremarkable drama and curse yourself if you’ve already bought tickets to it. It’s a damn…
