By SHARON EBERSON
So much Pittsburgh theater, so little time is among my top picks for the subtitle of my theater-going life. A good overall title might be: “There’s No Business Like Covering Show Business.”
Combine those two, and you understand that the joy of a “Best Of” lists is the opportunity to look back on fond memories of the year. However, they also serve as reminders of all that I’ve missed.
I did not make it to Broadway and I rarely ventured beyond the city limits in a year when I had several eye surgeries, although I made it to single productions at South Park Theatre, Stage 62 and Little Lake Theatre. (Support your local theater, folks!)
I don’t include university productions here, although I attended several. How lucky, we are, to have professional-quality drama departments where future stars are launched. There were, however, some exceptional professional roles filled by current students, such as Isabella Campos (Carnegie Mellon Class of 2023) in City Theatre’s Somewhere Over the Border, and cast members of City’s current show, Miss Bennet: Christmas at Pemberley.
Performer recognition will be limited to Pittsburghers or those with strong local ties, so you won’t find, say, Darius de Haas, Keziah John-Paul and music director Matthew Whitaker of Pittsburgh Public Theater’s world-premiere event Billy Strayhorn: Something to Live For, although surely they would be here otherwise. Likewise, Roosevelt Watts Jr. in Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company’s annual August Wilson offering, Joe Turner’s Come and Gone, or Najah Hetsberger in Once on This Island and much of the cast of Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of !812 for Pittsburgh CLO. Then there was Ethan Riordan in CLO Cabaret’s tick, tick … BOOM!, Amara Granderson in the Public’s A Midsummer Night’s Dream in Harlem … I could go on and on.
However, there’s so much that is strictly local to highlight, that I’ll try to stay focused.
So let’s get to it.
BEST OF PITTSBURGH THEATER 2023
INDIVIDUAL PERFORMANCE
(Image: Heather Mull)
Treasure Treasure (Hamlet, Quantum Theatre) – Treasure was dream casting, in an unforgettable, tough and touching performance, set against a stunning Carrie Furnaces backdrop.
Karla Payne (Chicken & Biscuits and American Menu, New Horizon Theater; Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and Pyramid Builders, Pittsburgh Playwrights) – From the Payne-quake that shook Chicken & Biscuits alone, Payne should make any year-end “best of” list.
Patrick Jordan (American Buffalo, barebones productions) – The barebones founder and leader has been after the role of Teach for a long, long time, and he and his epic mustache made the most of it.
Sam Turich (The Devil Is a Lie, Hamlet, Quantum) – Two very different shows, two devilishly nuanced roles (and, for those of us who attended the Three Rivers Film Festival, Turich was perfectly unlikeable as Bruce Ismay, in the Pittsburgh-filmed Unsinkable).
Dan Mayhak (Merrily We Roll Along, Front Porch; The Flying Lovers of Vitebsk, Quantum) – It’s hard to single out one performer from either of these lovingly presented musical productions, but taken together, it was a stellar year for Mayhak.
Dan Mayhak, Catherine Kolos and Nathaniel Yost.
(Image: Deana Muro)
NOTEWORTHY: Catherine Kolos and Nathaniel Yost (Merrily); Chad Elder, Falsettos (Front Porch); Isabella Campos, Somewhere Over the Border (City Theatre); Lara Hayhurst, Who’s Holiday! (CLO Cabaret); Charles Timbers, The Bluegrass Mile (Playwrights); Jeff Howell and Allan Snyder, Anything Goes (Pittsburgh CLO); Milky White puppeteer Lu Zielinski, Into the Woods (Pittsburgh CLO).
WORTH NOTING: Pittsburgh CLO’s summer season included multiple featured roles for local artists including Brady D. Patsy, Kylie Edwards, Christine Laitta and Melessie Clark, and Billy Mason came to the rescue for tick, tick … BOOM! when Patsy suffered a broken leg. Brenden Peifer, Richard McBride, Hope Anthony and Saige Smith were among those seen in featured roles on Pittsburgh stages.
PRODUCTIONS & ENSEMBLES
MUSICALS
of Billy Strayhorn: Something to Live For. (Image: Michael Henninger)
Billy Strayhorn: Something to Live For (Pittsburgh Public) – The beautifully realized world premiere tribute to a local jazz legend, with a starry cast and creative team, deserves a life beyond Pittsburgh. Sadly, illness to the show’s star forced the cancellation of a chunk of shows. In another first, the Public, which had recorded Strayhorn for the Steamland classroom service, invited ticket-holders to watch the film at the O’Reilly.
Merrily We Roll Along and Falsettos (Front Porch) – Mayhak, Kolos and Yost led a stellar Merrily, directed with clarity and depth by Daina Michelle Griffith, while Elder, Sal Bucci, Jenna Kantor & Co. excelled in a revitalized Falsettos, directed by Rob James.
Somewhere Over the Border (City Theatre) – A tight cast of newcomers and veterans took us on Brian Quijada’s musical journey, with the poignancy of a family separation and the urgency of illegal immigration.
Once on This Island (Pittsburgh CLO) – All of the CLO summer-season shows were produced just for their 2023 runs at the Benedum Center, and this Flaherty-Ahrens gem more than made up for the COVID-canceled tour.
Natasha, Pierre and the Great Comet of 1812 (PIttsburgh CLO) – The summer season was all made in Pittsburgh, and this show announced itself with a grand, modern display and striking artwork. It also took an immersive Broadway musical and transferred it beautifully to a proscenium.
PLAYS
Hamlet (Quantum Theatre) – Director Jeffrey Carpenter, working with a tight adaptation by Karla Boos, steered a revelatory reimagining of one of the best-known plays in the English language. The large, foreboding Tony Ferrieri set, itself dwarfed by a Carrie Furnaces ruin, was an additional character in the perfectly populated drama.
The Devils is a Lie (Quantum) – Of the three Quantum productions in 2023, the immersive production at the Frick Building, Downtown, took a big risk with technology and it paid off, engaging the audience (and their smartphones) in new and compelling ways. The drama was directed by Kyle Haden, whose very busy year finished with a flourish, a holiday show for City Theatre.
American Buffalo (barebones productions) – Jordan, Peifer and David Whalen jelled as a trio of spiraling small-time crooks, who get a hard lesson in found-family values. The Ferrieri set was not only a believable shop environment, it also gave the illusion of depth leading to the outside world.
Joe Turner’s Come and Gone and The Bluegrass Mile (Pittsburgh Playwrights Theater Company) – Performances of plays by August Wilson and PPTC’s Mark Clayton Southers form a bridge from the late, great playwright to his present-day disciplel The Joe Turner cast moved seamlessly from the August Wilson House outdoor stage to Southers’ Madison Arts Center, as weather dictated, and it was off to the races in the renovated former elementary school, home to the striking premiere of Southers’ The Bluegrass Mile, an insight into Black jockeys who dominated horse racing at the turn of the 20th century.
Native Gardens (City) – In this spirited and smart comedy, designer Tony Ferrieri’s side-by-side, seemingly full-scale backyards put us right in the flower beds of a feud between neighboring couples — Cotter Smith and Laurie Klatscher, and Juan River Lebron and Evelyn Hernandez.
NOTEWORTHY III: A Christmas Story: The Play and Steel Magnolias (Pittsburgh Public); Into the Woods (Pittsburgh CLO); Once (Pittsburgh Musical Theater); Native Gardens (City); Chicken & Biscuits (New Horizon).
JESSICA NEU’s TOP PICKS of 2023
Throughline Theatre Company’s Living News Festival was a profound exploration into local crises, and used theater as a space to spark a conversation with someone as young as my 6-year-old son about injustices in our community.
Moulin Rouge! and Tina: A Tina Turner Musical were standouts among the touring productions in the PNC Broadway in Pittsburgh Series. The sheer talent onstage was unparalleled in my experience, not to mention the extraordinary staging, art direction and choreography.
BOB HOOVER’s TOP PICKS of 2023
Quantum’s Hamlet, Pittsburgh Playwrights Joe Turner’s Come and Gone , barebones The Sound Inside, Public Theater’s Native Gardens, Riverfront Theater’s Assassins.
Elsewhere: Stratford Shakespeare Festival Rent, Shaw Festival On the Razzle.
GEORGE HOOVER’S TOP PICK of 2023 (No relation to Bob!)
The Greater Pittsburgh Performing Arts Scene! Looking back at our listings, I counted over three hundred and fifty theater, opera, dance and classical music events in 2023. Folks, the ‘burgh is not just eds, meds and sports – Pittsburgh is a performing arts town!
And we can’t say goodbye to 2023 without mentioning …
- The Benedum Center’s new LED marquee (above) arrived in December, while the fully revitalized outdoor displays await an official welcome.
- The grand revamping and unveiling of the Greer Cabaret & Lounge and Theater Square Box Office.
- Pittsburgh Playwrights moved into its new home in the Upper Hill, the Madison Arts Center, and named the center’s theater after hometown actor Carter Redwood.
- Billy Porter brought his Black Mona Lisa concert tour to Heinz Hall, and he was a producer for the Public’s Billy Strayhorn musical.
- New Horizon Theater announced that it will spend a full season at the Public’s O’Reilly Theater.
- Hans and Virginia Gruenert said goodbye to Pittsburgh and off the WALL Productions. (Clarification: The Gruenerts remain active in the Pittsburgh art scene with financial support of Carnegie Stage, offering individual artists and small theater groups a home to showcase their work. off the WALL said goodbye to Pittsburgh, focusing on producing new plays in
New York City and Iceland.) - Andrew Paul’s Kinetic Theatre was on the move, to the University of Pittsburgh’s Rauh Theater with the electric Every Brilliant Thing.
- The Public, Pittsburgh Filmmakers and local unions launched Create PA, a training program for behind the scenes crew members in theater and film.
- Season’s Readings: 2023 saw the continuation of City Theatre’s annual Momentum Festival, and added live new-play reading series by the Public, the new PICT (now Pittsburgh International Classic Theatre), and Prime Stage Theater.
- Point Park University named Kiesha Lalama managing and artistic director of the Pittsburgh Playhouse.
- From Zoom to production: Alec Silberblatt’s Tell-Tale Heart at the Public. From Spark (at CLO) to production: Somewhere Over the Border at City.
- There were COVID-related delays and cancellations in 2023, and attracting audiences to pre-shutdown numbers remains a challenge. However, there were some positive signs to be celebrated. The long-delayed tour of Moulin Rouge! finally made it to Pittsburgh and did not disappoint, and the pre-Broadway tour of The Wiz brought out first-year Pittsburgh Cultural Trust president and CEO Kendra Whitlock Ingram and Mayor Ed Gainey with a welcoming proclamation.
- Finally, cheers, as always, to the unsung heroes of theater: stage managers, ensemble members, orchestra pit musicians, understudies, swings and front-of-house guides.
Categories: Arts and Ideas, Feature Stories, Our Posts
Correction: Hans & Virginia Gruenert still are active in the Pittsburgh art scene with their financial support of Carnegie Stage, offering individual artists and small theater groups a home to showcase their work.
off the WALL productions said good bye to Pittsburgh, focusing on producing new plays in
New York City and Iceland.
Thank you so much for the recognition. I’m honored! 🥹😊