theasylogo
BLOG

MISSION

Theatre Is Easy (Theasy.com) is committed to connecting audiences to New York theatre. Through trustworthy reviews written by theatre practitioners, Theasy offers quick and easy information about what's playing on Broadway, off Broadway, and downtown. We believe that growing an audience starts with accessibility, and that's why we are passionate about championing the work we love. We are a group of knowledgeable theatre professionals and experienced writers who are eager to share information about the great live performances that take place all over town, every day.

Click here to support Theatre Is Easy (Theasy.com).

STAFF

Dan Dinero

Dan Dinero - Editor in Chief

Dan has directed theatre in New York for over fifteen years; recent projects include Joker at FringeNYC, Boys of a Certain Age, and The Austerity of Hope; for the last, he won Best Director at the Fresh Fruit Festival. Dan has also worked on Broadway, assisting director Jeff Calhoun on Brooklyn the Musical and Deaf West’s Big River. Dan holds a B.A. from Yale University and a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from NYU, and is a proud voting member of the Drama Desk, where he serves on both the Board and the Nominating Committee. See more at dandinero.com. (Photo by Julian Budge)

click here for reviews by Dan

Molly Marinik

Molly Marinik - Founding Editor

Molly is a dramaturg and director with a dance background who has worked in the theatre in a whole bunch of ways. She has a master's degree in theatre history and criticism from Brooklyn College and additional training from LCT3, The Kennedy Center, and Atlantic Theater Company. Find more info at mollymarinik.com. Molly is passionate about developing audiences for New York theatre and hopes that Theasy functions to empower potential audiences to go out and see shows, thus filling the houses of deserving productions all over town. Thanks for visiting Theasy! (Now go and tell your friends.)

click here for reviews by Molly

Regina Robbins

Regina Robbins - Associate Editor

Regina is a writer, director, and native New Yorker. She has worked with several NYC-based theatre companies, including Everyday Inferno, Manhattan Theatre Source, and Hedgepig Ensemble Theatre. Other accomplishments include: making three short films (screened at venues across the U.S.), earning two master's degrees, and writing for TDF Stages and Time Out New York. Learn more at reginarobbins.com.

click here for reviews by Regina

Jenna Ready

Jenna Ready - Business Manager

Jenna is an ex-actor, writer, and arts administrator based in New York City. She is currently employed as Assistant General Manager for Playwrights Horizons and holds a Bachelor of Arts in Theater Studies, in addition to one in English Literature, from the University of North Carolina at Wilmington. She loves the thrill of live performance and hopes Theasy can be a resource that will assist others in finding that passion, no matter their age, income level, or amount of exposure (or lack there of) to the arts. 

Emily Cordes

Emily Cordes - Marketing Director

Emily is a New York City-based actress and arts marketer/fundraiser. A graduate of Smith College and Columbia University, she has held administrative roles with such theatre companies as The Neo-Political Cowgirls, The Bushwick Starr, and Musical Theatre Factory. Offstage, she can be found perfecting her crow pose, reading Tarot, or baking some killer vegan cupcakes.

click here for reviews by Emily

Keith Medelis

Keith Paul Medelis - Social Media Director

Keith is the Creative Director of Upstream Artists’ Collective, developing new work with an environmental conscience. Stage and company management credits include Off-Broadway: White Rabbit, Red RabbitTurn Me Loose; New York: LaMaMa for Superhero Clubhouse, Bushwick Starr, The Flea Theater, Elastic City, and Brooklyn College. Several directing credits in New York and regionally. He is an adjunct professor at Mercy College and a teaching artist at the Professional Performing Arts School.  MFA: Brooklyn College. upstreamartistscollective.org

click here for reviews by Keith

Adrienne Urbanski

Adrienne Urbanski 

Adrienne’s love for the written word has led her in many directions including broadcast journalism, print journalism, creative writing, and academia. She currently works as an English instructor and freelance writer, primarily covering literature and theater. She holds BAs in English and journalism from the University of Minnesota, Minneapolis and an MA in English from Brooklyn College. Her writing has appeared in Bust Magazine, New York Press, The Onion’s AV section, Downtown Express, The Villager, Chelsea Now, The Feminist Review, Elevate Difference, Bitch Magazine, Venus Zine, The Minnesota Women’s Press, Pulse of the Twin Cities, and others.

click here for reviews by Adrienne

Alexandra Holden

Alexandra Holden 

Alexandra is currently pursuing a BFA in Drama and a Minor in Dance at NYU's Tisch School of the Arts. She has studied at the Stella Adler Studio of Acting, the British American Dramatic Academy in Oxford, UK, and graduated from the NJ magnet high school Bergen County Academies. Her favorite pastimes include attempting to dismantle racist socioeconomic structures, playing Shakespeare, and finessing her skincare routine.

Angel Lam

Angel Lam

Angel is a music composer, writer and performer who has been a three-time commissioned composer for Carnegie Hall, and has had her compositions performed all over the world by international ensembles and world class performers. Her most recent ventures include the premiere of her new musical, a short film with symphonic band, an orchestral suite with narration, a multimedia work with dance, and performing in her own solo show in the city that never sleeps. In her free time she likes to bike the island to catch the latest, hippest shows, or sip a late night Irish coffee in West Village. angellam.com

Angelina Kelly

Angelina Joyce-Dibart

Angelina is an award-winning actress and musical theater major at NYU-Tisch’s New Studio on Broadway. She is currently balancing classes and appearances in an Off Off Broadway children’s musical. In her free time, she enjoys giving and receiving awesome hugs and going out for sushi as often as possible.

Asya Danilova

Asya Gorovits

Asya holds a MA in Arts Criticism from Saint Petersburg State University in Russia. At the age of 12 she was accidentally locked in the back of the theater after rehearsing for a children’s ballet. Soon after this incident she abandoned the stage to pursue her interest in journalism and visual arts. Asya’s passion for photography eventually brought her back to the behind-the-scenes of many movies produced in New York and behind the curtains of many theaters. asyagorovits.com

Brooke Viegut

Brooke Viegut

Brooke is a director, choreographer, and producer with a dance and arts education background. She is the Founding Artistic Director of the Envisage Theatre Company dedicated to providing space for young playwrights to explore their stories, and has received training from The Conservatory of Theatre Arts at Webster University, Pittsburgh CLO, and Atlantic Theater Company. Brooke believes in the power of theatre and the arts to find the universal struggle in our individual experiences, exploring real people in a variety of storytelling forms to slowly bring our shared world a little closer together. For more, check out brookeviegut.com.

Charlotte Arnoux

Charlotte Arnoux

Charlotte hails from Marseille, in the south of France. She is a stage and screen actress, writer, producer and teacher, with a particular penchant for new works. Her recent credits include Word Play as part of the Midtown International Theater Festival and the Radioactive Festival; Splat Goes Your Day at the Sam French OOB Festival; The 24 Hour Plays: Nationals; the Coffee Catchups web series; and the award-winning independent short film Absolute Threshold. Charlotte is also a teacher at the Cappiello Studio, where she mentors young actors to develop works pertaining to social justice issues. charlottearnoux.com

Ed Malin

Ed Malin

Ed is a playwright whose work has been anthologized in Plays and Playwrights 2015 and in the Spontaneous Combustion Anthology from Manhattan Theatre Source. His plays have been performed at Theater for the New City, Nylon Fusion, Amios, Samuel French, The Brick, Wide Eyed, New York Madness, Dixon Place, Frigid NY, FringeNYC and Manhattan Theatre Source. His play Generic Magic Realism received a 2013 NYITA nomination for Outstanding Solo Performance for Nat Cassidy. Ed has reviewed New York theater for IndieTheaterNow, ClydeFitchReport, and TheatreIsEasy. temeritytheatre.org

Eleanor J. Bader

Eleanor J. Bader

Eleanor teaches English at Kingsborough Community College in Brooklyn. She also writes for Truthout.org, ReWire.News, Lilith Magazine and blog, and other progressive, feminist news sites and publications. She is a 2015 winner of a Project Censored award for "outstanding investigative journalism" for an article that was posted on RHRealityCheck.org, now called ReWire.News. (Photo by Rudy Riesgo)

click here for reviews by Eleanor

Heather Violanti

Heather Violanti

Heather has written reviews for Indie Theater Now, Nytheatre.com, and Theateronline. She has an MFA in Dramaturgy and Dramatic Criticism from the Yale School of Drama.

Jake Lipman

Jake Lipman

Jake is an actor, writer, director and the producing artistic director of Tongue in Cheek Theater Productions, which she founded in 2006 to produce and create thought-provoking comedies. Her 2018 play Relentlessly Pleasant was awarded a Puffin Foundation grant, as was the 2014 TIC-devised piece Buffalo Heights. MFA, Actors Studio; BA, Smith College. More at JakeLipman.com and tictheater.com.

click here for reviews by Jake

Jason Rost

Jason Rost

Jason is a Chicago native, turned New Yorker. He earned his BA in Theatre Studies from Southern Illinois University and his MFA in Theatre Directing from Brooklyn College. He has worked artistically in New York with companies such as Soho Rep, the Culture Project, and Primary Stages. In 2015 he and his wife will be spending the year working, studying, and surveying the theatre world in Europe. Jason also writes about and has a passion for craft beer. 

Katharine Nedder

Katharine Nedder

Katharine is an NYC-based actress, writer, voice talent for SpokenLayer, and preschool soccer coach. She has a BFA from NYU-Tisch and has appeared in a variety of short films, festivals and Off Off Broadway theaters around the city. In addition to Theasy her written work has been seen in the Mangrove Literary Journal and the Edgar Allen Poe Room.

Ken Kaissar

Ken Kaissar 

Ken’s article "Baring It All" was published by American Theatre magazine in January of 2013. He holds a BFA in directing from Carnegie Mellon University and an MFA in playwriting from Columbia University. He teaches playwriting and theatre history at Rider University and the Richard Stockton College.

 

Lexi Orphanos

Lexi Orphanos 

Lexi is a Manhattan-based actor, comedian, and soon-to-be graduate of NYU Tisch. Lexi has a theater (The PIT, UCB, Atlantic Acting School) and dance background with a current focus in film and television. In addition to a plethora of NY-based short films and web series, she is excited to be working on her first feature-length film—That V-Thing: A Raunchy Vegan Comedy—with Team Seven Films. When she’s not acting, writing, or binge-listening to NPR, you’ll probably find her looking at pictures of dogs and complaining about public transportation somewhere in the East Village.

 

Linda Buchwald

Linda Buchwald 

Linda is a theater journalist based in New York City. You can read her writing at TDF Stages, American Theatre magazine, Broadway Direct, Backstage.com, Beamly, and other publications. If you want to read her 140-character thoughts about theater, pop culture, and whatever else pops into her head, follow her on Twitter @PataphysicalSci.

 

Maria Paz Alegre

Maria Paz Alegre

Maria is a New York-based playwright, librarian, and activist. Along with reviewing theatre, she has had dozens of book reviews published online and in the School Library Journal. Recently, she interviewed prima ballerina Misty Copeland about her triumphs in the face of adversity and prejudice, as well as her work in mentoring young children of color. Maria also received the great honor of giving a speech alongside former President Bill Clinton titled Stories and the Only True Human Currency, in hopes of raising funds for international and domestic microloans. She has worked with many theater companies both in New York and abroad including The Shelter, Vertigo Theater and LAByrinth Theater, of which she is a member of their 2012 Intensive Ensemble. BFA in Acting from Emerson College, MLS from Queens College.

Matt Kiesling

Matt Kiesling

Matt is a graduate of New York University, where he studied musical theatre at Tisch’s New Studio on Broadway. Recently he played the title role in Macbeth and John Adams in 1776. You can hear him be silly in the comedy improv podcast Matt and Tariq’s Terrible Book Club, which he created and co-hosts. Alongside performing, Matt pursues directing and writing.

Max Berry

Max Berry

Max is a playwright and screenwriter based in New York City. His plays have been featured in multiple theaters around the city including the Hudson Guild Theatre, the Players Theater, and the Manhattan Repertory Theater. Max is a proud resident artist with First Kiss Theatre Company for which he produced his interactive Zoom play Same Time Next Year. Max is the creator and co-writer of the comedy web series Hey, Professor!, which premiered on YouTube in the summer of 2021 and was an official selection for NYCWebfest 2021. Other pursuits include his work as a contributing writer of Encore Monthly, pole dancing, and teaching chess to 3-8 year olds. For more information go to maxberryplaywright.com 

Rachel Abrams

Rachel Abrams 

Rachel is a dramaturg currently working as an Artistic Intern at Women’s Project Theater, a writing/research assistant to Allegiance’s Director of Education, and a freelancer. Previously, Rachel has worked with Abrams Artists Agency in NYC, and The Space Theatre in London. BFA Dramaturgy, Carnegie Mellon. Proud member of LMDA. rabramsdramaturgy.wordpress.com.

Rachel Lepore

Rachel Lepore

Rachel is an actor and playwright based out of NYC. She recently graduated from New York University with dual degrees in Theatre and Psychology. She trained with Playwrights Horizons and has been published under Samuel French. When not acting, writing, or seeing theatre, Rachel can be found hunting down good places to get tacos.

Ran Xia

Ran Xia

Ran is an interdisciplinary dramatist and co-founder of The Arctic Group Theatre Collective. Her plays have been performed at Dixon Place, the Brick Theater, Workshop Theater, 4th Street Theatre, the Kraine, Chinatown Soup, and many more. As a director and designer (scenic and sound), she has worked with Theater in Asylum, the Artilliers, Exquisite Corpse Company (most recently the immersive piece The Enchanted Realm of Rene Magritte as a writer and visual artist), the Barrow Group, ESPA at Primary Stages, YOLO! Productions, and FringeNYC. ranxia.info

click here for reviews by Ran

Rosie Vaughn

Rosie Vaughn

Rosie is an NYC-based writer and performer. She is currently a senior at NYU-Tisch, where she studies writing, directing, and design at Playwrights Horizons Theatre School. Her biggest interests and passions are devised theater, slam poetry, rap, and all animals—though NYC’s lack of real estate has limited her to only one pet: her pride and joy, Chicken the hamster.

Sarah Moore

Sarah Moore

Sarah got her start in theater reviewing in high school with the Greater Philadelphia Cappies, where she had a review published in The Philadelphia Inquirer. A former editorial staff member of TheaterMania.com, she has been writing for Theasy since the summer of 2013. She tweets lots of theater related opinions at @imsarahmoore, if you’re into that kind of thing. She earned her BA in Journalism and Dramatic Literature from New York University.

 

Sarah Weber

Sarah Weber 

Sarah received her bachelors at Muhlenberg College where she studied theatre, English, creative writing, and whatever she could find in the library. So, naturally she now works at a publishing company and is pursuing a career in writing and dramaturgy. Her interests also lie in indie film and the lifelong pursuit of finding good coffee (lots of good coffee). 

Shawna Cormier

Shani R. Friedman 

Shani hails from Canada, but has lived in NYC for years and still loves it. She's a tenant advocate in housing court, as well as a writer, editor, and blogger. Her work has appeared in Time Out New York, NY Press, The Park Slope Reader, New York Family Magazine and The Forward.

 

click here for reviews by Shani

Shoshana Roberts

Shoshana Roberts

Shoshana is a bubbly and bold actress with a black belt. She has a B.A. in Theatre, with a concentration in Acting, from Kutztown University and moved to New York immediately after graduating. Before college she attended Pittsburgh's Creative and Performing Arts High School, but it was even earlier, at the age of 8, that she truly solidified her career path since she got to say ‘meow’ as her only line as a cat in the kids' musical Really Rosie. As a result, she has done everything from stage managing to acting since then.

click here for reviews by Shoshana

Zachary Connor

Zachary Conner  

Nothing appeals more to Zachary than roaming the world and taking in every bit of art along the way. After graduating from the University of Oklahoma with a BFA in Musical Theatre Performance, he headed to NYC, becoming the proverbial moth to the flame. Other passions in life include: French bulldogs, horror movies, and Kill Bill: Volume One.