Onstage NTX Writers’ 2025 ‘Bests & Faves’ (Jan)
—Jan Farrington, Managing Editor
DECEMBER 30, 2025: In the closing days of the year, Onstage NTX writers have an opportunity to write about the shows they admired most, and (within editorial reason) their thoughts about related theatrical matters.
I am printing them as they come in, and with little editing: if they’re long, how can I justify “cutting” an actor’s or designer’s shout-out for good work done?
They can be long, or short.
Here are my Top Ten shows, in no particular order—plus some extra mentions I couldn’t resist. About the only rule is that though a writer need not have reviewed a play, we do need to have SEEN it ourselves, right?
I’ll take the hit up front: My list slants heavily in a Westerly direction. Can’t help it: Dallas theater-makers did great work…but Fort Worth theatre companies consistently came up with picks and productions of amazing impact and quality. That said, of course there’s plenty of Dallas and environs in the various critics’ mix—all around, it was a Very Good Year, as Sinatra might say….
Plays about loneliness clung tenaciously to my heart in 2025: Amphibian Stage’s The Heart Sellers, a “dazzling, sobering, often hilarious” work by Lloyd Suh, follows a pair of young wives, recent emigrants who’ve follow their med-student husbands to the U.S. of the 1970s and slowly forge a vital friendship. Excellent work by director Shyama Nithiananda and actors Olivia de Guzman and Tara Park. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/lloyd-suhs-the-heart-sellers-amphibian-stage
Primary Trust, a co-pro of Stage West Theatre in Fort Worth and the Dallas Theater Center, likewise followed a story of isolation and loneliness—and the vast impact just a few friends can have (even if one is imaginary). Eboni Booth’s script creates four vivid, memorable characters, balances humor and pain—and director Sasha Maya Ada and cast (Lee George, Jamal Sterling, Tiana Kaye Blair, Brian Mathis) could not have brought it off more perfectly. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/primary-trust-stage-west
Penelope, a cabaret-style chamber musical starring Cara Statham Serber, will run at Theatre Three in 2026—by popular and industry demand, it seems—but Stage West’s spring 2025 production was one of the best nights of theatre I’ve ever spent. No kidding. The endlessly changeable “Evie” theater space was tricked out with little tables and dim lamps, and a vintage-look proscenium stage to hold a terrific music ensemble (piano, strings, percussion) led by Cody Dry. And Serber knocked us sideways with her charismatic and high-style singing/storytelling of Alex Bechtel’s cheeky, dramatic, angry, tender story: a young woman is left alone for 20 years…and imagine that, finds her head full of new ideas. Hands raised to the theater gods for director Sarah Gay, Cody Dry and musicians, and the unforgettable performance by Serber. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/penelope-stage-west
Conor McPherson’s The Birds (at Amphibian Stage) and Ericka Schmidt’s Mac Beth (at Circle Theatre) gave me a double dose of the shivers, each offering a different way to signal us that this world is really, truly messed up—though we’re never quite told why. Somehow, a free-floating, unnamed fear is worse, and rooted in the certainty that nice birdies and kilt-wearing schoolgirls shouldn’t be acting like this. David Lanza’s brilliant sound and Jay Duffer’s pinpoint direction produces quiet terror in The Birds, and we can’t take our eyes from the rowdy antics and “glorious gore” of Mac Beth. Both casts terrific. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/the-birds-amphibian-stage and https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/4oy82b4h6seecce4sxf0lrwafrpbxs
Anna Skidis Vargas’ El Rey del Pollo at Echo Theatre made the heart sing—a welcome bilingual Shakespearean, sit-com family comedy. And at the time, I argued that El Rey needed to make the rounds all over the state of Texas, DEI naysayers be damned. I doubt it was my advice, but they did take it to Austin for a short run. Part of a collab between Echo and the Borderlands Shakespeare Colectiva in South Texas, and directed by Amanda Reyes, the show collected a cast of NTX talents who made every scene pop. Special mention to Jovane Caamaño as the Narrator and many more, to Joe Chapa as Chicken King Raymundo Lear, and to his three daughters (Caitlin Chapa, Carrie Viera, and Mia Azuaje), each hard to handle in her own way. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/el-rey-del-pollo-echo-theatre
James Ijames’ Pulitzer/Tony winner Fat Ham at Stage West—Hamlet with a side of sweet beans and ribs—didn’t just look to amuse us by changing Elsinore to a North Carolina backyard BBQ. Yes, it threw us into a Hamlet-esque cycle of family manipulations, bitterness, and violence…but with Juicy, the prince to this BBQ empire (hey, shades of El Rey), a guy who we slowly realize won’t be content to just keep on keeping on. Change is gonna come. You have a chance to see the production in the next few weeks at the Dallas Theater Center, so I won’t say much more. Directed by the great vickie washington, the cast is fine, with Tyler Ray Lewis as Juicy (visibly growing before our eyes); Zachary Willis as his comic, empathetic Horatio. Read Rick’s great review for the rest of the fine cast. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/fat-ham-stage-west
Counting as ONE theatrical entity, the trio of works by local playwrights: Healed (Blake Hackler), Your Wife’s Dead Body (Jenny Ledel), and Incarnate (Parker Davis Gray)
Mad Dog Blues at Hip Pocket Theatre: Let’s not let go of the strange theatrical alchemy of the 1960s and 1970s too easily. Heaven knows if these plays will last the centuries…but there was something happening back then—and who better to send the young Sam Shepard into orbit than the funky folks of Hip Pocket? I frankly have no fixed idea why all these notions and images and threads of legend crowded together in Shephard’s head—but somehow, letting a great cast run them up, down and around the HPT flagpole for this revival run (director Christina Cranshaw killed it in all ways) did create a crazy sense of disjointed Americana—which sounds about right for the times. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/sam-shepards-the-mad-dog-blues-hip-pocket-theatre
All is Calm: The Christmas Truce of 1914 at Stage West—a gift to the theatre-going community at the holidays, a true story told mostly in song, and sometimes in letters home, poems, or diary entries that survive. Men (boys, some of them) at war, walking toward each others battle lines in search of peace and sanity. A gorgeously directed and sun production, leaving us with the “what ifs” of history. What if the British and German soldiers had kept on trading songs, and cigarettes, and a warming drink of brandy? What if that truce—that quiet rebellion against a feckless waro—had gone into another day? another week? until the generals tried to arrest them all, by the tens of thousands? The play did achieve a beautiful calm…but there was room for regret and sorrow as well. https://www.onstagentx.com/reviews/all-is-calm-the-christmas-truce-of-1914-stage-west
AND ALSO: Great memories and admiration for the casts and creatives of the following productions: Ochre House Theatre’s Libro de los Suenos Olivados, a foot-stomping reminder (via Matt Posey’s spare dialogue and the eloquent language of flamenco) that great, vibrant theater needn’t be a sea of words; bodies in motion can carry the load. … August Wilson’s moving King Hedley II from Soul Rep and Bishop Arts Theatres (to be followed soon by a Soul Rep production of Wilson’s Gem of the Ocean) … Theatre Too’s (downstairs at T3) Goblin Market, a gorgeously sung adaptation of Christina Rossetti’s 19th-century poem, brought to life by Elizabeth Kensek and Jessica Humphrey … and The unexpected and great-hearted play Rooted ( a hilarious, touching story of eco-celebrity) at Amphibian Stage … Theatre Arlington kicking it new school with a lively In the Heights, and old school with You Can’t Take It With You (my Lord, plays used to be long…but good) … Outcry Theatre’s sprawling, intense production of Rajiv Joseph’s Describe the Night … Shaw’s Heartbreak House at Hip Pocket Theatre, written at another time when the world seemed to be going to hell … Circle Theatre’s Destroying David, with a stunning solo performance from Amanda Nicole Reyes … And Ride the Cyclone at Stage West, with psychic/psychedelic set and lighting, and a collective performance by TCU’s musical theater students that popped us back in our seats. Good thing Brian Mathis (as the magic guy in the “Big” booth was there to keep things in order.
MORE TO COME from our Onstage NTX contributors!
