Review: TheatreWorks, “Circus Fire”

TheatreWorks, Hartford, CT
https://twhartford.org/
through May 31, 2026

By Shera Cohen

On a hotter-than-usual July 4th weekend approximately 80-years ago the circus came to town, specifically Hartford, CT. Families, especially children, cheer and laugh at the hire-wire acts, horses, clowns, et al.

Theater Works takes on the daunting task of mounting "Circus Fire" for the first large-scale professional production about one of the most horrific dates in CT history and likely circus history. Not coincidentally, the drama is set at a location near where the actual fire took place on July 6, 1944. 

 The count of those who perished is still a bit uncertain at 167 with more than half children.

It takes an amazing, intelligent, and sensitive triumvirate, along with dozens of actors and crew under their helm, to establish the facts with an oh-so-human touch to the 12 actors, in at least the roles of four characters each.

 

The threesome includes Rob Ruggiero, Artistic Director of the theatre for some 30 years, who often takes on risks and new works. He is the man at the core. Oftentimes, TW does not receive attention and accolades that it deserves alongside some of the other, larger theatre venues in and around Hartford. A suggestion is to pay attention to TW, especially “Circus Fire”.

 

The second of the three talents is Jacques LaMarre, playwright. Well-known in CT, primarily as a writer of comedic plays, his “Circus Fire” exposes his chops at drama at its most raw and extreme, all the time true to this account in history. He develops a somewhat linear flow – individual families eager to attend the circus, then tragedy and its aftermath, next inquiry. There is not a solitary word of dialogue that is unnecessary. The last section, the investigation, intersperses though the latter half of the play. The audience participates in the entire event including the prosecution. LaMarre presents this story of shock, helplessness, and comradery with depth and compassion. 

 

Director Jared Mezzocchi moves his players into a circus-like tent setting in the middle of the theatre with audience seats on raised levels along the perimeter. Directing in-the-round is not an easy task with a large cast. Adding a very limited number of props, centerstage also turns into settings for homes, offices, and back to the circus.

 

What makes Mezzocchi’s skills extraordinary are his multimedia show primarily appearing in black and white on the tent’s ceiling and as a circle on the inside of the entire tent/theatre. From the play’s start (names of those who died are scattered above audience's seats) to its conclusion (moving images of the actual fire), these pictures (both still and moving) indicate circus atmosphere. With projection, the play's circular center stage becomes that of the circus. Mezzocchi's work is beyond clever; it is extraordinary. "Circus Fire" is extraordinary. 

 

NOTE: This play takes place at the First Company Governor’s Foot Guard, 159 High Street, downtown Hartford. The venue proves ideal and historically fitting. Check with the box office if seats remain; it's that wonderful a play.

Review: “Jesus Christ Superstar”

Goodspeed Opera House, East Haddam, CT
www.goodspeed.org
April 17 – June 7, 2026
By Geoffrey and Linda O’Connell

In the late 1960’s, young composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyricist Tim Rice tried their hand at songwriting with the pop-music cantata “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.” The piece was a minor success and led them to something grander, their rock opera “Jesus Christ Superstar,” which has been produced worldwide for more than half a century. Goodspeed Opera House brings a new production that is as fresh as today’s headlines while paying homage to the original work.

The musical conveys a modern interpretation of the last days of Jesus. The music and lyrics were and still are bold, brash, questioning and genre-bending; a cultural cauldron boiling over with the tensions of the times.

Playing Jesus of Nazareth, Justin Matthew Sargent, commands the lead vocals, bringing back the heavy-metal style belting grit of the original album’s Jesus. Judas Iscariot, Austin Lesch, matches Sargent’s range and grit, lifting the Jesus-Judas, love-hate relationship to dizzying, emotionally fraught heights. The ensemble is strong throughout. Gender-blind casting as Nicolette Antonia Shin plays King Herod is a showstopper.

Director Tatiana Pandiani deftly manages the relationship between Jesus and his betrayer Judas, who wanted Jesus to lead the zealots’ revolt against the Roman occupiers and who questioned his divinity.

Both Pandiani and Scenic Designer Riccardo Hernandez use their spare tools wisely. The sand-filled stage serves as a prop for cast members to sift through the sand of time. Spare-looking small tables add depth to the otherwise empty stage, morphing into raised walkways, thrones, and temple terraces on which Herod and Pilate, Caiaphas and his high priests lord over the Jewish rabble below.

Pandiani never lets the secular, political themes that Rice explored in his lyrics be overshadowed by the theological gauntlet or the deeply personal psychology of Jesus and Judas. With echoes of the protests of 50 years ago morphing into today’s headlines, Pandiani makes the politics explicit with the zealots carrying signs saying: “Rome Lies, People Die” and “No Justice, No Peace, No Ceasar.”

Goodspeed’s stage extends with the pit musicians now set three floors below to vastly increase the space for dancers to spread their wings. Choreographer Amy Campbell has the talented full cast fill the space with energetic pop dancing movements.

Cha See’s heavenly-turned-hellish lighting, Adam Souza’s spare, rock band instrumentation, and Pandiani’s gifted direction conjure up the violence of the story – Judas’ suicide, Christ’s torture and crucifixion – in a way that live theatre rarely can these days.

The company successfully embraces the complexity of the creators’ narrative, balancing the intimate setting with arena-rock energy and music festival zeal.

REVIEW: Hartford Stage, "Native Gardens"

Hartford Stage, Hartford, CT 

www.HartfordStage.org 

April 17 – May 10, 2026 

by Nechama Katan

In a cultural moment when conversations about race, class, and identity too often flatten into competing slogans, Karen Zacarías' "Native Gardens" arrives at Hartford Stage like a breath of fresh air from an overgrown garden.

 

T. Charles Erikson (photo credit)

Directed by Nicole A. Watson, this sharp contemporary comedy follows two neighboring couples in Washington, DC whose shared dream of replacing an old chain-link fence spirals into something far more revealing than a property dispute. What looks like a comedy of manners turns out to be one of the most layered, humane, and deeply funny explorations of how those with diverse backgrounds relate, especially in recent years.  

 

At the heart of the conflict are young couple Tania and Pablo, newly arrived in the neighborhood, and their established neighbors Virginia and Frank, guardians of an aspiring to be prize-winning English garden. When a fence replacement on a tight deadline goes wrong, the audience watches in anticipation to see what happens between the two couples. 

 

Playwright Karen Zacarías is too skilled to let this remain a simple, unfriendly neighborhood issue. Race, class, age, gender, and entitlement all take root in the soil of this story, and what grows is a portrait of four complicated, fully realized people. Nobody here is entirely right, and nobody is entirely wrong, and that recognition alone makes the play remarkable.

Alina Collins Maldonado is deeply authentic as Tania, a very educated woman of firm conviction still tethered to her roots. Bradley Tejeda's Pablo radiates the polished confidence of a man building his future in a new country by any means necessary. Judith Lightfoot Clarke's Virginia is a revelation, every chip on her shoulder earned and visible, yet softened by unexpected depth. Greg Wood's Frank, old school and garden-devoted, anchors the production with quiet wit and a love for his garden, sprinkled with a lot of old-fashioned competition. Lawrence E. Moten III's split-yard scenic design is a delight, and there is not a bad seat in the house.

What sets "Native Gardens" apart is its refusal to take sides. Every scene carries layers beneath layers, and when you are not laughing you may find yourself crying, sometimes both at the same time. In a world that has largely forgotten how to let neighbors be complicated, this play insists on exactly that. The insistence feels necessary and deeply hopeful.

Hartford Stage follows with "Sweeney Todd," a historic partnership with Theater Works Hartford.

Review: Majestic Theater, “Come From Away”

Majestic Theater, West Springfield, MA
https://www.majestictheater.com/
by Shera Cohen

Canadians are the nicest people in the world. Everyone knows this. The musical “Come from Away” proves it.

Photo by Kait Rankins

Imagine 7,000 uninvited visitors arriving, all at the same time, in your tiny town whose own population numbers are nearly the same. The initial response might be, “Get the heck outa’ here.” Yet the folk of Gander, Newfoundland emerge as an ensemble of 12 amazingly talented actors/singers who not only open their doors wide, set up dormitories, cook up meals, pour on the beer, and install as many phones as Gander can find.

The plot starts on 9/11/2001 and the days that follow when 38 planes were diverted to Canada. With horrific challenges in the world beginning on that fateful day, these passengers were not initially aware of the terror in the U.S.

The stirring opening number, “Welcome to the Rock,” features the full cast singing, hooting, ‘n foot-stompin’. While there are no hummable tunes for the drive home, most of the music is atypical from musicals “back in the day”—here we have country meets ballad meets sea-shanty.

Director Russell Garrett doubles an already immense role with that of choreographer. Movement is seamless from one vignette to another. There is purpose in every encounter between characters. Each actor’s role is essential to create the relationships among passengers, and more importantly between the homespun Canadians and the strangers embarking on Gander.

Garrett creates an atmosphere of hope and camaraderie and gifts the audience a piece of humanity, made more poignant because it depicts an honest point in human history.

The actors take on at least two roles; one as a townie and the other as an airplane passenger. Each actor changes his or her character instantly. A hat, a small prop, a gesture transforms one distinct personality into another. Never for a moment is the audience confused. Canadian accents also trade off with Texan, British, or Middle Eastern, and then back again.

For the most part the set, too, transposes from numerous locations as actors essentially play musical chairs in the townies’ café “where everybody knows your name” and then to seats on the plane where no one knows you, or care.

Throughout the performance, many of the musicians are visible onstage, blending within the action. They are a fun, talented group, playing on an eclectic collection of instruments: pipes, mandolins, and bouzouki, and bodhran (a stringed instrument and a drum, by the way).

Many theatergoers have never heard of "Come From Away”. These two-hours at the Majestic are joyful. What is special about this show is that; it is incredibly inventive in style, music, and staging, it manages to be deeply affecting and moving -- true account of people simply being nice to each other when needed most.

 

REVIEW: Hartford Symphony Orchestra, "Brahms’ Third"

Bushnell, Belding Theater, Hartford, CT

www.hartfordsymphony.org

April 10-12, 2026

by Michael J. Moran

For the seventh weekend in its 2025-26 Masterworks series, HSO Music Director Carolyn Kuan led the orchestra in four pieces by three composers, including two HSO premieres, one featuring the composer as soloist.

The concert opened with the first HSO premiere, the rarely heard 1831 concert overture inspired by French composer Hector Berlioz’s take on Shakespeare’s tragedy, “King Lear.” In an engaging spoken introduction, Kuan asked sections of the HSO to play segments of the piece, with themes depicting Lear, his three daughters, and his descent into madness. The full orchestra gave a fiery version of this rousing mini-drama.

Photo by Jim Henkel

The second HSO premiere was Brazilian-born composer Clarice Assad’s colorful 2024 “Flow, Suite for Piano and Orchestra.” Commissioned by the Albany Symphony for the bicentennial of the Erie Canal between Albany and Syracuse, New York, its three short movements depict “the flow of ideas” across time and space, Assad comments in a program note. She proved a virtuosic pianist, also playing a small drum in the mercurial “River Tide,” relaxed and sensitive in the jazzy “Last Song,” and dazzling in the energetic “Rhapsodic Dances” finale. Kuan and the orchestra were supportive accompanists. The well-filled house gave Assad a standing ovation.

Next came a vibrant performance of Johannes Brahms’ 1883 third and shortest symphony. An alternately energetic and reflective “Allegro con brio,” including the often-omitted repeat, was followed by a flowing “Andante” that surged forward to a magical hushed ending, an exquisitely melancholy “Poco allegretto,” and a robust closing “Allegro,” fading to a quiet close. Standing out among the many players who took bows for their work in solo passages was HSO principal oboe Erik Andrusyak, who also excelled in the Berlioz.

As a sort of “orchestral encore,” Kuan spoke again to introduce “the fun-loving, beer-drinking side” of Brahms with a rip-roaring rendition of his popular 1869 “Hungarian Dance No. 5 in G minor,” based on a folk-like melody for piano four hands, arranged for orchestra by conductor Albert Parlow, which ended the program on a festive note. 

The HSO’s next Masterworks program (May 8-10) will feature Kuan leading music by Clyne and Mendelssohn, with HSO principal clarinet Sangwon Lee as soloist in Mozart’s clarinet concerto.

REVIEW: South Windsor Cultural Arts, "Shelest Piano Duo"

South Windsor, CT
www.facebook.com/SouthWindsorCulturalArts
March 22, 2026
by Michael J. Moran

An enthusiastic full house in South Windsor was treated to a captivating debut appearance by acclaimed Ukrainian-born pianists Anna and Dmitri Shelest. First meeting as students at the Kharkiv Special Music School, they later married and began performing together as a piano duo after moving to the US. The imaginative program shed new light on familiar music and introduced unfamiliar repertoire that should be better known.

It opened with an exuberant reading of the Overture to Leonard Bernstein’s “Candide,” arranged by Charlie Harmon, showcasing both the emotional sensitivity and technical precision of this four-hands team playing the same keyboard, Dmitri, the low notes, Anna, the high. This was followed by the deeply felt of Variations on a Shaker Melody from Aaron Copland’s ballet “Appalachian Spring,” flowing without pause into “Carpathian Song,” an original piece written in folk style by contemporary Ukrainian cellist-composer Zoltan Almashi.  

Next came beautifully characterized performances of five Romantic Pieces (1890) for piano duet by once-popular French composer Cecile Chaminade, whose lovely music is now being rediscovered. Introducing their virtuosic rendition of Camille Saint-Saens’ “Danse Macabre,” Dmitri noted a “special bond” the Shelests feel with Ukrainian-born pianist Vladimir Horowitz, whose sister Regina taught for many years at the Kharkiv School.

Composer Theodore Akimenko was born in Kharkiv in 1876 but lived for many years in Paris, where his music was influenced by French impressionism. His ravishing folk inflected Six Ukrainian Dances for piano duet (1925) received affectionate readings from the duo.

The concert closed with George Gershwin’s "Rhapsody in Blue". Dmitri’s opening notes replaced the famous clarinet glissando in the orchestral version with pianistic elegance. Anna’s delicate handiwork in the upper keyboard filled in expressively for the missing strings and woodwinds. The power of their combined sound in climaxes had an almost orchestral sonority.

The charismatic stage presence of both performers was apparent not only in their carefully balanced playing but in the personal engagement with which they alternately introduced each musical selection, highlighting how profoundly both their home (the US) and homeland (Ukraine) have shaped the duo's artistry.  

 SWCA will next present pianist Wynona Wang on April 12 at 4:00 pm.

 

REVIEW: The Bushnell, Hartford, CT “Kinky Boots”

The Bushnell, Hartford, CT
www.bushnell.org
March 17 – March 22
by Simon Brighenti

Pop culture mavens of a certain age may remember Cindy Lauper as a bubbly, bejeweled bopper whose 1980’s persona might be summed up at least superficially as “MTV, the WWE and Me”. However, as evidenced brilliantly by the current production of "Kinky Boots" at the Bushnell, her talent as a songwriter and wordsmith is much deeper than that.

Combining Lauper’s memorable tunes with a book by the inimitable and legendary Harvey Fierstein, "Kinky Boots" is a fun, sassy, and brassy theatrical experience; in a phrase everything a Broadway-worthy musical should be.

The message permeating the production is how we can be changed, our lives enhanced and dreams achieved by recognizing the true colors within each other and ourselves. The musical is inspired by a true story which brought together two seemingly wildly disparate individuals who find common ground and realize that what is underneath is what truly counts.

The immensely talented Omari Collins (aka Scarlett D. Von’Du) is first introduced as Lola, a flamboyant and boisterous drag performer, who, as the production and relationships develop and evolve on stage, reveals a real tender and thoughtful soul and a determination to remain true to both identities.

As Charlie Price, portrayed by Noah Silverman, is torn between respecting and trying to maintain the shoe making business his father and grandfather built – mostly for the sake of the supportive lifelong friends his family has employed and kept on over the years -- and his desire to find his true self which may mean putting the business and his treasured relationships behind him. 

The discomfort that some “traditionally minded” folks might feel when presented initially with who Lola is and what Lola represents is personified by Jason Daniel Chacon in the role of Don. In the hands of a lesser actor this portrayal could easily turn cartoonish, but Chacon inhabits it with a heartfelt humanity and (eventual) understanding.

No review of "Kinky Boots," and especially this production, would be complete without an appreciation of the costuming, hair and makeup, and scenic design. It all comes together in a pageant of flair and fun. The ability to work within an athletic and gender-fluid presenting cast of main players and “angels” such as presented at the Bushnell is surely a dream assignment. 

The energy of the choreography and flamboyancy of the ensemble as they go through many intricate and fabulous costume changes and the ability to navigate the set while wearing footwear ranging from “sensible shoes” to “are you kidding me?” is nothing short of stunning.

So, an enthusiastic suggestion would be to don that favorite footwear and head over to the Bushnell for an entertainment experience that will delight down to the very sole.