South Florida’s March Theater Roundup: Dancing Lessons, Memphis, and More

Here’s your monthly reminder that South Florida has a vibrant and thriving theater scene. From Broadway musicals to comedies to engrossing dramas, there’s never a shortage of great theater to catch at any given playhouse throughout Miami-Dade and Broward. And we’re not just talking about the Arsht Center or the Broward Center.

Written by Jackie Mason’s Ex, 700 Wives Stars His Spurned Daughter

The politically incorrect comedian Jackie Mason can rest easy knowing there is no mention of him in ex-lover Ginger Reiter’s upcoming comedy musical 700 Wives. Reiter took a break from poking fun at her ten-year love affair with her baby daddy, whom she razzed in Both Sides of a Famous Love Affair: The Jackie Mason Musical and its previous incarnations, 702 Punchlines and Pregnant and Oh, Jackie, Oh.

Reservoir Dolls, an All-Woman Reservoir Dogs Reboot, Flips the Script

As Hollywood continues to unpack more casualties from the #MeToo movement, women are fighting back by creating the kind of work they want to see and the roles they want to play. Erika Sorensen’s Reservoir Dolls, presented by the Outré Theatre Company at the Pompano Beach Cultural Center, flips the script in an all-female stage adaption of Quentin Tarantino’s 1992 testosterone-driven heist film, Reservoir Dogs.

I Mom So Hard Brings Honest Mommy Humor to Hollywood

The internet has been a boon to modern moms in many ways. It has provided stay-at-home moms with contact and communication with the outside world. It has practically created the work-at-home mom. And just as important, it has given moms a way to vent, to get real — often with hilarious results.

Primal Forces Brings Communion to Empire Stage

Theater collective Primal Forces’ new production, Communion, promises “emotional fireworks” and more, says artistic director and theater founder Keith Garsson. Sparks will fly among the disparate characters: a lesbian psychiatrist, her alcoholic mother, and her evangelical daughter, each hooked on her own ardent and oppositional beliefs.

Fort Lauderdale Fringe Festival Lets Theater Geeks Get Weird

A ’90s-inspired sing-along van ride with the “Fringy Mime Queen.” A one-man show about the complete history of drag. An epic battle among giants in a town called Normal. These are just some of the plays that will be showcased at the third-annual Fort Lauderdale Fringe Festival from April 20 to 23.

Dave Chappelle Is the Comedic Voice Trump’s America Deserves

In 2006, during an interview with Oprah Winfrey, Dave Chappelle told his onetime sketch-comedy target: “I was doing sketches that were funny but socially irresponsible. I felt like I was deliberately being encouraged, and I was overwhelmed. It’s like you’re being flooded with things and you don’t pay attention to things like your ethics.”

Hamilton Is Finally Coming to South Florida

South Florida fans of the insanely popular musical Hamilton have felt snubbed this year. The touring production announced visits to metro areas such as Salt Lake City and Des Moines but skipped Miami and Fort Lauderdale. The closest local Hamilfans could get was last month’s auditions held at Florida International University. Until now.

Improv U Offers Opportunity for Everyone

Who doesn’t like to laugh? Possibly the only thing better than laughing is making someone else laugh; unfortunately, the former is much easier to do than the latter. Some people are just born with comedic juices running through their bodies, while others need to work a little harder on their…

The Naked Magic Show: Sleeves Up, Pants Down at the Broward Center

Growing up in Brisbane, Australia, Mike Tyler never imagined he’d be performing in front of sold-out crowds across North America. Naked. After packing venues throughout Australia, Hong Kong, and New Zealand, The Naked Magic Show is making its way to the Broward Center for the Performing Arts on its first…

David Sedaris Brings His Hilarious Storytelling to the Parker Playhouse

The world is filled with long-winded storytellers and boring status updates about babies and dinner. Unless you’re Keith Richards, Ozzy Osbourne, Richard Branson, or some other filthy-rich British person, there’s a good chance your life is pretty mundane. Still, there are the rare few who can take a seemingly unexceptional…

The Ten Best Stages Shows in Broward and Palm Beach of 2015

When assessing 2015’s best productions in Broward and Palm Beach counties, it has to start with Maltz Jupiter Theatre’s Les Miserables. After the debacle of Tom Hooper’s 2012 film adaptation, director Mark Martino restored the epic musical to its glorious perch near the top of the international musical canon, from…

Bug Brilliantly Burrows Into a Heart of Conspiratorial Darkness

The first example of intrusive sound in Bug opens when the play does: A telephone rings inside a squalid motel room in Oklahoma, but there’s nobody on the line. There’s never anybody on the line. Sometime later, a persistent cheep resounds across the room — a smoke alarm that seems…

Technical Issues Hamper The Last Five Years

Jason Robert Brown’s off-Broadway hit The Last Five Years is both an ecstatic celebration of love and a bone-scraping anatomy of a divorce. It all happens in about 90 minutes, ingeniously structured as a showcase for two actors and conveyed through expository songs with a minimum of dialogue. Running at…

Daniel’s Husband at Island City Is a Masterpiece

South Florida playwright Michael McKeever’s latest work, Daniel’s Husband, is a comedy; then it’s a tragedy. It warms hearts and then breaks them, leaving in its wake a foundation-rattling cautionary tale about the necessity of marriage equality that might be the most momentous play he’s ever written. Under Andy Rogow’s…

The Consul’s Jason Ferrante Brings Opera to South Florida

The Florida Grand Opera’s (FGO) 2014-15 season comes to a close with a production of Gian Carlo Menotti’s The Consul, a modern opera in three acts. First performed in 1950, Menotti’s first full-length opera is a study on the causalities of political dissidence upon a family. Leading the drama is…