Shapiro on Theater

The musical adaptation of Roald Dahl's children's fantasy brings the book's cartoonish — and nasty — characters alive.

Two graduate students, into their work but aloof from themselves

The musical, in a sterling production, does justice to Alice Walker's book.

The ghost of John Barrymore is the liveliest part of the play, and surely of this production.

Nora, who walks out the door at the end of Henrik Ibsen's masterpiece, is back.

The war hero Achilles and his friend, Petroclus, consider their love and interdependence.

The annual awards for professional theater in metropolitan Philadelphia draw a crowd of about 700 to celebrate.

Can old and new neighborhood cultures survive together?

Sheridan's witty 1775 play about love and rivalry becomes a musical romp.

A post-apocalyptic vision of a world without electricity uses "The Simpsons" as a cultural icon that draws people together.

People live by the rhythm of the waves, at the end of an era of oystering.

Slimmed down and moving along, the production irons some of the wrinkles out of Arthur Miller's play.

An ancient story by Euripides that never gets old.

A witch contest in drag, to find this year's witchiest.

Lynn Nottage's play about factory decline and its effect on disrespected workers puts the stage company back into production.