Berkshire Bright Focus...

. . .On Theatre, on the Berkshires and its expanded region in New York State, Vermont and Connecticut!

Home

The Author at Work

Contact Us

Three Continents

From the ship at sea 1

From the ship at sea 2

From the ship at sea 3

From the ship at sea, 4

From the ship at sea, 5

From the ship at sea , 6

From Rio!!

The Trip Home

NEW SHORT STORIES

Nothing There For You

Nothing There For You, 2

Nothing There For You, 3

Nothing There For You, 4

Chase of The Thrill, 1

Chase of the Thrill, 2

Chase of the Thrill, 3

Chase of The Thrill, 4

Of Course, part1

Of Course, part 2

Of Course, part 3

Of Course, concluded

In Memory: Of My Cruise 1

In Memory: Of My Cruise 2

In Memory: Of My Cruise 3

In Memory: Of My Cruise 4

Las Vegas, 1

Las Vegas, 2

Las Vegas, 3

Las Vegas, 4

Las Vegas, concluded

Mad Moment #1

Mad Moment #2

Mad Moment #3

Mad Moment #4

Margaret Never Knows, 1

Margaret Never Knows, 2

Margaret Never Knows, 3

Margaret Never Knows, 4

Margaret Never Knows, 5

Remote, part 1

Remote, part 2

Remote, part 3

Remote, concluded

POETRY

April's Fools

Easter Sunday

...simple answers

And when they come at me

Fogged In

Barrington Stage 2015

Veils

Engagements

His Girl Friday

A Little More Alive

Lost in Yonkers

Shining City

Man of La Mancha

Butler

10x10 Upstreet2015

Barrington Stage-2014

An Enemy of the People

Character Man

Celebrating...William Fin

Romance in Hard Times

Dancing Lessons

Alix Korey

The Golem of Havana

Breaking the Code

KT Sullivan: Colored Lts.

Fyvush Finkel

Working on a Special Day

BSC's Kiss Me, Kate

The Other Place

10X10 Upstreet 2014

BSC ARCHIVED REVIEWS

Absurd Person Singular

All My Sons

Art

Bashir Lazhar

The Best of Enemies

BNelson's All-Male Revue

Brel in the Berkshires

Carousel

The Chosen

Clybourne Park revisited

The Crucible

Dr. Ruth, All the Way

The Fantasticks

Fiddler on the Roof

Freud's Last Session

The Game

Going to St. Ives

Guys and Dolls

I Am My Own Wife

Lord of the Flies

Lungs

The Memory Show

Mormons, Mothers...etc.

Much Ado About Nothing

Muckrakers

My Name is Asher Lev

Mysteries of Harris Burdi

The North Pool

On the Town

N. Coward's Private Lives

Scott and Hem. . . .

See How They Run

See Rock City. . .

Sleuth

Southern Comfort

A Streetcar Named Desire

Sweeney Todd

10X10 On North

10X10Upstreet

This Wonderful Life

To Kill a Mockingbird

Trumbo

21st...Spelling Bee

Underneath the Lintel

Vincent

The Violet Hour

The Whipping Man

Zero Hour

Berkshire Fringe Festival

Berkshire Opera

Le Nozze di Figaro

La Boheme

Berkshire Theatre 2015

The Homecoming

Frankie and Johnny in the

Neighbor/Smile

Bells are Ringing

Deathtrap at BTG

Thoreau or, Return to Wal

BTF ARCHIVED REVIEWS

Anna Christie

BTF Archive

Babes in Arms

Benefactors

Birthday Boy

The Book Club Play

Brace Yourself

Broadway by the Year

Candida

Candide

The Caretaker

The Cat and The Canary

Cedars

BTG's A Chorus Line

A Christmas Carol

Christmas Carol 2010

A Class Act

Colonial Christmas Carol

A Delicate Balance

Design For Living

Dutch Masters

Edith

The Einstein Project

Eleanor: Her Secret Journ

Endgame

Extremities

Faith Healer

The Guardsman

Ghosts

A Hatful of Rain

Homestead Crossing

In the Mood

K2

The Last Five Years

The Lion in Winter

A Little Night Music

A Lover's Tale

Eric Hill's Macbeth

A Man For All Seasons

Mary and Edith

Moonchildren

The Mystery of Irma Vep

No Wake

Noel Coward in Two Keys

Oklahoma!

Pageant Play

Period of Adjustment

Poe

Prisoner of 2nd Avenue

Puppetmaster of Lodz

Re-View Puppetmaster

Red Remembers

Same Time, Next Year

Sick

Sylvia

A Thousand Clowns

The Who's Tommy

Waiting for Godot

Chester Theatre - 2015

blink

Memory House

The Gospel. . .Discord

Chester Theatre Archive

An Iliad

Chester's Amish Project

Annapurna

Arms On Fire

The Betrothed

Body Awareness

The Swan

Animals Out of Paper

Madagascar

A Number

Tilted House

The Dishwashers

Almost, Maine

Blackbird

Copake Theatre Company

Nine Months

I Do! I Do!

Sour Grapes

Talking Heads

Grace & Glorie

Dorset Theatre Fest 2015

I Hate Hamlet

Outside Mullingar

S Holmes & the Jersey Lil

Intimate Apparel

DORSET ARCHIVED REVIEWS

All in the Timing

Barefoot in the Park

Boeing-Boeing by Camolett

Christie's The Mousetrap

Clybourne Park

Deathtrap

Dial "M" For Murder

Fallen Angels

Good People

The Hollow

June Moon

Marry Me a Little

Mauritius

Merton of the Movies

Murder on the Nile

Noises Off

Out of the City

Red

St. Nicholas

Superior Donuts

The Novelist

The Pavilion

The Scene

The Whore and Mr. Moore

A Year with Frog and Toad

Ghent Playhouse 2015/2016

The Weir

House of Dwarfs

Ghent "Little Shop"

Ghent Playhouse Archives

Ghent's "Almost, Maine"

Ali Baba...4 Tea Thieves

Ayckbourn at Ghent

Belles

The Boys Next Door

Clue: The Musical

Complete Wm Shakespeare

The Countess

Dancing at Lughnasa

Enchanted April

Coward's Fallen Angels

Fantasticks

Ghent's "Dial M...."

Grapes of Wrath

Hair Loom!

Hay Fever

The Heiress

Heroes in Ghent

Jack and the Beanstalk

Jerry's Girls

Lettice and Lovage

Lost: The Grimm Years

Madwoman of Chaillot

Menagerie A Trois

Mrs. Farnsworth

My Cousin Rachel

O.P.M. at Ghent

Over the River, etc.

Pack of Lies

Picnic

Prisoner/2nd Avenue

Puss in Boots

Rabbit Hole in Ghent

Robin Hood: 50 Shades. .

6 Women...

The 25th Annual Putnam...

Urinetown

You're a Good Man, Charli

Hubbard Hall

Illiad

Tartuffe

Shakespeare's King Lear

Parellel Lives

Ondine

Hubbard Shirley Valentine

Shakespeare's Macbeth

The Drawer Boy

You Can't Take It With Yo

Literature

Antibes

B ob Dylan

Christmasville

A Lesser Saint

Upstreet, #1

MacHaydn Theater-2015

Xanadu

Thoroughly Modern Millie

The Producers

West Side Story

Hairspray 2015

Rent in Chatham

Drowsy Chaperone in Chath

The Baker's Wife

MACHAYDN ARCHIVED REVIEWS

The All Night Strut

All Shook Up

Annie

Anything Goes

Beauty and the Beast

Best Little Whorehouse...

Brigadoon

Bye Bye Birdie

Carousel at the Mac

Chicago

Chorus Line

Crazy For You

Damn Yankees

Mac Fantasticks

Fiddler in Chatham

forty-second Street

Machaydn's The Full Monty

Guys and Dolls in Chatham

Gypsy

Hairspray

Hello, Dolly!

High Society

Joseph. . .Dreamcoat

Jekyll and Hyde

The King and I

Kiss Me, Kate

La Cage aux Folles

Legally Blonde

Les Miz

Love a Piano

Mac-Haydn's Grease

Mame

Meet Me in St. Lou

The Music Man

9 to 5

Nunsense

Oliver!

Phantom

The Secret Garden

Show Boat

Singin' In The Rain

Smokey Joe's Cafe

Sondheim Putting It Toget

The Sound of Music

State Fair

Sweet Charity

Swing!

Yng Frankenstein

Music

10 mini trios

Journeys by Robert Baksa

Mary Verdi: Precious Love

Mahagonny

New Stage Theatre Company

Death and The Maiden

Blood Sky

Fahrenheit 451

The Maids

NYSTI

Romeo & Juliet

And Then There Were None

King Island Christmas

A Legend of Sleepy Hollow

The Philadelphia Story

Yours, Anne

Orphan Train

Of Mice and Men

Twelve Angry Jurors

Anastasia

1776

Macbeth

Miracle On 34th Street

Arsenic and Old Lace

American Soup

Ordeal By Innocence

Reunion

Oldcastle Theatre 2015

Oldcastle Lion

Black Comedy

Cabaret

Time Stands Still

Tallley's Folly

OLDCASTLE ARCHIVED REVIEW

"Almost, Maine" in VT

Around the World in. . .

Beauty Queen of Leenane

Cat on a Hot Tin Roof

Doubt in Vermont

4000 Miles

Fox on the Fairway

The Grass is Greener

Last Days of Mickey & Jea

My Fair Lady

Night and Her Stars

Northern Boulevard

One Two Three

Other People's Money

Rembrandt's Gift

S. Holmes-Knight's Gambit

A Song For My Father

Strange Disappearance of

Third

Restaurants

Bezalel Gables

Blantyre

Brazillian

Burrito Bound

SPICE!

Shakespeare & Co. - 2015

An Illiad at S&Co

Red Velvet

Mother of the Maid

The Unexpected Man

The Comedy of Errors

Henry V

The How and The Why

Shakespeare & Co. - 2014

Private Eyes

Vanya, Sonia, Etc.

Henry IV, Parts One &Two

6-Actor Romeo and Juliet

TCWOWSabridged

Julius Caesar in Lenox

A Midsummer Night's Dream

The Servant of Two Master

Shakespeare's Will

Shakespeare & Co -2013

Private Lives

It's a Wonderful Life

Accomplice

Kaufman's Barber Shop

Beauty Queen/Leenane

Mother Courage...

Richard II

Love's Labour's Lost

Heroes

Master Class

Shakespeare&Co - 2012

The Liar

2012 Santaland

S&Co's The 39 Steps

Satchmo at the Waldorf

The Tempest

Parasite Drag

King Lear

Tale of Allergist's Wife

Cassandra Speaks

Shakespeare & Co-2011

The Learned Ladies

Cymbeline

Santaland

War of the Worlds

Red Hot Patriot

Broadway in the Berkshire

Baskervilles (Revisited)

Romeo and Juliet, 2011

The Hollow Crown

As You Like It

The Memory of Water

SHAKES & CO ARCHIVES

All's Well That Ends Well

Bad Dates

The Canterville Ghost

Cindy Bella

Real Inspector Hound

Dreamer Examines Pillow

Goatwoman of Corvis Count

Golda's Balcony

Hound of Baskervilles

Irma Vep, The Mystery of

Julius Caesar

The Ladies Man

Liaisons Dangereuses

Mengelberg and Mahler

Othello

Pinter's Mirror

Richard III

Romeo and Juliet

The Santaland Diaries

Sea Marks

Shirley Valentine

The Taster

Twelfth Night

White People

The Winter's Tale

Sharon Playhouse

Little Shop of Horrors

Merrily We Roll Along

Georgie

TriArts' Les Miz

Special Attractions

Grinder's Stand

Babylon Revisited

Five Women..Same Dress

John

Dracula's Grandmother

Mock the Vote-CSteps 2015

The Aliens

It Shoulda Been You

Skin Deep

Cranwell's Capitol Steps

Kill Me Now

The Garden of Martyrs

Capitol Steps 2013

The Capitol Steps

Doubt

Four Dogs and a Bone

Zara Spook & Other Lures

Trial of F.D.R.

Autres Temp. . .

Real Desperate Housewives

Capitol Steps for 2011

Ludwig Live!

The Seagull

Stop Kiss

On The Verge

Seascape

Starcrossed

"Earnest" in Albany

Life Is Short

Paris, 1890--Unlaced

BCC's A Christmas Carol

Sister's Christmas Catech

The Pajame Game

Her Name is Vincent

Property Known as Garland

12th Night

I Know I Came...Something

Doubt, a Parable

Voices' A Christmas Carol

Dickens A Christmas Carol

Marie Galante

Machinal

Capitol Steps

Late Nite Catechism

Rabbit Hole

Taming of The Shrew

Mystery of Irma Vep

I Love a Piano

The News in Revue

The Mikado

Saturday Night Liv

A Chorus Line

BCC - Christmas Carol

Morgan O-Yuki

Rent

Stageworks Hudson 2013/14

Tomorrow in the Battle

Stockholm

Looped

Play by Play Unchained

Stagework Hudson Archives

The Amish Project

The Divine Sister

Forbidden Broadway

Imagining Madoff

Or,

Play By Play Blue Moons

Play By Play Shadows

The Rivalry

Tennis in Nablus

Theater Barn 2015

Evita

Fantasticks at the Barn

John & Jen

A Murder is Announced

Moon Over Buffalo

THEATER BARN ARCHIVES

A. Christie's The Hollow

The Addams Family

Agatha Christie's. .None

Altar Boyz

The Andrews Brothers

Better Late

Black Coffee

Boeing-Boeing

Dirty Rotten Scoundrels

Don't Dress for Dinner

The Drowsy Chaperone

Forever Plaid

The Full Monty

Funny Thing Happened

God of Carnage

Grease

Great American Trailer...

Gutenberg! The Musical

Half and Half

Housewives of Columbia

How the Other Half Loves

TBarn's I Love a Piano

I Love You....Now Change

It Had To Be You

Leading Ladies

Lies & Legends

The Little Dog Laughed

Moonlight and Magnolias

Five Course Love

The Mousetrap

Murder at Howard Johnson

The Musical of Musicals

Red, White and Tuna

Romance, Romance

Same Time, etc.

Spider's Web

Stones In His Pockets

The 39 Steps

They're Playing Our Song

The Unexpected Guest

Veronica's Room

Visiting Mr. Green

You Should Be So Lucky

Young Frankenstein

Zanna Don't!

Visual Arts

Walking the Dog Thtr 2014

The Umbilical Point

WALKING THE DOG: ARCHIVED

BecomingFrederickDouglass

Bon Appetit!

Cyrano

daemons

Eurydice

The Gospel of John

i take your hand in mine

Lost Frontier of America

Our Town

The Owl and the Pussycat

Painting Churches

Under Milk Wood

Vritue, Desire, etc.

Walking the dog's HAMLET

Who Am I This Time?

WAM Theatre Company

Holy Laughter

In Darfur

Emilie

The Old Mezzo

Attic, Pearls & 3 Fine Gi

Melancholy Play

Weston Playhouse -2015

Weston's Guys & Dolls

Weston's Other Place

Peter and the Starcatcher

Pump Boys and Dinettes

Weston Playhouse Archived

Analog and Vinyl

Baskervilles in Vermont

Weston's Chorus Line

Educating Rita

Ella

42nd Street

A Funny Thing...Forum

Fully Committed

The Light in the Piazza

Les Miserables

Next to Normal

No Child. . .

Pregnancy Pact

A Raisin in the Sun

Rent - Weston

Souvenir

25th Spelling Bee

Weston's Uncle Vanya

V&S&M&Spike

Williamstown Theatre 2015

An Intervention

Moon for the Misbegotten

Unknown Soldier

Paradise Blue

Kinship

Legacy

Off the Main Road

WTF ARCHIVED REVIEWS

A Doll's House

A Month in the Country

After the Revolution

American Hero

Animal Crackers

The Atheist

Beyond Therapy

The Blue Deep

Broke-Ology

Caroline in Jersey

Children

David Storey's "Home"

The Elephant Man

Far From Heaven

Fifth of July

A Flea in Her Ear

Fool For Love

Funny Thing/Forum

Funny Thing II

A Great Wilderness

Hapgood

Importance of/Earnest

It's Jewdy's Show

Johnny Baseball

WTF's June Moon

Knickerbocker

The Last Goodbye

Living On Love

The Old Man&The Old Moon

One Slight Hitch

Pygmalion

Quartermaine's Terms

Samuel J. and K.

She Loves Me

She Stoops To Conquer

Six Degrees of Separation

Streetcar Named Desire

Ten Cents a Dance

Three Hotels

Three Sisters

The Torch-Bearers

True West

The Visit

What is..Cause of Thunder

WTF's Our Town

Dancing Lessons by Mark St. Germain. Directed by Julianne Boyd. Reviewed by J. Peter Bergman.

"Others fear kissing is an attack of intimacy."

          You might wonder what the fuss is all about concerning Mark St. Germain's new play, a romantic comedy (two words that usually bring a groan into a conversation) called "Dancing Lessons." Well, it's about an injured dancer and a man with Asperger's Syndrome. That's a bit different. It has John Cariani in the male role; his play "Almost, Maine" has been seen locally in at least four theaters in three states over the past few years. Paige Davis, just out of "Chicago" on Broadway is playing the woman. Unlike most of St. Germain's recent plays there are no famous people in the play, not even one referred to: no Freud, no Dr. Ruth, no Hemingway or Fitzgerald, not even one Roosevelt in sight.
          And then there is Julianne Boyd, the Barrington Stage Company's artistic director and founder, finally directing a show this season.
          Boyd, who has a knack and a flair going for these intimate plays, has brought her finest touches to this show. As in so many of her efforts before this, the actors seem to inhabit their roles to the point where curtain calls feel oddly intrusive. Boyd has brought us closer to the characters through her work with the actors and when they break their reality to clasp hands and bow we have a moment of creepiness knowing we're doing what we're supposed to but wondering how the folks on stage will react to so much unexpected noise. That is the unusual level of intimacy Boyd manages to place before us. It makes the lines the author has put into the mouths of the actors all the more poignant and charming.
          Charm is a difficult word to use with Ever, the man in the play. The abruptness and classic civility that come with his Asperger's reflect his peculiar genius and downplay his inherent lovable qualities. Cariani makes this man both awkward and intense and provides a perfect picture of a New York City neighbor to be avoided at all costs. His growth during the ninety-five minutes of this one act play is remarkable. Never shy, but definitely off-putting, Ever intrudes on his injured female neighbor with a special need and makes himself as unwanted as ever and yet he is ingratiating in the oddest ways and creates a niche for himself in her life. I loved watching him make this work. I mean, I loved seeing how he did it.
          Paige Davis' Senga (that's her real name) is a dark and down creature who is struggling with day to day existence in a world that doesn't seem to know there is an organization known as "Career Transition for Dancers." Senga needs to find them and start making a new life for herself when she meets her odd neighbor, Ever, and embarks on a life-shifting relationship. Davis is wonderful as the graceful imp whose earth-bound feet won't support her any longer. Living in a one-room lair that shelters and hides her, Senga is the loneliest gal in town but it isn't desparation that drives her into this new affair with an unlikely partner, it is something strong, something deeper, a little something called compassion. The beauty in Davis' playing of the role comes through that specific emotional stage just south of empathy. Davis handles all of the transitions in Senga's journey with the most delicate touches.
          In both characters the fine hand of Boyd's understanding comes through as these two choice players portray the best mismatch since "Born Yesterday"'s Billie checked into a Washington DC hotel and started her education. Laughs abound in this new play and so do those plucked heartstrings. The wedding of words, vision and interpretation result in a perfect evening of theatre.
          The set by James J. Fenton works wonderfully as it transports among places including Senga's apartment, the Millenium Hotel Ballroom and a lecture hall at the NY Institute of Technology. Sara Jean Tosetti's costumes help us visually see the inside and outside of the characters. Mary Louise Geiger's lighting includes some abrupt blackouts, the likes of which I haven't seen in a long while and which I appreciated as the scene endings don't always have a real verbal button to them, an issue I've raised before in St. Germain's work.
          All in all this is an excellent new play given a first-rate production under the supervision of a fine director who has chosen two remarkable actors to work with in creating this special comedy event. If that's not enough superlatives to warrant a ticket sale, then I'm the only one not doing the perfect job.
08/14/14

John Cariani and Paige Davis; photo: Kevin Sprague
Paige Davis and John Cariani; photo: Kevin Sprague
Paige Davis and John Cariani; photo: Kevin Sprague
Dancing Lessons plays on the Boyd-Quinson MainStage at Barrington Stage Company's theater at 30 Union Street, Pittsfield, MA through August 24. For information and tickets call the box office at 413-236-8888 or go online at www.barringtonstageco.org.


Web Hosting powered by Network Solutions®