Ann Lemons Pollack

  • South Pacific

    Are critics harder on shows they know and love – or does their previous affection soften their hearts toward new stagings of them? I have no good answers for that. Nevertheless, I publicly admit that South Pacific is one of my favorite shows, and I argue that it’s the best of any of the Rogers

    read more

  • Union Loafers: Pizza!

    There’s a great deal of logic in thinking that a good bakery – a good bread bakery – should be able to deliver good pizza. Jim Lahey, the New Yorker who gave us the wonderful no-knead bread, for instance, has Co., a restaurant featuring his bread and his pizzas. And St. Louis has Union Loafers.

    read more

  • The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time

    The Curious Incident of the Dog in the Night-Time has opened Repertory Theatre of St Louis’ 51st season. What a fascinating show it is, showing the work that must have gone into it for much of the summer. Based on the bestselling novel of the same name, it tells the story of a teenaged boy

    read more

  • DOT

    It’s no small task to mix broad comedy and a serious subject like Alzheimer’s disease. The Black Rep’s new show DOT, by Colman Domingo, attempts, and, for the most part, succeeds in doing so. Moreover, it manages without poking fun at the disease or the person who has it. Everything else, however, is fair game.

    read more

  • Polite Society

    The name Polite Society might be a two-edged sword for the Lafayette Square restaurant. Co-owner Brian Schmitz said he and partner Jonathan Schoen were just trying to convey an air of pleasant behavior, particularly thinking about service. Polite Society definitely isn’t one of those stiff places where murmured conversation and dainty wiping of the lips

    read more

  • Agnes Wilcox

    I first met Agnes Wilcox as one of the coterie of friends that were one of my husband’s inadvertent wedding gifts to me. She, too, was married to a theatre critic, Bob Wilcox, but in addition was running The New Theatre Company, which she’d founded. This meant, theoretically, that she was someone about whom I

    read more

  • Uncle Vanya: Valiantly Accepting Next Year’s Agony

    “White nights” refers to the long, lingering twilights occur at far northern (and southern, of course) latitudes such as Russia. A gathering of people having tea just before dusk is happening several times currently in town. It’d be a good idea to join them. Rebels and Misfits’ Immersive Theatre Project is giving us an utterly

    read more

  • On the Road: Potatoes in New York City

    It’s no secret that I’m pretty crabby on the subject of morning potatoes. The last place I expected to find platonic antemeridianal spuds was New York City. But there they were, smiling and waving at me from a plate across the street from the Whitney Museum, in an eatery with the unlikely name of Bubby’s.

    read more

  • Suburban Baltimore: Conrad’s Crabs

    Folks don’t dress up for seafood in Baltimore. There, as in New Orleans, it’s an ordinary part of everyday life, not something that calls for nice shoes and something a step up from a t-shirt. Sure, there are fancier spots, but there are also neighborhood hangouts and restaurants folks say their parents took them to

    read more

  • On the Road: ATL, Hartsfield-Jackson Airport (and two other suggestions)

    Can we agree that most airport food is pretty unsatisfying? Accordingly, when good stuff pops up, it’s worth noting. I have a few standards I always suggest – but with the reminder that part of the trick is being in the right terminal. It’s no good to hope for Danny Meyer’ Shake Shack at JFK

    read more