MARK BLANKENSHIP

By MARK BLANKENSHIP You’re closer than you realize to co-starring in an Off-Broadway play. Just buy a ticket to Every Brilliant Thing, now at the Barrow Street Theatre, and you could easily land a significant role. That’s because the show relies on audience participation, and in a meatier, more dramatic way than you’ll find at […]

Welcome to Building Character, our ongoing look at performers and how they create their roles Make no mistake: the new Broadway musical Honeymoon in Vegas is supposed to be a lark. Based on the 1992 film, it’s a fizzy romance about Jack Singer, a guy who won’t propose to his girlfriend Betsy because his mother […]

At Keen Company, sincerity is a rebellious stance.

Heidi Schreck on the moral questions in Grand Concourse — After I saw Heidi Schreck’s play Grand Concourse, I made a mistake. The show left me uncomfortable, so I thought that meant I didn’t like it. But I realized I was wrong: The play, which is at Playwrights Horizons through November 30, is successful because […]

By MARK BLANKENSHIP There’s no way to see the entire set of Lost Lake. A slightly surreal cabin in the woods, it’s packed with so many objects that it would take hours to absorb them all. And besides, some elements are only visible to the actors—props and pictures tucked behind curtains or just past the […]

By MARK BLANKENSHIP When you hear about a play called Straight White Men, what do you think it’s going to be? Which cultural and political assumptions do you think it’s going to challenge? Which audience members do you think it’s going to unsettle? Whatever you’re thinking, you’re right: That’s exactly what Young Jean Lee is […]

Sarah Ruhl’s new play The Oldest Boy may be filled with a sense of cosmic mystery, but there’s one question that’s not mysterious at all.  When the show begins, an American mother is visited by a pair of Buddhist monks who believe her three year-old son, Tenzin, is the reincarnation of their beloved teacher. And […]

By MARK BLANKENSHIP For over 40 years, Mummenschanz has arguably been one of the most reliable sources of all-ages theatre in the world. With their unique style of mask and prop performance—which uses no speech, sound effects, or even music—they create scenes that are both charmingly abstract and recognizably human.  For instance, a creature with […]

By MARK BLANKENSHIP George Bernard Shaw’s Major Barbara may spin your moral compass until you don’t know where you’re standing anymore.  On one hand, it seems impossible to argue with the title character, a Salvation Army worker who’s dedicated to helping the poorest people in London. Barbara is so upright, in fact, that she leaves […]