With Stoppard's passing, Peter and Elisabeth ask: Who are the canonical playwrights of our time? We wish you a merry podcast with this gift of the two of us, talking about Tom Stoppard's legacy; our recent theatrical experiences and Elisabeth's giving shoutouts to some of her 2025 favorites.

In our latest episode, @petermarksdrama.bsky.social and I discussed his recent trip to a theater festival in Krakow, Tom Stoppard and some of our favorite shows of the year. marksvincentelli.substack.com/p/with-stopp...

Attended Randy Rainbow’s show at Town Hall tonight. I needed that.

What’s Bred in the Bone. Fab.

Opinion | The Pointless Triumph of a Hapless President

The Pointless Triumph of a Hapless President www.nytimes.com/2025/07/04/o...

“If Barry Goldwater was the book and Ronald Reagan the movie, Mr. Trump is the glitzy jukebox musical.”

This is the kind of dumb, lazy analogy that “intellectuals” use to disparage theater.

Kathleen has always had an interesting theater brain.

Thanks Dan!

Is Hamlet a total head case? We talk to the director who has set a new audio version of the play in the Prince's mind. Jeremy McCarter's Make-Believe Association asks you to put on headphones to fully experience "Hamlet."

So, once and for all, is Hamlet a head case? Director/author Jeremy McCarter has decided to get inside Hamlet's head -- and get him inside yours, too -- to probe the question in a delicious new audio version of the play. Let us three tell you about it!

marksvincentelli.substack.com/p/is-hamlet-...

It's worth doing if only to force a reaction from Vichy homosexual Ric Grenell.

Early voting, Saturday 6/21. Lower Manhattan.

🤣

Staying at a house in Maine. Conservative Republican family next door.
They’ve put up a Dump Trump sign.

Rockland, Maine!
#NoKings

Peter was sitting in the hall. Elisabeth was sitting at her screen. Listen to their scintillating post-Tony Awards talk! The 78th Tony Awards, broadcast on June 8, 2005, was by many accounts one of the best shows in years. How come? Peter and Elisabeth drill down.

We talk Tonys - the proceedings were the best in memory. And ratings were up. (My first time in the audience. Elisabeth followed avidly from afar.) A discourse for our paying subscribers!

open.substack.com/pub/marksvin...

Helen!

Yes. But I’ve seen the musical 4 times.

I was there. Best Tony Awards show in ages.

How it looks in the hall!

What it looks like in the hall!

How it looks in the hall!

How it looks in the hall!

How it looks in the hall!

How it looks in the hall!

What do we see during commercial breaks? Set changes!

How the Buena Vista Social Club number looks in the hall.

Great opening number. In the room, goosebumps.

Could you feel Harvey Fierstein’s emotion at home? In the room it was electric.

Maybe Happy Ending score note: Darren Criss showed me the cramped little room adjacent to the Belasco Theatre stage, where the several string players sit. Several stories above them is located the conductor, whom they see on closed circuit TV.

First standing O of the night goes to Edwin Robinson, the teacher teacher at Boys and Girls HS in Brooklyn. The voice!