Arts, Briefly: Script Concerns Close ‘Ragtime’ Production

Citing concerns about racial sensibilities, officials of the Wilmette Park District in suburban Chicago have canceled a production of “Ragtime.”

ArtsBeat: Spoleto Italy: French Plays, Old and New, in Festival’s First Weekend

The Spoleto festival’s first weekend had a heavy dose of theater, with a Gallic complexion to it.

On London Stages, the Devil in Love’s Deep Blue Sea

When lovers meet on London’s stages this summer, the odds are it’s not violins they’re hearing. It’s alarm bells.

Theater Review: A ‘Forbidden’ Update With a Broad Appeal

The Gateway Playhouse’s absolutely first-rate production of “Forbidden Broadway” is in full swing.

Theater Review | ‘A Brush With Georgia O’Keeffe’: The Adventures of Georgia, Queen of the Desert Painting

The eager, animated actress-playwright Natalie Mosco tackles perhaps America’s first female superstar painter in “A Brush With Georgia O’Keeffe.”

Jozef Szajna, 86, Writer of Quiet Protest in Poland, Dies

Mr. Szajna was a playwright, set designer and theater director who through often nearly wordless productions evoked the beastliness of humanity and the oppressiveness of dictatorship.

Theater Review | ‘Superior Donuts’: So, How Would You Like Your Culture Clash? Joke-Filled or Sugar-Glazed?

Tracy Letts’s “August: Osage County” is a full theatrical meal. His new play, “Superior Donuts,” is a much less ambitious repast.

Arts, Briefly: Chicago Shows, Going and Coming

“Adding Machine” is closing and “The Strangerer” is opening.

Theater Review: Where King John Gets His on the 10-Yard Line

“The Complete Works of William Shakespeare (Abridged)” is the sort of thing that might be funny even if the 12-year-olds in your neighborhood performed it.

Not Your Mother’s Original-Cast Albums

The influence of rap and rock is being felt in a new crop of original-cast albums.