In her review of “Noel Coward in Two Keys” at Berkshire Theatre Festival, Frances Benn Hall writes, “Just as his own songs have ornamented his plays, so do the two titles of these two swan song-plays seem to me to be Coward having his last fun with words, scoffing at prudery and coming out with just a song at twilight.”
Frances Benn Hall writes in her review of the revival of Noel Coward’s play Private Lives at Barrington Stage Co. in Pittsfield, MA, “…the play is a sheer delight from the moment the lights go off to rise on two identical balconies of a posh hotel on the French Riviera in 1930.”
The Goat Woman of Corvis County, written by Christine Whitley, is being given its world premiere in the new Elayne P. Bernstein Theatre at Shakespeare and Co. in Lenox, MA.
Looking back on theatre history of the 20th century, it is apparent that one play has generated more speculation, interpretation, and ambiguity than any other single play as critics, academics, and audiences, troubled but delighted by it, try to extract from it the author’s intent as to meaning and production details.
Barrington Stage Company’s July 20, 2008 production of The Violet Hour reviewed by Frances Benn Hall, who wrote: “This has been a difficult play to describe, the mood and tone shift from act one to act two having jolted, as probably the author intended. However, for me, the second act was too cluttered, needing streamlining …”
If the bland title of playwright Karen Zacarias’ The Book Club Play now gracing the Berkshire Theatre Festival stage leads one to expect a predictable comedy concerning the motley types who inhabit the ubiquitous book clubs that seem to exist everywhere, think again.