Berkeley Rep Blog

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Beginning 2012 with a look back at 2011's best

posted by Kyle Sircus on Wed, Jan 4, 2012
in News , Our shows

Happy New Year, blog readers! January offers all of us a time to commit to resolutions and reflect back on the year that was. In our case at Berkeley Rep, it was certainly a busy one filled with a whole slate of shows, some of which were lucky enough to receive some "best of 2011" nods from theatre critics around the country. In case you missed it, here's a rundown:

• The Agony and the Ecstasy of Steve Jobs, Mike Daisey's controversial new monologue, appeared on critics' lists in the New York Times, Washington Post, Wall Street Journal for its New York and Washington, D.C. runs, respectively. The production made lists in both the Seattle Times and Seattle Weekly, too. Closer to home, Bay Area News Group, Huffington Post, and the SF Bay Guardian all named it as one of their top picks for the year.
• Anna Deavere Smith's Let Me Down Easy earned the engaging performer the Barrymore Award for Best Leading Actress in a Play. This knockout performance landed in the Top 10 lists in the San Francisco Chronicle, Bay Area News Group, and Los Angeles Times. 
• In addition to his Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for Outstanding Solo Performance, John Leguizamo's Ghetto Klown was awarded the Biggest Laugh of 2011 by Eric Grode in the New York Times. 
• Our co-production of Ruined made lists in the San Francisco Chronicle, Idiolect, and the Boston Globe.  
• Les Waters' staging of Three Sisters made Karen D'Souza's Top 10 list in the Mercury News, Oakland Tribune, and Contra Costa Times.
• Speaking of Les, Charles Isherwood of the New York Times recently wrote about the year’s “most promising out of town development: The appointment of the director Les Waters to head Actors Theater of Louisville, which hosts the annual Humana Festival of New American Plays.” After eight years as Berkeley Rep’s associate artistic director, Les will be dearly missed in the Bay Area – but everyone wishes him well with his new adventure!

To close out this post, we are so excited that our current production of The Wild Bride was named the "high point of the year" in Robert Hurwitt's San Francisco Chronicle list. The show's been extended until January 22. If you haven't seen it yet, why not add that to your list of resolutions?