Admittedly I'm a Sondheim junkie. I confess that he's my favorite American musical theater composer/lyricist. Perhaps it is my English degree that digs through his metaphors, or that fact that I'm partial to strings in an orchestra, but either way, he's my hetero man crush. What's not to admire about someone who has won multiple Tony Awards, a Pulitzer Prize, an Academy Award, and did I mention the Grammy?

It was with great excitement that I headed over to Ferguson Center to see the Virginia Symphony Orchestra (VSO) perform on Friday the 13th (wooooo): April 13th, 2007 at 10:30 am.  And who wouldn’t be excited, I was getting the opportunity to hear one of the top 40 classical hits of all times: Mussorgsky’s Pictures at an Exhibition.  Though I walked away impressed, it was not Pictures that was the highlight of the morning.

The first time I heard the name “The Painted Lady” (about five years ago, I guess) I thought it was a tattoo parlor. I kid you not. Since then I, and the rest of Hampton Roads, have obviously learned that it’s a lovely English tearoom. It has received tons of awards and reviews already, but from what I can tell, everyone’s always talking about their dinners. Well gosh darn it, I’m gonna talk about their lunch. And their tea.

The crusty Christie is back, and this time…she’s ….well the same thing she always is.  It’s Agatha Christie, a favorite of high schools and Little Theaters everywhere.  You already know the story, a few people, stuck somewhere, get bumped off one by one until the person you least suspect for doing it is caught.  Admittedly this is not one of my favorite types of theater so I have to ask myself why is this show still running in London?  Perhaps getting there is half the fun…I mean, you do have to figure out whodunit.  So you’d better pay attention, because the clues are hard to catch from this cast at the Little Theatre of Norfolk. 

Eugene Ionesco is often considered a “love him or hate him” kind of playwright. Whether or not this is true, after Regent University’s An Evening of Ionesco, I have come to the conclusion that Ionesco is at least not for the faint of heart. Nor for the weak of bladder.

“Off the Top” is a comedy improv show that models itself after the popular television series, “Whose Line Is It Anyway?”. Coming from an acting background, it sounds like a lot of fun to participate in the improv games they do on TV. And, honestly, it seemed that the actors at the 40th Street Stage were having a ball. They were loud, they were confident, they were laughing and carrying on. They had a great time. I did not.

Vulgar Little Theatre Company presents what could be called an extreme bastardization of Moliere's play The Doctor In Spite of Himself at 40th Street Stage.  The play by Moliere (if you want to still call it that) has been adapted by Frankie Little Hardin and leaves you with 'little' of Moliere.