A dialogue between a relentless young woman and a famous, reclusive author plays out in endearing shades of human emotion as the Boulevard Theatre presents the local premiere of Victor L. Cahn's Roses in December. Anne Miller stars as Carolyn Meyers, a graduate student working in the alumni office of Prescott College. The play opens as she is writing a letter to author Joel Gordon (David Ferrie) in an effort to engage him in a dialogue. Gordon is reluctant to do...

Perhaps the most fundamental task for any stage actor is drawing an audience into a story through the recitation of dialogue. The actor is usually aided in this task by the set, costuming, props, lighting, sound design and the like. Quite often, however, smaller studio theaters lack such decoration, and actors are challenged to deliver the full reality of the play to audiences. The Boulevard Theatre's production of the Victor L. Cahn comedy Roses In December, opening this week, offers just such a challenge to two different actors from two different...

It was a matinee on the last Saturday before Christmas. Cell phones of absentminded patrons intermittently chirped through the cozy Off Broadway Theatre throughout the performance. A bracingly caustic laugh would occasionally contrast against the rest of the laughter whenever local theater icon John McGivern would hit a punch line. And in spite of the fact it had already been one of the snowiest Decembers in recorded history, and in spite of imminent wind chills around 30 below zero, and in spite of another significant snowfall due to hit by the end of the afternoon, McGivern...

There are three different kinds of successful comedy shows: those that are funny, those that are funny in ways the author and actors hadn't intended and those that aren't really all that funny but still manage to be wildly entertaining. That last category is the most difficult to describe in a review, and it is that category into which Off The Wall's Holiday Punch 2008 fits. For a number of years now, Off The Wall Artistic Director Dale Gutzman and a cast of regulars have opened their stage in December to...

Deborah Staples would have done the Bard proud as the versatile solo performer in the new Rep production of Robert Hewett's recent play, The Blonde, the Brunette, and the Vengeful Redhead. It seems "custom cannot stale her infinite variety," and Staples needs every bit of variety to hold together this odd cornucopia of unusual moods and contrasts signified by seven different characters, each with their own unique dialect. The play purports to be an "exploration of multiple perspective on love, anger and adultery," or "how you can really know your neighbors when a single moment of madness can change ones life forever"-somewhat heavy baggage for a one-woman...

December comes to the Milwaukee theater season each year like a fresh, new evergreen. And every year the theater district produces the same beloved ornaments with which to decorate it. The Milwaukee Ballet's Nutcracker goes here, the Milwaukee Rep's A Christmas Carol goes there, and In Tandem's A Cudahy Caroler Christmas fits right over here. As always, there's the reassuring comfort of another John McGivern holiday show at the Off-Broadway Theatre, and if you look closely enough you can see Off the Wall Theatre's rugged, long-running...

To close one's eyes in the theater is usually considered bad form. To do so during Acacia Theatre's presentation of It's a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play could be considered a tribute to the way this adaptation of Frank Capra's classic Christmas movie might have been experienced in radio's heyday. But it would be better not to let your eyelids droop too often, lest you miss an authentic evocation of the way many Americans took in drama and comedy between trips to the movies about 60 years ago. From the lighted...

Milwaukee's holiday theater season is filled with tradition: The Rep's A Christmas Carol is staged each year within walking distance of the Milwaukee Ballet's annual Nutcracker, which again shares a roof with In Tandem's A Cudahy Caroler Christmas. This year, In Tandem's sketch comedy The Show makes a strong case for inclusion in that local holiday tradition with a yuletide program that runs through Dec. 20 at In Tandem's 10th Street Theatre...

Good-old Milwaukee received a fresh load of snow just in time for the seventh annual (minus one skipped year) opening of In Tandem Theatre's Cudahy Caroler's Christmas, a nostalgic tribute to Milwaukee's South Side. The show featured close-harmony singing, rowdy burlesque and little or nothing to do with Christmas, but an abundance of the three Bs: boobs, bowling and beer. The show's simple formula: Take a familiar...

For the second time this season the Milwaukee Rep calls on a single actor to carry an entire production, as the company stages Australian playwright Robert Hewett's suburban mystery The Blonde, the Brunette and the Vengeful Redhead. The show, opening this week, stars Rep Resident Actress Deborah Staples at the Quadracci Powerhouse Theater. Staples' varied roles will provide a contemporary look at the nature of love, anger and adultery from multiple perspectives...