Steve Callahan - Page 3

Steve Callahan

A native Kansan I have a BA (Math and Theatre) and MA (Theatre). I was working on a PhD in Theatre when IBM sniffed my math background and lured me away with money enough to feed my (then two) children. Nevertheless I've been active in theatre all my life--having directed sixty-eight productions (everything from opera in Poughkeepsie to Mrozek in Woodstock to musical melodrama in Germany) and I've acted in ninety others. Now that I'm retired I don't have that eight-to-five distraction and can focus a bit more. I've regularly reviewed theatre in St. Louis for KDHX since 1991 and for BWW since 2014.




Favorite Show:

"The Gospel at Colonus" by the St. Louis Black Rep (1996)

Favorite Stories:



BWW Review: GIANNI SCHICCHI at Opera Theatre Saint Louis
BWW Review: GIANNI SCHICCHI at Opera Theatre Saint Louis
May 24, 2021

The glorious Opera Theatre of Saint Louis opened it’s festival season last night with a sheer delight: Puccini’s delectable one-act comedy, Gianni Schicchi.

BWW Review: SUOR ANGELICA Opens at Winter Opera Saint Louis
BWW Review: SUOR ANGELICA Opens at Winter Opera Saint Louis
March 23, 2021

Winter Opera Saint Louis rises from its pandemic slumber with a very lovely production of one of Puccini’s more rarely performed works—Suor Angelica.

2020-2021 SEASON FULL OF HISTORIC FIRSTS AT OPERA THEATRE OF SAINT LOUIS
2020-2021 SEASON FULL OF HISTORIC FIRSTS AT OPERA THEATRE OF SAINT LOUIS
October 19, 2020

Opera Theatre of Saint Louis announces adventurous season of streaming and out-door opera.

BWW Review: LA FANCIULLA DEL WEST at Winter Opera St. Louis
BWW Review: LA FANCIULLA DEL WEST at Winter Opera St. Louis
March 9, 2020

St. Louis's wonderful Winter Opera closes it's thirteenth season with a fine production of a rarely-seen work by Puccini--La fanciulla del West, or The Girl of the Golden West. Now Puccini was fond of choosing exotic settings for his operas--look at Madama Butterfly and Turandot. Well, to a European, Fanciulla is equally exotic. It's set in a mining camp in the Sierra Nevadas during the California Gold Rush of 1848.

BWW Review: LA FILLE DU REGIMENT at Winter Opera St. Louis
BWW Review: LA FILLE DU REGIMENT at Winter Opera St. Louis
January 28, 2020

Winter Opera St. Louis continues its 13th season with a most charming production of Gaetano Donizetti's comic La fille du regiment (The Daughter of the Regiment).

BWW Review: MADAM at .ZACK
BWW Review: MADAM at .ZACK
January 13, 2020

1870: Eliza Haycraft, the reigning Madam of St. Louis brothels fights the powers that be in a bright new musical.

BWW Review: THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE Charms at Winter Opera
BWW Review: THE PIRATES OF PENZANCE Charms at Winter Opera
November 10, 2019

It's 140 years old, but it's as fresh and appealing as when it first bounded into the public eye on New Year's Eve, 1879.

BWW Review: THE LIFESPAN OF A FACT at Repertory Theatre Of St. Louis
BWW Review: THE LIFESPAN OF A FACT at Repertory Theatre Of St. Louis
October 22, 2019

The St. Louis Rep has opened a smart, fast-paced, rather serious comedy about the meaning of Truth. It's called 'The Lifespan of a Fact'.

BWW Review: THE AGITATORS at Upstream Theater
BWW Review: THE AGITATORS at Upstream Theater
October 2, 2019

For going on fifteen years now Philip Boehm's Upstream Theater has been giving us some of the finest, most thought-provoking theater in town. Now they have opened a play about two iconic American agitators in the struggle for equal rights: Frederick Douglass and Susan B. Anthony. It's by playwright Mat Smart, and it's called simply a?oeThe Agitatorsa??.

BWW Review: WHAMMY! at The Young Liars
BWW Review: WHAMMY! at The Young Liars
September 29, 2019

Some Things that All People Should Know About the Nature and Function of the Self, Its Place in the Economy of Life, its Proper Training and its Righteous Exercise

BWW Review: 'A MODEL FOR MATISSE' at Midnight Company
BWW Review: 'A MODEL FOR MATISSE' at Midnight Company
September 16, 2019

'A Model for Matisse' opens at the .ZACK in St. Louis.

BWW Review: A GRIM AND POWERFUL 'GLORY DENIED' at Union Avenue Opera
BWW Review: A GRIM AND POWERFUL 'GLORY DENIED' at Union Avenue Opera
August 19, 2019

A soldier gone to a far off war, absent for years. His wife in anguish, not knowing whether she's a widow. It's a story far older than The Odyssey.

BWW Review: LA BOHEME at Union Avenue Opera
BWW Review: LA BOHEME at Union Avenue Opera
July 29, 2019

Union Avenue Opera is on a roll! Two homers in a row! First their sublime Candide, and now an equally fine production of Puccini's La bohème. Union Avenue knocked them both right into the bleachers, and those of us who were lucky enough to catch one of those prize performances now own a true treasure. I caught La bohème last night and I think I'll have that experience bronzed.

BWW Review: Union Avenue Opera Gives St. Louis a Brilliant CANDIDE
BWW Review: Union Avenue Opera Gives St. Louis a Brilliant CANDIDE
July 8, 2019

Run, don't walk, to see the brilliant CANDIDE at the Union Avenue Opera in St. Louis! This is the opening production of their twenty-fifth festival season, and it is, for my money, the most wonderful of the many lovely shows they've done.

BWW Review: FIRE SHUT UP IN MY BONES at Opera Theatre St. Louis Captures Your Heart!
BWW Review: FIRE SHUT UP IN MY BONES at Opera Theatre St. Louis Captures Your Heart!
June 18, 2019

Fire Shut Up in My Bones has opened at Opera Theatre St. Louis. It is gorgeous! Deeply intimate and honest, the beautifully told story almost overshadows the music by the great jazz trumpeter Terrence Blanchard.

BWW Review: THE CORONATION OF POPPEA at Opera Theatre Of St. Louis
BWW Review: THE CORONATION OF POPPEA at Opera Theatre Of St. Louis
June 11, 2019

This baroque masterpiece is gorgeous and disturbing.

BWW Review: A Glorious RIGOLETTO Opens at Opera Theatre St. Louis
BWW Review: A Glorious RIGOLETTO Opens at Opera Theatre St. Louis
June 4, 2019

The Opera Theatre of St. Louis continues its 44th festival season of world class opera with a magnificent production of Giuseppe Verdi's Rigoletto. OTSL presented a splendid Rigoletto fourteen years ago, but this production is, I think, even better. It's the best Rigoletto your ever likely to see.

BWW Review:  FIGARO is Brilliantly Married in St. Louis
BWW Review: FIGARO is Brilliantly Married in St. Louis
May 28, 2019

Opera Theatre of St. Louis has opened its 44th festival season. This is St. Louis' prized centerpiece of opera, with a world-wide reputation. It is famous for its superb productions. The company's home is the beautiful and comfortable 763-seat Browning Theatre at Webster University. Gourmet picnic suppers may be enjoyed before the show on the lovely grounds of the theater. All operas are performed in English with super-titles.

BWW Review: Winter Opera brings Remarkable Voices to the Druidic World of NORMA
BWW Review: Winter Opera brings Remarkable Voices to the Druidic World of NORMA
March 11, 2019

Winter Opera has opened a sumptuous production of Norma, Vincenzo Bellini's bel canto masterpiece from 1831.

BWW Review: Clowns' Crude Humor Assaults GLASS MENAGERIE
BWW Review: Clowns' Crude Humor Assaults GLASS MENAGERIE
March 11, 2019

The Glass Menagerie has been revered by audiences and critics around the world for three-quarters of a century. I suppose that, like all sacred icons, it occasionally should be taken down a peg or two. The very energetically wild folks at Ten Directions have arrived, axes in hand, to have a chop or two at this old classic. Their Bouffon Glass Menajoree opened last night at the Centene under the aegis of the Young Liars.



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