★★☆☆☆ Musicalization of a popular young adult novel about people’s cruelty toward human difference is too-thinly told and too-broadly played
Initiative: Dungeons & Dragons And Sex, Oh My
★★★★☆ The travails of adolescence get a hard-hitting and sympathetic airing in a work of epic proportions
Meet the Cartozians: A People Proud, A History Melancholy
★★★☆☆ A skillful cast explores the Armenian American experience across two eras, a century apart
Chess: Just Another Bored Game
★★☆☆☆ Two musical theater kings and a queen strive mightily with a famously elusive concept album, but play to a draw
The Baker’s Wife: Redemption for a Musical With a Big Heart
★★★★☆ A flawless cast and thoughtful direction turn a famously problematic tuner into a darling, healing event
Richard II: This Campy Breed, This England
★★☆☆☆ Michael Urie and entourage double down on facile gimmickry and leave Shakespeare behind
The Queen of Versailles: Chenoweth Is Crowned As Broadway Royalty
★★★★☆ Kristin Chenoweth rules in the role of a lifetime as a true believer in the American Dream
From Massachusetts: The Weekend, Angst Upon a Time
★★☆☆☆ A quartet of disaffected souls assembles in the mountains of Western Mass. to explain, indeed overexplain, their problems
From Maine: When Elvis Met The Beatles, A Melding of the Music
★★☆☆☆ The re-creation of a real-life encounter between the King and the Fab Four isn’t as fab as it ought to be
From Massachusetts: Williamstown, New Festival, New Focus
A venerable theater fest rises like a phoenix in its 71st year to celebrate Tennessee Williams