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About Last Night

Terry Teachout on the arts in New York City

The best theater of 2015

December 18, 2015 by Terry Teachout

107083Today’s Wall Street Journal contains my best-theater-of-2015 column. Among those present:

Best ensemble. I’ve yet to see a more consistently fine group of actors than the five women who appeared in Danai Gurira’s “Eclipsed,” which just ended its run at the Public Theater and is bound for Broadway next March with the original cast intact….

Best revival of a modern play. Chicago’s TimeLine Theatre Company outdid itself with Arthur Miller’s “The Price,” directed with quiet tautness by Louis Contey and featuring the the 91-year-old Mike Nussbaum, who grows younger by the year….

Playwright of the year. Katori Hall nailed the honors for 2015 with a premiere, “The Blood Quilt” at Washington’s Arena Stage, and a revival, Lyric Stage’s Boston production of “Saturday Night/Sunday Morning.” I rank her next to Amy Herzog as the top up-and-comer among under-40 playwrights….

You can probably guess which show I picked as best musical, but to see my other picks and runners-up, including the best play, director, and company of 2015, go here.

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Terry Teachout

Terry Teachout, who writes this blog, is the drama critic of The Wall Street Journal and the critic-at-large of Commentary. In addition to his Wall Street Journal drama column and his monthly essays … [Read More...]

About

About “About Last Night”

This is a blog about the arts in New York City and the rest of America, written by Terry Teachout. Terry is a critic, biographer, playwright, director, librettist, recovering musician, and inveterate blogger. In addition to theater, he writes here and elsewhere about all of the other arts--books, … [Read More...]

About My Plays and Opera Libretti

Billy and Me, my second play, received its world premiere on December 8, 2017, at Palm Beach Dramaworks in West Palm Beach, Fla. Satchmo at the Waldorf, my first play, closed off Broadway at the Westside Theatre on June 29, 2014, after 18 previews and 136 performances. That production was directed … [Read More...]

About My Podcast

Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I are the panelists on “Three on the Aisle,” a bimonthly podcast from New York about theater in America. … [Read More...]

About My Books

My latest book is Duke: A Life of Duke Ellington, published in 2013 by Gotham Books in the U.S. and the Robson Press in England and now available in paperback. I have also written biographies of Louis Armstrong, George Balanchine, and H.L. Mencken, as well as a volume of my collected essays called A … [Read More...]

The Long Goodbye

To read all three installments of "The Long Goodbye," a multi-part posting about the experience of watching a parent die, go here. … [Read More...]

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