Theatre

The ‘Spike’ of life Theatre B closes with laughs and a look at family tension

April 8th, 2015

Spring brings another play into full bloom at downtown Fargo’s Theatre B next week – Christopher Durang’s “Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike,” a modern farce speckled with family tension.

Loaded with laughs and offering a look into sibling rivalries and caring for aging parents, “Vanya” offers plenty for audiences looking for entertainment, escape or introspection.

“If it’s not reason enough to come out and spend the night laughing until your gut hurts, (it is) to see…

One new opera, nine high C’s

April 1st, 2015

Photo by Abigail Maki

'Daughter of the Regiment’ sees its regional debut

For the Fargo-Moorhead Opera, the 2014 to 2015 season has seen new things all over.

From its new office on 25th Street South to staging its last show in a different venue, the company keeps shaking things up, and its season closer couldn’t prove this better. “Daughter of the Regiment,” a comic opera from 1840, makes its area premiere next weekend and embodies the phrase “ending on a high note.”

Nine high C’s in a tenor aria…

From ‘Judgment’ to ‘Jail’

March 11th, 2015

Karla Underdahl / Photo by G. Michael Jahnl

Tin Roof Theatre continues season of justice in Henry David Thoreau telling

Justice will always prevail, and for Tin Roof Theatre’s 10th season, justice is the prevalent theme.

Coming off of “Judgment at Nuremberg,” the courtroom drama detailing the post-WWII Nazi war crimes trials, Tin Roof explores similar themes with its season closer “The Night Thoreau Spent in Jail.” Chronicling the night that writer/philosopher Henry David Thoreau spent in a Concord, Mass., jail for…

Reuniting for ‘Run For Your Wife’

March 11th, 2015

Harwood Prairie Playhouse still going strong after 31 years

For the first time in 31 years, the Harwood Prairie Playhouse is doing something new. Well, kinda sorta.

The West Fargo theater company known for its annual farces isn’t putting on a different show this year, but rather digging into its past to present a farce for the second time. “Run For Your Wife” by Ray Cooney is presented as a reunion show, rounding up Harwood actors of the last 15 years.

Shanara Lassig is one of…

Major milestones for local comics Adam Quesnell and JD Provorse

March 4th, 2015

By Jay Rice

Adam Quesnell and JD Provorse, two long-time Fargo-Moorhead comics, take the stage this Thursday through Saturday at Courtney’s Comedy Club to lend some legitimacy to our local comedy scene. This is Adam’s first full headlining gig at Courtney's and JD will be recording his first comedy CD. Let’s learn more about them.

HPR: When and how did you get your start?

Adam Quesnell: I opened for Todd Barry in 2009, showing me that I knew nothing about stand-up, but wanted more.…

Making light what is dark

February 25th, 2015

A small-scale production takes on a comprehensive issue in Theatre NDSU’s performance run of the modern rock musical “Next to Normal.”

Facing the contemporary topics of mental illness and its effects on a family, the six-person show follows the Goodman family – father, mother, daughter and son – as mother Diana’s mental illness puts the family in a crisis. Director Lori Koenig hopes to start a conversation on the reality of mental illness and those living with it.

“This is…

Love story for anybody

February 25th, 2015

Revamped ‘Romi/eo and Juliet’ takes a transgender focus at MSUM

For centuries, “Romeo and Juliet” has remained as one of William Shakespeare’s most celebrated love stories.

But for Patrick Carriere, theater faculty at Minnesota State University Moorhead, the story has been one of the bard’s “most lightly treated” plays, leading Carriere to select a modernized update of the story for MSUM Theatre. The result: “Romi/EO & Juliet,” a retelling of Shakespeare’s text,…

Don’t fear ‘the woods’

February 19th, 2015

MTFM explores Sondheim’s metaphors and music in fairytale season closer

In a season themed with fairy tales, Music Theatre Fargo-Moorhead is pulling every one’s favorite characters and creatures together in an outing marked with fantasy, realism, music and metaphors.

Stephen Sondheim’s “Into the Woods” follows the musical theater master’s own couple of characters (a baker and his wife) as they meander through the woods with a wish of their own. All around them, other fairy…

Raising ‘Metal Children’

February 11th, 2015

Photo by Brianne Lee

Concordia College Theatre ‘pushes boundaries’ in adult-themed play

By Jack Dura

Concordia College Theatre cracks the can on adolescents in adult themes with its spring play, “The Metal Children” by Adam Rapp.

Based around a banned book in a small Pennsylvania town and the events that stem from it, “The Metal Children” tackles several social themes affecting adolescents and young adults.

“The play is significantly about censorship, authority … when is a person really an…

Fasten your seatbelts: ‘Boeing Boeing’ lands at The Stage for two weekends

February 4th, 2015

Fly away with the Fargo-Moorhead Community Theatre in a farce that’s picking up passengers the next two weekends.

Marc Camoletti’s “Boeing Boeing,” the most performed French play in the world, brings sky-high laughs in FMCT’s production, splitting a season with drama and musicals with a farce in February.

In the story, the womanizing Bernard thinks he can juggle his three foreign fiancees as their stewardess schedules on Boeing aircraft always keep two away whenever one is with…