Can I Say Yes to That Dress is a brand new play, written in two exceptional creative bursts ten years apart, which Salt Lake audiences are fortunate to have premiered at a moment in time when love and laughter are welcome distractions. While it sprints through five hundred […]
Politics and religion are topics to avoid during polite conversation, but today, most would also add marriage to the list. Before the middle of the last century, marriage was an assumed part of life after a certain age, but now, depending on your generation, there’s a broad spectrum […]
It has been almost five years since playwright Shawn Fisher first ventured into Utah’s theater scene with his play Do Not Hit Golf Balls Into Mexico at the Salt Lake Acting Company. It began as two performances on a minimal set. “I admire [SLAC’s] commitment to developing new work and […]
Once upon a time, stories told through theater resonated with audiences because they explored uncomfortable yet real themes, but this power has been diminished by the popularity of theatrical productions with fairy-tale endings where love conquers all and conflicts are ultimately wrapped up in a tidy, sugar-coated […]
I had forgotten she plays the drums. Or that she once wrote the Itty Bitty Salt Lake City feature for the Deseret News. Amazing what you discover while researching a piece on someone you thought you already knew a lot about. Elaine Jarvik is a woman of numerous […]
Early in Salt Lake Acting Company’s production of “Streetlight Woodpecker,” the protagonist Benji (played by Stefan Espinosa) mistakes the pecking of a neighborhood woodpecker for the sound of distant machine-gun fire. Benji, who has just returned from active duty with debilitating injuries, struggles to readjust to his hometown […]
The premise is unalluring: a smartly dressed, middle-aged woman stands in front of the audience and recounts the struggles of caring for a parent with Alzheimer’s. Yet an emotionally taut performance by April Fossen; a sharp, engaging script by Steve Yockey; and the fairy-tale interludes of Glen and […]
Lighting adds a lot to a play and it simply wasn’t there opening night at Salt Lake Acting Company’s world premiere of Elaine Jarvik’s “Two Stories.” There were two interruptions in the production due to a blown fuse before it was decided that, well, the show must go […]
The theatre lights dim and the stage transforms into a world where the audience forgets actors, costumes, and lighting. Transfixed onlookers are given a reprieve from their daily lives as captivating characters quickly become familiar friends. Plot seems to vanish as seamless storytelling weaves scenes that are more […]
