On October 29th, Robert Sanford Brustein died at his home in Cambridge, Massachusetts. His journey to prominence in the theatre began in Brooklyn on April 21, 1927. Throughout his long life (96 years), he battled the theatrical establishment and founded two not-for-profit, professional theatre companies associated with two of America’s leading universities, Yale and Harvard.

The musical theatre lost one of its great lyricists this past week Sheldon Harnick at the age of ninety-nine.

Transforming on stage, better known to us today as acting, is an exhausting business and can have dire consequences. Actor Charles Laughton (1899-1962) “transformed” to King Lear in 1959, and it has been said that he never fully recovered. Of course, we hope Mr. Hayes and Ms. Chastain will be with us for years to come. Each of these shows has a limited engagement and each is worthy of attention, but for different reasons.

Reporters attending Charles III Coronation (May 6th) talked about the elation of the crowd, but for those of us who are theatregoers, the elation this year (2023) could not have compared with the way the crowd felt when Charles II was crowned also in May (29th) but in 1660, coincidentally Charles’s 30th birthday.