Players' Ring

Latest Articles

Welles + Olivier spar, commiserate at Players’ Ring

Aging dreams
How does a star negotiate a changing age?
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | September 28, 2011

Review: Generic Theater takes on Havel's tale of an intellectual amid revolution

Brainy burdens
In these days of ongoing revolution, many are drawn to look back to protest and uprisings of the past.
By BY MEGAN GRUMBLING | April 13, 2011

Review: A Streetcar Named Desire at the Players' Ring

The Williams masterwork, in Portsmouth
Fairly or not, my most immediate association with A Streetcar Named Desire tends to be Brando and his inimitable mournful bellow.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | January 05, 2011

By | January 01, 0001

Review: Rolling Die gets Closer

How close is too close?
The relativity of truth is one of the enduring problems of the last half-century, and it is particularly gray and dangerous in Patrick Marber's 1996 drama Closer .
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | November 11, 2010

Review: Summer Blink

Lovemaking, confrontations, and unanswered calls
If autumn and your imminent mid-30s are starting make you feel too sluggish, static, or reasonable, you might consider viewing Summer Blink , a new Seacoast-area movie that limns volatility and sexual curiosity circa age 18.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | October 20, 2010

Review: Steampunk at the Players' Ring

Metallic myths
Since they began gaining mass popularity in the '80s, the antique copper laser-guns, cog-studded corsets and alternate electronic empires of the steampunk genre have been buzzing the cultural circuitry ever more.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | October 06, 2010

Fall Theater Preview: Not quite Oklahoma!

August: Osage County + steampunk robots
Perhaps the most anticipated Maine premiere this season is the darkly caustic family apocalypse of August: Osage County (October 14-November 7), the much-lauded 2007 tragicomedy by Tracey Letts, to be produced by the GOOD THEATER .
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | September 15, 2010

By | January 01, 0001

Ending violence

It's much more of a struggle than we might think
V-Day is once more upon us, and for those not partial to Hallmark-driven capitalism, the V now also popularly stands for "Vagina" or "Victory," thanks to Eve Ensler's famous monologues about violence against women.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | February 10, 2010

Into new worlds

Theatrical journeys for the year ahead
The New Year opens with a duo of two-man, many-character comedies.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | December 30, 2009

Soft thrusts

Players’ Ring’s Master is a tease
Seeking the gore-porn stimulations of mutilations, leather, and fellatio to get your Halloween on? Well, Players’ Ring is offering severed fingers, wanton women with whips, and a very, very demanding master, not to mention a mordant punchline. Rolling Die Productions does it all in the spirit of the early 20th-century French horror spectacles of the Grand Guignol Theater.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | October 28, 2009

Mixin' it up

Fall's theater shows cover serious ground
First on my dance card this fall is the Good Theater's The Little Dog Laughed (September 17-October 11), a scathing comedy about Hollywood, a closeted actor's indiscretions with a hustler, and his agent's desperate clean-up duties.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | September 16, 2009

Catharsis + rebirth

Portland theater's losses and gains since 1999
My own backward gaze over the last decade of local theater only takes in the second half of it, so I've consulted a few veterans.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | September 16, 2009

More Bard, please

Lots of Shakespeare for summertime
The sultry season is soon upon us, and as always, it will bring area theater-goers such dependable balms as Shakespeare (both in and out of the park), classic musicals, and giddy misbehavior of various sorts. Between that manna and a few original productions, written and performed by local artists, we've got a rich season line-up.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | June 10, 2009

Don't get comfy

The Pain and the Itch is no cozy reunion
If you expect your own Thanksgiving to also include a helping of familial anxiety, rest assured that you have nothing on the relatives gathered in Bruce Norris's very black comedy, The Pain and the Itch .
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | November 26, 2008

Origins of a species

At Players’ Ring, taking stabs at the human order
In her excellent theatrical pairing for Daniel Productions at the Players’ Ring, billed as 2 x 2 x 2 , director Liz Korabek juxtaposes two modern takes on the human quintessence.
By MEGAN GRUMBLING | March 08, 2006