Joann Green Breuer

Theater Review Roundup: Taking in London Stages

March 9, 2011
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Reviews of eight stage productions in London, with two terrific shows noted: American dramatist Bruce Norris’s powerful study of racial relations, Clybourne Park, and Alan Ayckbourn’s 1980 farce Season’s Greetings. Another winner on the West End, the critically acclaimed War Horse, comes to New York next week. By Joann Green Breuer Penelope by Enda Walsh…

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Film Review: Shakespeare’s “Tempest,” Technologically Enhanced

December 19, 2010
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Julie Taymor’s film version of William Shakespeare’s The Tempest is conclusive proof that just because we can do something with technology does not mean that we should. Less is often more, and one great text in hand is worth a dozen computers in the mix. And what was the director thinking with the racist portrayal…

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Theater Review: HD Hamlet — Determined Relevance

December 11, 2010
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Royal National Theatre Director Nicholas Hytner is determined to make the drama as relevant to our own times as to the Bard’s. The setting is a somewhat flimsy, gray-walled salon. Theatrical apparatuses are visible: a klieg light here, a fresnel there. Hamlet by William Shakespeare. Staged by the Royal National Theatre, London, England. Taped by…

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Fuse Film Clips: Focus on the Boston Jewish Film Festival, Final Films

November 15, 2010
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A Jewish film festival is at heart a communal event, even longer than Hanukkah. If one needs proof of community, see who the sponsors are. By Joann Green Breuer. My final film of this year’s Boston Jewish Film Festival was The Girl from a Reading Primer, directed by Edyta Wroblewska in Poland. It is short…

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Short Film Reviews: A Focus on The Boston Jewish Film Festival [2x Updated]

November 10, 2010
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And so I go, Jewish and glad to be, theatre director—maybe between gigs, old enough to believe that movies are best on the big screen among other (quiet) viewers and that you don’t have to be Jewish to love good Jewish movies. By Joann Green Breuer The danger of speaking critically of any ethnic art…

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Book Review: Mamet’s Minimal-Minded ‘Theatre’

May 13, 2010
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Theatre by David Mamet. Faber and Faber, 157 pages, $22 Reviewed By Joann Green Breuer David Mamet’s concise and consistently frustrating book, Theatre, informs even while it infuriates, arguing for throwing out babes with the bath water as if theatre could, or should, make a splash without them. Get your towels out. But as you…

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