Author Archives: burdreviews

“The Porch on Windy Hill” is billed as a new play with old music. The music is mostly country style folk music, many of which I knew from other versions sung by singers of the 1960’s. It opens with a young couple leaving New York, where they’ve been cooped up during the pandemic, as theyContinue reading “The Porch on Windy Hill at People’s Light”

This play is about the President of the United States, right?  Not really. The subtitle is “Or, Behind Every Great Dumbass Are Seven Women Trying to Keep Him Alive.” Arden Theatre Company’s latest production of this all-female farce is directed by Jennifer Childs, the brilliant artistic director at 1812 Productions, is quite funny, though atContinue reading “POTUS at Arden Theatre Company”

            “The Wanderers” is the story of two Jewish couples who live in the Williamsburg section of Brooklyn. One is an Orthodox couple whose marriage was arranged as we first meet them. The other is a secular Jewish couple who are writers and have known each other since they were children. Both marriages are struggling.Continue reading “The Wanderers at Lantern Theater Company”

Tony Braithwaite is one of my favorite Philadelphia actors because he can play so many different types of characters without absurdly stretching the limit. So I was most intrigued when I learned he be would portraying God in Act II Playhouse’s comedy, “An Act of God.” Written by Emmy Award Winner comedy writer for hisContinue reading “An Act of God at Act II Playhouse”

With a title like “Somewhere Over the Border,” you can’t help but wonder if it is about immigration or is it a take on the song, “Somewhere, Over the Rainbow.” It turns out that this musical is about both. Reina is a 17-year-old girl in El Salvador in 1978 who has just given birth andContinue reading “Somewhere Over the Border at People’s Light”

Myra is trying to deal with the death of Douglas, a poet she met many years ago and she is struggling as she tries to send texts to the man’s son. But she has inadvertently sent the texts to a young woman, Fran, who she doesn’t even know, because she sent the messages to theContinue reading “off by one at People’s Light”

Marge is a successful photographer and professor of photography.  Tiffany is a former student of Marge’s who has become the subject of all Marge’s photographs since they met. They fall in love and are married. But now, six years later, Tiffany is questioning her whole relationship and takes off on a month-long backpacking hike byContinue reading “The Climb at InterAct Theatre Company”

            It is the summer of 1862 in West Texas as the U.S. is in the midst of the Civil War. Hero is a slave on a plantation when he is told by the owner, his master, The Colonel, that if he joins him and the Confederate Army, he will be given his freedom. ItContinue reading “Father Comes Home from the Wars at Quintessence Theatre”

Though the show, “Forever Plaid” was created 35 years ago and has been performed around the world, it is a musical that I’d never seen. I only knew it was something about the “boy bands” of the 1950’s and a kind of musical review. It is so much more than that as presented at ActContinue reading “Forever Plaid at Act II Playhouse”

Dionysus was the Greek god of vegetation and fertility. In her Obie winning play, “Hurricane Diane,” Madeleine George has the god look down upon the modern world and, seeing it about to be destroyed by man’s poor treatment of the planet, decides to come to Earth to save it. Able to inhabit different bodies, heContinue reading “Hurricane Diane at People’s Light”