Over the course of 30 years in Rajiv Joseph's two-hander Gruesome Playground Injuries, childhood friends Kayleen (Irene Hamilton) and Doug (Jimmy Bartlebaugh) both suffer more than their share of scrapes, bruises, and near-fatal events. The pair's complicated friendship likewise encounters a few close calls in their lifelong shared journey of hurt and healing.
Alternately brooding and lighthearted, the play hovers between heartfelt coming-of-age drama, star-crossed romance, and persistent gallows humor surrounding Kayleen and Doug's preponderance of painful, sometimes gruesome, ills and injuries.
If you've known a true sociopath, it's likely you'll recognize the type among the three hyper-ambitious grad students in Aurin Squire's wicked new comedy My Favorite Sociopath.
Making its world premiere at the venerable Contemporary American Theater Festival, in Shepherdstown, West Virginia -- in a solid production directed by Céline Rosenthal -- the play pits the three aspiring journalists against each other for a plum job at a newspaper. And the competition gets dirty.
The tactics used by one or more of them to steal an advantage might be described as amoral. Their behavior could certainly be seen as sociopathic.
Former Disney star Geno Segers has left the new Broadway cast of Hadestown, following backlash over social media videos in which he mocked transgender people and dismissed claims that their rights are under attack.
Segers, who previously starred in the Disney XD sitcom Pair of Kings, was set to play Hades, god of the underworld, in the hit musical. According to the Broadway and community theater publication OnStage Blog, Segers had posted several videos to his social media channels with titles including "TRANS FAIRNESS?", "NO MORE TRANS?" and "HE...I MEAN SHE BROKE THE RECORD."
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