June 15th, 2012
By Rick Pender |
Arts |
Posted In: Theater
 and jessica hendy (diana) - photo ryan kurtz.nar.jpg "arts lead - 9-7 - next to normal @ etc - charlie clark (dr. madden - dr. fine) and jessica hendy (diana) - photo ryan kurtz - Caption: - Credit:")
Stage Door: 'next to normal' Is Back
If you missed my
recommendations last September about seeing the Tony Award-winning
musical next to normal at Ensemble Theatre Cincinnati,
you have a reprieve. Starting today, the show is back for a two-week
revival. It’s the story of a woman struggling with paranoid
schizophrenia and how it affects her family; that might not sound
like the stuff that musicals are made of, but it uses the power of a
brilliant Rock score to deliver the impact of this story. ETC has
reassembled all of the superb cast, including Jessica Hendy in the
central role; the one role that needed a new performer is that of the
beleaguered husband, and ETC has lined up one of our area’s best
actors, Bruce Cromer. Tickets are being snapped up already, but this
is the hot show to be seen at the moment. Box office: 513-421-3555
The Showboat Majestic just opened a production of the classic comedy Arsenic and Old Lace. It won’t break any new ground, but it is one of the funniest shows you’re likely to see, the tale of an off-kilter set of relatives who keep their quite normal nephew astonished and scrambling to keep them in line. His aunts take in boarders, quiet elderly men who are alone in the world, and polish them off with elderberry wine laced with arsenic; they convince their addled brother, who believes he’s Teddy Roosevelt, to bury them in the basement by telling him they’re victims of yellow fever who have been working on digging the Panama Canal. There’s lots more, but you get the picture. Box office: 513-241-6550
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Another stage full of laughs is available from Cincinnati Shakespeare Company in the form of The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged). It’s your chance to see at least a passing mention of all the Bard’s works — although many are completely unrecognizable, thanks the three buffoonish characters who undertake the task. The second act is a wild send-up of Hamlet that involves the audience. There’s never a dull moment, and the CSC actors seem to especially relish the task of poking fun at their usual fare. Box office: 513-381-2273, x1.
Summer is the season for lighter entertainment at the Commonwealth Dinner Theater, on campus at Northern Kentucky University. They’re offering Neil Simon’s Plaza Suite, a glimpse into the relationships of three couples that occupy the same suite at the Plaza Hotel in New York City. One couple is celebrating their 23rd wedding anniversary in the same room where they honeymooned; another is an oft-married Hollywood producer who’s hoping for an encounter; the third is a mother and father trying to coax their bride-to-be daughter out of the locked bathroom and downstairs to the impatient wedding guests. Box office: 859-572-5464
Each week in Stage Door, Rick Pender offers theater tips for the weekend, often with a few pieces of theater news.
