JACK SMART
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“If/Then” Star LaChanze As Theatre Gateway Drug
Welcome to Fanmail, our tributes to theatre artists we admire — As a small white boy from Honolulu, I always had difficulty explaining my obsession with The Color Purple. I suppose it started with Alice Walker’s graceful writing in the book, and intensified when I watched Whoopi Goldberg’s and Oprah Winfrey’s powerful performances in the movie. But […]
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Who’s In Charge of the Giant Bubble?
For performance art junkies and thrill-seekers alike, Fuerza Bruta WAYRA offers a breathtaking array of multi-sensory spectacles not found in an ordinary theatre. From the high-flying performers to the epic, Argentinian-influenced music—not to mention the massive, two-sided climbing wall and the pool of water hovering above the audience’s heads—this operation begs the question: who on […]
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What Are Your Favorite Guilty Pleasure Shows?
Welcome to Geek Out/Freak Out, where theatre fans get super enthusiastic about things. This week, Stages contributor Jack Smart geeks out (via Google doc) with Nate Silver, Managing Director of Chicago’s Jackalope Theatre and assistant director of the upcoming Broadway production of Disgraced, which previously played at Lincoln Center. Today’s Topic: What are your favorite […]
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Muslims, Shakespeare, and Marriage
— Ayad Akhtar got the idea for his new play in the back of a taxi cab. An advertisement for Kiss Me Kate , Cole Porter’s musical adaptation of The Taming of the Shrew, flashed on the backseat TV screen, and it got him thinking.
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Did This Play Predict the Future?
20 years later, Jon Robin Baitz’s “The Substance of Fire” seems eerily prescient about America — When Jon Robin Baitz sat down in 1991 to write a play about the demise of books and printing, he likely had no idea just how prescient he was. In 2014, however, The Substance of Fire seems remarkably accurate.