Her Voice Is Unlike Anything in Opera

That headline is no overstatement. Sound on for this great article about the Finnish singer Vilma Jää: www.nytimes.com/2026/04/22/a...

through all the thick mists of the dim doubts in my mind, divine intuitions now and then shoot, enkindling my fog with a heavenly ray

If you called her "the goat," I think you'd get one of the most withering staredowns in history. But the truth is the truth. Happy 94th to Elaine May. Long may she reign!

I can’t be objective, as Cinco Paul is a childhood friend, but now that critics have weighed in I feel I can join the chorus of praise for SCHMIGADOON, an embarrassment of riches full of wit, heart, craft, and joy. Indeed, aside from the new CATS, it’s the most joyful night to be found on Broadway.

cajoling me into the delusion that it was a choice resulting from my own unbiased freewill and discriminating judgment

“Soul-wrecking” may not sound like a compliment or a recommendation, but it’s the best way I can sum up the extraordinary impact of Kaija Saariaho‘s towering opera INNOCENCE at the Met, in a devastating production by Simon Stone. Run, don’t walk to this one.

I had much the same opinion of FEAR OF 13 as most of my colleagues, but I must say that Adrien Brody makes an impressive stage debut. Is it a self-conscious star turn? Yes. A tad schmactory? No question. But the guy can hold the stage, and in the right role I think he'd kill.

Reading Walter Kerr on the advice of @helenshaw.bsky.social and I’m still thinking of this brilliant turn of phrase, at the end of an item about how Eddie Foy brought his usual vaudevillian shtick to an ostensibly serious role: “We pretend to believe in legitimacy, but we can’t be serious.”

I don't know who introduced me to the great Brazilian singer-songwriter Tim Bernardes—thank you, whoever it was! I've been lost in this lush, sinuous 2022 record all day. Imagine Jeff Buckley and/or Nick Drake doing MPB and you're close. Exquisite. timbernardes.bandcamp.com/album/mil-co...

People to Watch: Alan Muraoka The longtime 'Sesame Street' cast member talks about his work as a director at U.S. regional theatres, including a new show at Rose Theater in Omaha.

Best known for his role on Sesame Street, Alan Muraoka will next helm Wai Yim and Jason Ma’s TYA play The Great Race at Rose Theater. In our spring 2026 print edition, the actor/director chats about the joys of TYA.

Instagram lin_manuel & Dave Malloy, Original Cast of Octet • Fugue State octet REHEARSAL SIGN-IN SHEET 1 JESSICA Amanda Seyfried 2 VELMA Rachel Zegler 3 PAULA Sheryl Leer Ralph 4 KARLY Philippa Soo 5 TOBY Gaten Matarazzo 6 HENRY Jonathan Groff 7 MARVIN Tramell Tillman Paul-Jordan Jansen 8 ED

Lin Manuel Miranda just posted his cast for the movie musical of Octet and it’s bananas.

New issue just dropped. Very proud of this one

Happy Praying Mantis Appreciation Day, to all who celebrate…

CHILD PRAYING MANTIS: Dad, who are we all praying to exactly?
DAD PRAYING MANTIS: Depends which religion you belong to
CHILD: So not all people follow the same religion?
DAD: No, son… we’re in sects

This is really worth watching.

Bored of Peace

I know you’re exaggerating for effect but that is not how I see his films at all—to me they depict worlds as spooky, capricious, and brutal as they are wondrous or transcendent, sometimes at a level that feels almost Greek. (TOTORO and KIKI’S may be the notable exceptions.)

I have no thoughts about this whatsoever

Ecclesiastes is the fine hammered steel of woe. “All is vanity.” ALL.

more than suspects that the joke is at nobody’s expense but his own

A guy asking ChatGPT to review a series of fart sound effects and getting a serious kiss ass response that calls it atmospheric

I can't stop laughing at this post. It's perfect.

Had a blast writing this column, for which I had the honor of visiting both Dmitry Krymov and Bill Rauch in the midst of rehearsal.

I’m so happy for the brilliant puppeteer James Ortiz to land and nail such a high-profile gig as PROJECT HAIL MARY. He does yeoman’s work in a movie I otherwise found cutesy and cloying.

Okay this isn’t really happening anymore so I can tell you how l had “internal ICE sources”: the 3000 very stir-crazy ICE agents were all going wild on Minneapolis Tinder. Local girls would match with them and string them along for intel. They loved to brag about what they were doing all day

Can Victory Gardens Bloom Again? Edward Torres and Archana Vaidya take over as interim leaders of the embattled company as it seeks to reestablish itself in Chicago’s theatre scene.

When Victory Gardens Theater re-emerged with a new mission—“New work. Boldly.”—we at American Theatre had a lot of questions. Emily McClanathan sat down with new leadership to find out where the company is headed since its implosion.
www.americantheatre.org/2026/04/08/c...

Caveat, I don't know a lot of his stuff, just the major titles. At worst you could say he's neither fish nor fowl, straddling naturalism and absurdism unsatisfyingly. At his best, though, he draws from both of those wells in ways I've often found invigorating. (And THE GOAT isn't a problem play)

I'm game; say more.

Cécile McLorin Salvant's - Take this stone (feat. June McDoom & Kate Davis (Official Audio) YouTube video by Cecile McLorin Salvant

How quickly can a song go from one I’ve never heard before to one of my favorites of all time? This folky, sneakily complex gem by Cécile McLorin Salvant is in the running for fastest uptake. What a gorgeous meeting of craft and inspiration. Can’t stop playing it. youtu.be/8OQ8tnOkOy8

Oh my gd, the Artemis II crew doing a parody of a bad 1980s sitcom intro from in space.

Source: www.instagram.com/p/DWwuHPfCZ8Z/

"The way I think about criticism is that it is itself a form of theatre. You have a voice, and you grip people, and you're honest, and you have an audience, and your way of respecting the medium that you're writing about is engaging with it publicly." podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/c...