All posts by Amanda N. Gunther

A full-time theatre reviewer in the Baltimore, Washington, and surrounding areas; Amanda holds a BFA in Acting from the University of Maryland Baltimore County as well as a minor in Creative Writing. Having spent two of her five years at college studying abroad at the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia, she has learned a great deal about improv, devised work theatre, and interpretive movement pieces. Striving to promote theatre of all types, she can often be found in a theatre of some type, even on her nights off.

Come And Meet Those Dancing Feet: Dueling Divas in 42nd Street at Scottfield Theatre Company- Katelyn Dixon as Peggy Sawyer

What was that word you just said? Havre de Grace? They’re offering you the chance to see the biggest musical the city’s seen in 20 years and you say— Havre de Grace? Now listen, readers, and listen good— cause you’re gonna wanna come on along and listen to— Scottfield Theatre Company as they present the splashy, flashy, big, lush, Broadway musical 42nd Street. And in a sit-down two-part interview session, we’ve got the show’s dueling divas answering some questions all about the production and their experiences!

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(L-R) Omar A. Said (Panch), Beth Amann (Rona Lisa), B.J. Robertson (Mitch), Taylor Litofsky (Logainne), Cera Baker (Marcy), Preston Grover (Chip), Sam Slottow (Leaf), Lila Cooper (Olive), and Stephen Emery (Barfée) in The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee, presented by Compass Rose Theater 📷

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee at Compass Rose Theater

Charming— (adjective) ‘Extremely pleasing or delightful.’ Compass Rose Theater is now producing the most charming production of The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee I think I can ever recall seeing— and that’s saying something as I’ve covered it over a dozen times in as many years, including just a month ago elsewhere! C-H-A-R-M-I-N-G. Directed & Choreographed by Tommy Malek with Musical Direction by Rachel Sandler, this feel-good, upbeat, absolutely adorable musical is perfectly parsed in the intimate staging space that Compass Rose Theater has at Maryland Hall;

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The Secret Garden at Woods Memorial Presbyterian Church 📷 Audrey Lengbeyer

The Secret Garden at Woods Memorial Presbyterian Church

Come spirit! Come charm! Come days that are warm! Come magical spell— they will help you get well! Come to their garden for the most extraordinary theatrical experience that is so stunning, so professional, and so polished you’ll find it hard to believe that it’s a community organization and playing in a church nonetheless! The Secret Garden now live in living color is appearing through the weekend of March 17th with the Woods Memorial Presbyterian Church and it is beyond remarkable,

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Jesus Christ Superstar at Third Wall Productions 📷 Kristin Rigsby

Jesus Christ Superstar at Third Wall Productions

Third Wall Productions, you know I love you. Did you see I waved? I believe in you and your show so tell me that I’m saved! If you’re ready to rock and roll along with the best of them, Third Wall Productions is bringing you that iconic Andrew Lloyd Webber musical Jesus Christ Superstar and it’s the most solid production that they’ve had so far! (In their new home at Chestnut Grove Presbyterian.) Directed by Mike Zellhofer,

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Local Limelight: Actor Paul Ballard on Jesus Christ Superstar at Third Wall Productions and Other Theatre Experiences

I dreamed I met a local thespian, a most amazing man. He had that look you rarely find— the happy, cheerful kind! So we’ll take some liberties with Lloyd-Webber’s lyrics to suit our story, but in the first of an on-going series entitled “Local Limelight” we bring to the table, Paul Ballard— an area actor who has been involved with theatre for over 20 years in the Baltimore community scene, and some several years prior to that with some decades of being a lawyer in-between.

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Finding Nemo Jr. at Children's Playhouse of Maryland. 📷 Peer Joy Images

Finding Nemo Jr. at Children’s Playhouse of Maryland

Just below the coral— sea parents dream of who their kids will be! And live on the stage of Children’s Playhouse of Maryland— you can see how wondrous these talented kids can be! Just as long as you— JUST KEEP SWIMMING, JUST KEEP SWIMMING, JUST KEEP SWIMMING! And you’d better swim fast if you want a chance at catching this production of Finding Nemo Jr.— several of the performances have sold out!

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Laughing Stock at Spotlighters Theatre 📷 Matthew Peterson

Laughing Stock at Spotlighters Theatre

Madness does not run through the theatre family; it gallops. With sardines. And while you’re certainly not going to get a gargantuan house on the postage stamp stage at The Audrey Herman Spotlighters Theatre, you can definitely get a hilariously good time with their current production of Charles Morey’s Laughing Stock. Mild to moderate insanity with a dash of ‘WTF’ all balled neatly into the nonsense that is the lifestyle we choose when we jump into the world of theatre.

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Looping Live: A Real-Time-Now-Transcribed Conversation with Director David Mendizábal on Mexodus’ debut at Baltimore Center Stage

Theatre is forever reinventing itself; telling stories, telling tales and expanding itself. New formats and phases, growing and showing— there’s so many new ways that the theatre keeps going. And this new format of a two-person, live-looping musical telling the story of the Underground Railroad and how it ventured south into Mexico is one of those new innovations. Appearing first at Baltimore Center Stage before it travels over to Mosaic Theatre in DC, Mexodus— a blended hip-hop history musical,

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Escape to Margaritaville at Tidewater Players 📷 Matthew Peterson

Escape to Margaritaville at Tidewater Players

Reset your mind to island time. Because it’s five o’clock somewhere. And for the next two weekends, it’s five o’clock in Havre de Grace as the Tidewater Players presents Jimmy Buffett’s Escape to Margaritaville. Directed by Dickie Mahoney, with Musical Direction by Chris Rose, and Choreography by Evyo (and tap-choreo by Bambi Johnson), this ‘throw-your-cares-away’ silly good time show is just what the doctor ordered in these chilly winter months. And if you really want to be on “island time”?

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Adrift: A Medieval Wayward Folly by Happenstance Theater 📷 L Hewitt Photography

Adrift at Happenstance Theater

As above— so below. From the profoundly deep to the oddly absurd, Adrift: A Medieval Wayward Folly, the latest live stage performance from Happenstance Theater, has it all. And also a strawberry. Appearing for a limited two-weekend engagement at Baltimore Theatre Project, this newly devised work comes the masterminds of Mark Jaster, Sabrina Mandell, Gwen Grastorf, Sarah Olmsted Thomas, and Alex Vernon, with their inspirations set ‘adrift’ on stage from the works of Hieronymus Bosch (amongst others) and will fill you with an oddly enlightened sense of wonderment,

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Dontrell, Who Kissed The Sea at Sisters Freehold

Dontrell, Who Kissed The Sea at Sisters Freehold

Dreams are dreams. Awake is awake. Know the difference. But if you don’t know— or don’t want to know? In stunningly beautiful narrative that blend magical realism with the burning yen to simultaneously connect one’s past to one’s future, Dontrell, Who Kissed The Sea is playing a limited engagement with Sisters Freehold currently at The Peale Museum for the next two weekends. This evocative coming-of-age journey, written by Nathan Alan Davis and directed by Makeima Elise Freeland,

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Nolan Almeida (left) as Peter Pan and Cody Garcia (center) as Captain Hook and Hawa Kamara (right) as Wendy and the cast of Peter Pan. 📷Matthew Murphy

Peter Pan at The Hippodrome

econd star to the right and straight on til— viral video ballroom waltzing? Shut the fort door, since when does Peter Pan have Wendy being obsessed with going viral so that she can help pay for her medical school training because she wants to grow up and be a surgeon?

~*~*~*ANGRY TINKLING & CHIMING NOISES*~*~*~

What was that, Tinker Bell? In the newly refurbished national tour launch production that’s leaping into the air with lovely thoughts straight out of Baltimore’s Hippodrome Theatre?

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Ms. Story’s Living History at Greenbelt Arts Center

Dreams don’t have to be deferred. They can grow and bloom; they can bring nourishment to the soul. The sentiment, if not the words exactly, of creator Shemika Renee in the setting the tone for her one-woman production of Ms. Story’s Living History, now appearing at the Greenbelt Arts Center through March 3rd, 2024. Directed by Rikki Howie Lacewell, this educational presentation explores important narratives of historical women of color, telling their stories to help unravel the mystery of history when all too often these stories are overlooked.

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The cast of Chesapeake Shakespeare Company’s The Oresteia. 📷 Kiirstn Pagan Photography.

The Oresteia at Chesapeake Shakespeare Company

Do I remember this? Or is this what’s about to happen? This is no dream. This is no vision. This is the truth. Profound words. Or are they questions? What are words if not questions? You’ll hear them over and over— though never truly in one voice as one might expect from a chorus in a Greek tragedy; their effect, however, is no less striking. Chesapeake Shakespeare Company presents The Oresteia freely adapted from Aeschylus by Ellen McLaughlin and directed by Lise Bruneau.

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The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee at Stand Up For...Theatre 📷Lilou Altman

The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee at Stand Up For…Theatre

COMMUNITY— noun. “a unified body of individuals such as: people with common interests living within a particular area broadly; a group of people with a common characteristic or interest; a body of persons with common interest scattered through a larger society; a group linked by a common policy.” Stand Up For…Theatre’s production of The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee is fostering a real sense of dedication and commitment to the local theatre community,

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Hello, Dolly! at The St. Demetrios Suburban Players

Hello, Dolly! at St. Demetrios Suburban Players

Out there! There’s a world outside of Carney! Way out there beyond this suburb, Barnaby! There’s a theatre, Barnaby! Out there! Full of shine and full of sparkle! The Suburban Players of Saint Demetrios’ are glistenin’, Barnaby! Listen, Barnaby! Put on your Sunday clothes— or your Saturday clothes or your Friday clothes— and get yourself down to Hello, Dolly now appearing at The Suburban Players of St. Demetrios’ Greek Orthodox Church before that parade passes you by!

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Eric Bray as Ja'far 📷 Matthew Peterson

Twisted: The Untold Story of a Royal Vizier at Street Lamp Community Theatre

No one mourns the Twisted.

No one cries they won’t return (…of Jafar, terrible movie. Just terrible.)

No one lays a Jasmin on their graaaave.

The good man scorns the Twisted.

Through their lives our children learn.

What we miss— when we misbehaaaave.

And goodness knows— the Twisted’s lives are zany!

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Rent at Iron Crow Theatre

Today4U Tomorrow 4 Iron Crow Theatre: An Interview with Artistic Director Sean Elias on Landing Rent at The M&T Bank Exchange Performance Space

In daylights, in sunsets, in midnight, in cups of coffee— in inches, in miles, in laughter, and strife!

The beautiful ephemeral nature of theatre is that it lingers on in our hearts long after the last curtain drops. And rarely do audiences get such an extraordinary chance to see a sold-out performance, which was so popular, it had to be extended. It had to be extended half-way across town to a brand new space!

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Aparna Sri (left) as Lady Macbeth and Jaki Demarest (right) as Macbeth 📷 Constantia Rioux

Macbeth at The Rude Mechanicals

“Such welcome and unwelcome things at once ‘tis hard to reconcile.” Macduff, ActIVsc.iii

I spent hours trying to find the way I felt about the current Rude Mechanical’s production of Shakespeare’s Macbeth only to have Billy Bard having already wrapped it up for me more than halfway through the show. This particular production is a balancing act of strong performances, questionable conceptualizations, impressive technological inclusions, mismatched aesthetics, and a barrage of death,

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Rob McClure as Euphegenia Doubtfire in Mrs. Doubtfire 📷 Joan Marcus

Mrs. Doubtfire at The Hippodrome

Wanted: Heart-warming, feel-good, fun-loving musical to fill the aching hole in the hearts of Baltimore after Sunday’s devastating upset at Raven’s stadium.

Helloooooo, Poppets!

Mrs. Doubtfire is exactly what this city needs to wake up, feel good, laugh and cry a little, and be made whole again! Coming in hot off the boards of Broadway, Rob McClure and the sensational singing, rapping, hip-hop-happening Scottish nanny is hear to take Charm City by hilarious and heartfelt storm.

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Kaitlyn Ruby (foreground) as Ruth and Amanda Harris (background) as Tillie in The Effects of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds at Spotlighters Theatre 📷Matthew Peterson

The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds at Spotlighters Theatre

Some people were born to speak, others just to listen. And occasionally those of us that listen will report back on what we hear. Form an opinion, as it were. It’s me. I’m a listening opinion-former. And I’m forming an opinion on the current production of The Effect of Gamma Rays on Man-in-the-Moon Marigolds, now playing at The Audrey Herman Spotlighters Theatre through February 4th 2024. The midway point of their 61st season,

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Season of WOW: An Interview with Ron Legler talking about the 2024/2025 Broadway Hippodrome Season

The sun’ll come out— TOMORROW! Bet your bottom dollar that tomorrow— they’ll be— A Lion!?

Charm City is packing its Bromo-Seltzer Arts District with some of the hottest tickets in town for the 2024/2025 Hippodrome Broadway Series, powered by CareFirst. With not one but TWO National Tour launches, compliments of some hard-earned tax-credits now working in the state of Maryland (by way of Governor Wes Moore and the Maryland State Legislature), several shows direct from Broadway (or in some cases— still currently on Broadway) and a whole bunch of fun for everyone,

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Witness For The Prosecution at Vagabond Players

Do you swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth? You can’t handle the truth! Though I might be mixing up my courtroom dramas as this one seemed to be skirting all around the truth, only revealing parts of the truth, and there was a lot of questionable truths floating in the ether. In true Agatha Christie style, Witness For the Prosecution splashes onto The Vagabond Players stage to kick of the 2024-leg of their 108th season.

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The cast of Girl From the North Country 📷 Evan Zimmerman for Murphymade

Girl From The North Country at The Kennedy Center

Inspiration comes in dreams. Or maybe the answer, my friend, is blowing in the wind. Be it fever dream or disjointed wind that blows you into The Kennedy Center this December holiday season, you’re in for something a bit unusual when it comes to the National Touring production of Girl From the North Country. Now playing in The Eisenhower Theatre through new year’s eve, this ‘jukebox musical’ (and I use that term very,

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Pat McPartlin (left) as Santa Claus, with Talis Tighe (center) as Mac Adamia, and Josh Handal (far right) as Felix Navi-Dodd in 'Murder on 34th Street' 📷ANG Pix

Murder On 34th Street at Do or Die Productions

They’ve lived to kill another day! After a tumultuously ubiquitous 30th Anniversary Season, Do Or Die Productions has landed steadily in their Monday Night Mystery venue— Perry’s Restaurant of Odenton— and is thrilling and killing just in time for Christmas! Making its world-premiere, new script Murder on 34th Street, written and directed by the company’s founder, CJ Crowe, is— as the tag-line promises— a killer show with a dinner to die for!

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Phil Gallagher in A Christmas Carol at Spotlighters Theatre 📷 Matthew Peterson

A Christmas Carol at Spotlighters Theatre

Of all the blithe sounds you’ll hear this holiday season, tis none merrier than that of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, performed in near-entirety by Phil Gallagher as a one-man endeavor at Spotlighters Theatre. For its third year running, this solo-performer adaptation of the iconic Christmas classic holds its own against the 400 other productions of the Dickensian money-maker this time of year. Adapted for the stage by Sherrionne Brown and Phil Gallagher,

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Elf at Tidewater Players 📷 Matthew Peterson

Elf at Tidewater Players

If you find yourself short on cheer just think about that special year (no, not 2019 that was a different year…same story) that Tidewater Players reached up on their shelf…and put up on their stage a musical called Elf! It’s sparkle-jolly-jingle-twinkly! Or however it goes (this Christmas Grinch over here still hasn’t finished writing out her Christmas cards…) but however it goes— it goes with lots of razzle-dazzle seasonal pizzazz! Elf at Tidewater Players is a heart-warming,

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Moulin Rouge! at The Hippodrome

Hello, Chickens!!! Are you ready to experience the epicenter of your passions? The apogee of your desires? Of course you are, you radiant reprobates and rascals!

Truth

Beauty

Freedom

Love

They’ve got it all in Montmartre— it’s all there to titillate the senses, tease the mind, sway the heartstrings— it’s all there inside The Moulin Rouge! And Moulin Rouge has landed itself grandly at Baltimore’s Hippodrome Theatre for a limited two-week engagement just in time for the holiday season.

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Neverland: A New Musical at Children’s Playhouse of Maryland

What if you can’t remember the last time you were able to let go, have fun, and just be yourself? Well isn’t that exactly what theatre is for? A place to let go, have fun, and just be yourself! And Children’s Playhouse of Maryland has always been that place for all of the up-and-coming theatrical talents that pass through their doors over in Essex. Celebrating the holiday season with a very special, brand-new-production (written and conceived by their musical director and her father) Children’s Playhouse of Maryland is thrilled to present Neverland: A New Musical.

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L to R, Front to Back - Alix Fenhagen, Britt Olsen-Ecker, Molly Margulies, Hailey Withrow, Jem Creuzter; Meghan Stanton, Heather Morrison 📷 Kiirstn Pagan

The Lights Went Out Because of a Problem: A Found Opera at The Acme Corporation

Merriam-Webster defines the word Opera as a noun— “…a drama set to music and made up of vocal pieces with orchestral accompaniment and orchestral overtures and interludes.” Merriam-Webster also defines theatre as— well, a whole lot, see here for yourself, but the one I like the best is definition 5b— Spectacle sense— 1a (dramatic or theatrical quality or effectiveness) followed by 5c— entertainment in the form of a dramatic or diverting situation or series of events.

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