MARK BLANKENSHIP

Get to know Mint Theater Company, which breathes new life into lost or neglected plays.

Cynthia Nixon’s caftan is a fabulous fashion statement, yes, but it’s also an emblem of how costumes enhance the storytelling in Roundabout’s current Broadway revival of The Real Thing. The caftan—a glorious black-and-white number with a paint-splatter pattern and matching shirt underneath—operates on several layers at once. For one thing, it tells us something important […]

Welcome to Geek Out/Freak Out, where theatre fans get super enthusiastic about things. This week, Stages editor Mark Blankenship geeks out (via Gchat) with Mark Peikert, executive editor of Backstage Today’s Topic: Which performances from the Tony Awards do you watch the most on YouTube? — Mark Blankenship: Hey there Mark! I’m glad you could […]

Get to know Dixon Place, where every kind of artist is trying every kind of thing.

By Mark Blankenship There could, of course, be a very literal production of  The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time. As our teenage hero, Christopher Boone, investigates the death of a neighbor’s dog, he could certainly inhabit a realistic world. As clues lead him on an improbable adventure from suburban England to the […]

Why the reprises in Broadway’s On the Town are so important — During the new Broadway revival of On the Town, pay attention to the songs that come back. There are several of them in this classic 1944 musical, with music by Leonard Bernstein and book and lyrics by Betty Comden and Adolph Green. As […]

“I wanted to become a journalist before I became an actor,” says Jonny Orsini. “I think I approach roles the way a journalist approaches stories.” That means he does a serious amount of research for every part he plays. Take his work in Almost Home, a new drama by Walter Anderson that’s now at Theatre […]

By MARK BLANKENSHIP The Fatal Weaknesssneaks up on you. Superficially, George Kelly’s 1946 play, about a woman discovering her husband’s affair, seems like a typical pre-War comedy, with well-heeled New Yorkers snooping on each other and making droll statements about the ways of love. But the more you listen, the more you realize there’s something […]

By MARK BLANKENSHIP There aren’t that many places in New York City where you can see a musical that lets you lick whipped cream off the leading lady. Or lift her up on your feet so she can “play airplane.” Or hand her your glass of chardonnay after she accidentally breaks the bottle she’s toting […]