Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Richard Rogers and Oscar Hammerstein, Jr. are considered the fathers of modern American musical theatre.  Their OKLAHOMA opened the door to musicals with meaningful storylines, and the integration of lyrics, dancing and music to help move the plot along.

As with all of Rogers and Hammerstein’s musicals, there is a strong societal and moral base.  This aspect of their scripts is usually highlighted …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Mamaí,  Cleveland’s newest professional theatre, opened its summer season with a monumental undertaking, a staging of the U.S. premiere of Brendan Kennelly’s translation and script modification of Euripides’ classic tragedy, MEDEA.

The company’s mission is “to create intelligent, relevant classical theatre that offers an artistic home for Cleveland’s theatre artists, and equal opportunity for women in the professional theatre community.”

MEDEA, considered by many …more…

Roy Berko
(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Have you looked at a painting and asked, “What does that mean?” What would the world be like without the arts?  Does art have to have meaning?  Does the learning of artistic technique thwart a painter’s discovery and creativity?  What happens when a group of uneducated, unsophisticated men are encouraged to let their emotions create their world?  These and many more questions …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

CROWNS, now in production at Karamu Theatre, is a musical which not only features gospel music, but takes a short meander into hip hop, while featuring storytelling, dance and cultural history.  All of this centers on the black female Southern community’s pride in their crowns, hats that have been “bought and paid for and all they have to do is wear them.”  …more…

Roy Berko
Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle

Until the late 1960s and 70s, the age of women’s liberation, the writings and speeches of Gloria Steinem, Betty Friedan, and Bella Abzug, MS magazine, and the National Women’s Caucus, men knew what it was like to be a man.   They were the center of the patriarchal family.  They were the bread winners, the disciplinarians, role models, because father knew best.  The …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Musicals have come from various sources.  There has been the tale of an illiterate flower girl who was transformed into a proper woman (MY FAIR LADY), a Biblical Jewish youth who became a leader in Egypt (JOSEPH AND THE AMAZING TECHNICOLOR DREAMCOAT), a prince who kept searching for his corner of the sky until he realized that it was right where he …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association & Cleveland Critics Circle)

Philip Ridley, the author of TENDER NAPALM, now being staged at Cleveland Public Theatre, was trained as an artist.  His paintings, like his plays, are characterized by using a palate of colors, splashed all over.  There is also a bizarre quality to his writing which is fairly typical of 1990s British “In-Yer-Face” theatre.  Theatre that is filled with fantasy, dark surrealism, …more…

THERE IS A HAPPINESS (and absurdity) at Cleveland Public Theatre

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association & Cleveland Critics Circle)

Poet, painter and printmaker William Blake was considered to be mad by many of his contemporaries due to his out-of-the-time attitudes.  The mid-eighteenth and early nineteenth century writer is also considered to be one of the leaders of the Romantic Age, but his work was mainly unappreciated until after his death.  Part …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Cleveland Play House’s The 2013 New Ground Theatre Festival lit up the three stages in the Allen Theatre complex starting on May 2nd with parts running through the 19th.

The annual event showcased cutting-edge productions and readings from nationally-recognized artists.  This year’s offerings included a well written and performed world-premiere comedy, a delightful off-the-wall dance-theatre piece, play readings, new scripts and general excitement …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Fanatics of chick flicks virtually swoon when they hear the words, “Love means you never have to say you’re sorry,” or someone hums a bar or two of “Where Do I Begin?” Ah, yes, Andy Williams crooning the theme song from the 1970 film, LOVE STORY, which starred Ryan O’Neal and Ali MacGraw and holds the #9 place on the American Film …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Probing into the lives of real people often yields fascinating theatre.  The classical musical CHORUS LINE was based on interviews that Elyrian, James Kirkwood, wove into a fascinating tale of the true life and theatrical experiences of Broadway singers and dancers.

Cleveland writer Faye Sholiton used her experiences in interviewing Holocaust survivors to develop her heart wrenching THE INTERVIEW.

Studs Terkel, noted as the …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

A New York reviewer once wrote, “If I have to see one more play about a dysfunctional family, I’m going to commit suicide.”  Broadway and local audiences may be thinking the same thing after being exposed to the likes of two productions of NEXT TO NORMAL, RICH GIRL, SORDID LIVES, SPANK, and SONS OF THE PROPHET, within a short period of time.

Ah, …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

The plot:  self-made vindictive wealthy person, inhibited daughter, handsome suitor who may be after her money, parent attempts to torpedo the relationship.  Sound familiar?  It should.  That’s basically the storyline of the Henry James novella WASHINGTON SQUARE and the play and film, THE HEIRESS.  It’s also the basic description of Victoria Stewart’s RICH GIRL which takes from the past, but the play …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association, Cleveland Critics Circle)

Eugene O’Neill, along with such writers as Anton Chekhov, Henrik Ibsen and August Strindberg, transformed western theatre.  They transitioned the stage from a place for escapist ideas into a mecca for the examination of real life problems.  The quartet laid the foundation for what is now known as “the modern theatre” and laid the groundwork for such luminaries as Arthur Miller, Tennessee …more…

Roy Berko
(Member, American Theatre Critics Association & Cleveland Critics Circle)

What does is feel like to be uncomfortable in your own skin, even when you think you know, understand, and act like a moral and good person?  What happens when a playwright forces the viewer to have an unsettling, sobering experience by forcing him or her to challenge assumptions about race, what it means to be an American, and be brutally …more…

Roy Berko

(Member, American Theatre Critics Association and Cleveland Critics Circle)

Want to get away this spring, summer or fall?  Drive to Canada for great theatre, good food, and nice scenery.  This year marks the 61st anniversary of the Stratford Festival of Canada.

This season’s 12 productions in the Festival’s four theatres are:

ROMEO AND JULIET—Shakespeare’s tale of youthful passion which dares to challenge generations of enmity in the most famous love story ever …more…