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Cory Pattak

Spitting in the Face of the Devil

January 5, 2019

Mr. Brader is an engaging and soulful performer with a smooth and pleasing vocal delivery. Brader is an admirer of Spalding Gray and channels that monumental artist’s impassioned sense of storytelling. As a writer, he offers a vividly candid but somewhat flawed treatment of his explosive autobiographical material. Arguably a tauter and more focused scenario would flow more effectively.  Still, Spitting in the Face of the Devil ultimately achieves redemptive impact. [more]

Daddy Long Legs

October 9, 2015

Jean Webster’s classic epistolary novel of the coming of age of a college age girl at the beginning of the twentieth century, "Daddy Long Legs," has been dramatized many times. What makes this charming new Off Broadway musical now at the Davenport Theatre different is that it is played by only two characters and as a result it remains extremely faithful to the original book. Although the show written by composer/lyricist Paul Gordon and book writer/director John Caird, (Tony Award winner for the original "Les Misérables" and "Nicholas Nickleby"), the team responsible for the 2000 Jane Eyre, can’t compete with the big brassy Broadway musicals down the block, its very old-fashionedness and fully rounded characters make it extremely satisfying and endearing in a way that few musicals are today. Just try to not care about these characters. [more]