Reviews for touring company Performances
Review: The Great Gatsby by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on March 18, 2026
The touring GREAT GATSBY goes for glitter and rom-com, discarding the inconvenient themes and issues that made Fitzgerald's novel great.
F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel The Great Gatsby had its 100th anniversary just last year and the media focused on the fact that it is still being taught in schools. The most recent of its many adaptations is Baz Luhrmann's treatment in the film starring Leonardo DiCaprio that grossed more than $350 million worldwide. So, it's no surprise that the Broadway musical is distinctly inspired by the film’s aesthetic. The 2023 musical features music and lyrics …
Review: Hadestown by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on February 26, 2026
The second national tour may be Hadestown Lite, but it 's still an entertaining night of theater.
I last reviewed Hadestown in 2022, and I was quite enthusiastic, writing, “Let us thank the gods for Hadestown! Here is a production that has a devout appreciation for live music in its heart!” It is important to note that was the first touring production of it I saw, so last week I was quite excited to revisit this work. Hadestown had a long journey to get to the most recent Bass Concert Hall performances. …
Review: SIX, the musical by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on January 24, 2026
SIX of them. Diva queens, fast and funny, sometimes hard to follow, deliver goose-bump-inspiringly musical performances to create the soundtrack for thousands of future sleepovers.
Like most touring shows, SIX, created by Toby Marlow and Lucy Moss, is a powerhouse production with a giant fan following and a slew of awards including Tonys for Best Costume Design in a Musical and Best Original Score (Music and Lyrics). Marlow and Moss wrote SIX during their final year at Cambridge to offer at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe. Inspired in part by a Beyoncé performance, Marlow proposed a retelling of the lives of …
Review: The Look of Love by touring company
by David Glen Robinson
Published on January 19, 2026
Mark Morris has always known what the world needs now, and this evening of innovative dance to Burt Bacharat's music is his latest monument of U.S. dance.
The Look of Love, choreographer Mark Morris’s long-touring dance and music show, is a monument of popular music and postmodern contemporary dance. The show, presented one night only at the Bass Concert Hall, the main facility of Texas Performing Arts on the UT Austin campus, amazed us with its artistic directness, and dances set to iconic works of popular music. The show was based in simplicity—walking paces, repeated arm gestures, straightforward entrances and exits---the kind …
Review: Beauty and the Beast by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on December 12, 2025
The touring version of Beauty and the Beast is Disney comfort food: tamiliar, targeted, and as comforting as fresh baked chocolate chip cookies.
Beauty and the Beast is a beloved Disney fan favorite that despite the addition of a few new songs does not stray very far from the original animated film. Like many Disney properties, the words “beloved” and “fan favorite” do not go nearly far enough. Just saying the title of this piece will get you the question, which one? Based on a 1740 fairy tale written by Gabrielle-Suzanne Barbot de Villeneuve (later revised and published …
Review: The Outsiders by touring company
by Brian Paul Scipione
Published on November 02, 2025
It was great. Truly entertaining, fast-pced, familiar, a story flowing fast and loose. Solid performances by an energetic young cast.
The Tulsa Race Massacre happened on May 31st and June 1st, 1921. Thirty-five square blocks of the neighborhood known as "Black Wall Street" were destroyed, thirty-nine Black people were killed and more than eight hundred were hospitalized. Approximately six thousand were imprisoned in detention camps. This event cast a long shadow over the city that a sixteen-year-old Susan Eloise Hinton began writing about in 1965. Hers was a world of deep-seated segregation, gang violence, parental …