“Miriam finds herself in a situation unimaginable to most of us. And yet, Miriam could be any of us. She is a mother who loves her son. A mother with the best of intentions who still made mistakes. A mother questioning her choices and wondering what could have been done differently. She marks the seasons by baking the same treats in her kitchen that I bake to mark the seasons in mine. She loves her son despite his many imperfections, just as I love my children despite theirs (although theirs are thankfully much smaller in scale). By seeing ourselves in her, we feel empathy, connection, and understanding — all things our world could use a little more of.
Actor Kymberli Colbourne is perfection as Miriam. She portrays strength, vulnerability, courage, anger, compassion, humility, dignity, humor, and love, and the audience feels all of it right along with her.
This show is a must-see…”
— Erica Vo on Apples In Winter
“In this four-person performance, Luster and Rae seem to spend the most time onstage, as they are the bridges between Charlie and Tigg. Time shifts back and forth on stage frequently and instantly, which could be confusing were it not for Palmer’s precise directing, including two sets on the same stage…
The premise sounds complicated, but Palmer’s production makes it easy to follow on the stage. If you find yourself wondering why a play about Hamlet, and why now, it’s a fair thing to consider. Cain seems to be asking, with this play, if Hamlet still matters in today’s world. He is, after all, the ultimate white man – and haven’t we heard enough from them? Xandri even convinces herself that, if this production goes right, we will never need another Hamlet. With so many voices in today’s theater, do we still need this one?
The answer, I’m afraid, is not simple – and neither is playing Hamlet for any of these men, who all suffer and swordfight their way through the performance of a lifetime.”
— Deann Welker on The Last White Man
“Palmer has masterfully brought this brilliantly written work to life…The keen eye and graceful hand of a good director is evident in the intensity and interaction throughout. This production was of the quality and artistry I find at the Oregon Shakespeare Festival - it was just that good.”
— Dennis Sparks on Private Lives
“Palmer’s adaptation — really an old story within a new play — has the added advantage of doubling the show’s appeal. It presents enough of Dickens’s original 1843 Scrooge story to entertain kids and others who are experiencing the holiday classic for the first time in a long time, or ever, while giving those who know the original by heart get an entirely new story around it…”
— Brett Campbell on Charles Dickens Writes A Christmas Carol
“Palmer’s characteristic mastery of comic timing brightens the Venetian Theatre. An expertly paced and acted hotel lobby scene at Ben and Mrs. Robinson’s awkward first coupling had the audience giggling, as did the ingenious use of shadow screens to (hilariously) depict their different characters via bedroom tumbles. (Explicit naughtiness is deftly concealed behind those scrims, well timed blackouts and cleverly placed pillows.) These are the shows most entertaining moments…”
— Brett Campbell on The Graduate
“The big question with any kind of artistic fusion is: will the two elements interfere with or amplify each other? No one is better qualified to pull this kind of thing off than Palmer, a research nerd, particularly with Shakespeare, to whose work he’s devoted years of study and staging. Palmer also has experience with Shakespearean fusion, like Bag & Baggage’s masterful 2012 Kabuki-Titus, which used a traditional Japanese drama form to turn one of Shakespeare’s weakest creations into something far more compelling than it had any right to be.
Here, he wisely drew on the expertise of scholars and community members knowledgeable about the cultural, religious and historical context this show embraces. The result: a production that benefits from the best of both its sources — the lush beauty and dramatic depth of Nizami’s poetic setting, and the equally lyrical words and page-turning plot that has always made Romeo & Juliet so popular. “
— Brett Campbell on Romeo&Juliet/Layla&Majnun
“When's the last time a play (or movie, or even a comedy show) had you laughing out loud until your stomach hurt...for 2 hours? I'm having a hard time thinking of any at all. Comedies may have their moments, but very rarely do they keep you laughing long after the curtain goes down. But this one does.
It's part Monty Python, part Absolutely Fabulous, and one of the funniest shows I've ever seen.
This may all sound pretty cheesy. And it is. Totally cheesy, way over the top, and completely ridiculous. But thanks to Palmer’s spot-on direction and the extreme "thespionic" talents of the cast, MURDER AT CHECKMATE MANOR is belly-laugh funny. You hardly have a chance to catch your breath.
This is comedy done right. Go see it.”
- Krista Garver, Broadway World, on Fardale…Murder at Checkmate Manor
“In the darkness at Hillsboro’s Venetian Theatre, the fear begins even before the lights go up, in a haunting unscripted addition whose impact might be severely lessened if disclosed here. Suffice it to say that Palmer’s bold, Blair Witchy opening gambit — while entirely in keeping with the story — instantly ratchets the half century old story’s tension to maximum immediate urgency.
What really keeps us engaged until the final act fireworks commence are Palmer’s astute direction…
That scrim makes the stage even shallower than usual, which makes Palmer’s trademark deployment of actors in visually dynamic tableaux and arresting interactions (often placing disputing characters literally chest to chest and hand to throat) even more vital to sustaining the tension…
As usual, Palmer elicits committed performances from the actors…
Palmer’s Crucible doesn’t just engage our minds and test our morals. It clutches at our throats.”
— Brett Campbell on The Crucible
“Director Scott Palmer places the Bag&Baggage production firmly in a 1930s context. The ensemble performs before and around rough-hewn, weathered wooden board walls that represent the bunkhouse and barn of the play's rural California setting, but for backdrops behind the actors and these scenic pieces, Palmer uses projections of black-and-white period photographs that vividly recall the desolate, impoverished environment of the Great Depression.
Palmer also deftly integrates a number of 1930s folk and work songs into the play…
Palmer and his very able cast trace with sensitivity and power the characters' failed efforts to overcome despair…
As this fine Bag&Baggage production comes to an end, one is left pondering whether such a dénouement was or is inevitable.
Must "the best laid schemes of mice and men" always go awry?”
- Richard Wattenberg on Of Mice and Men
“Director Scott Palmer utilizes another non-realistic convention, the entering and exiting from and through the auditorium…
Palmer skillfully uses such entrances and exits to engulf us in the action especially of the memory sequences…
Willy and his family may live in a pre-television, pre-computer America, but as this production amply reveals the only innocence available to them was that of the duped…”
- Richard Wattenberg on Death of A Salesman
“Palmer… did not miss the significance in November 2016 of a play that embraces love and hope in the face of an ominously xenophobic political climate. The result is a show that is funny, heartwarming, but still able to subtly remind us of shadows on the national horizon…
Is there anything new to be gained from the efforts of Hillsboro’s Bag & Baggage? My answer is unequivocally “yes” – I found myself riveted by the deeper character and story exploration…
The final scene is a beautiful, but slightly chilling, masterpiece of caroling harmonies and gently falling snow underscored by the distant pulse of a police siren…”
- Tina Arth on Parfumerie
“But obsession and imagination also describe Ahab himself, obsessed by a whale and the manifold metaphors it represents, not to mention the minutiae of whaling. They characterize the great American film director Orson Welles, obsessed by Melville’s novel, which he spent years transforming into the play, Moby Dick, Rehearsed, which the company is staging at Hillsboro’s Venetian Theatre this month. They also apply to Palmer, one of Oregon’s and perhaps America’s most artistically ambitious theater artists, himself…
You might say Palmer is obsessed with transforming unlikely material, from Shakespeare’s worst plays to Arthur Miller’s weighty The Crucible and many others, into stage triumphs. He usually succeeds…
Palmer and his team compensate for the absence of Welles’ fabled camerawork with one of the most impressive productions Bag & Baggage has yet offered, somehow convincingly conjuring a rehearsal stage, seaport, church, whaling vessel and, yes, even Moby himself out of a few ropes, chairs, projected backdrops, wooden blocks and boxes — and our own carefully cultivated imaginations….
The direction is equally masterful. Palmer deftly deploys his forces throughout the theater, including the aisles, with stage directions shouted from behind the audience in the rehearsal sequences…
Not surprisingly, given Palmer’s expertise in matters Bardish, the Shakespearean elements shine…”
- Brett Campbell on Moby Dick, Rehearsed
“Without getting preachy or pedantic about it, this production aligns human fear of witches with the repression and homophobia that permeated American culture as much as the midcentury mod furnishings that decorate the set and even the Vault lobby, enough to make a DWR devotee drool…
Bell, Book & Candle’s themes of magic, self-sacrifice and redemption make it as appropriate for this holiday season as its opening scene Christmas setting, accentuated by Lawrence Siulagi’s lovely snowy projections in the Vault. The acting, design, direction, and Van Druten’s moving story together make for an entertaining collection of holiday gifts…”
- Brett Campbell on Bell, Book and Candle
“Palmer’s new production’s modern directorial sensibility makes a familiar, four-decade old classic feel contemporary again…
Stage director Palmer is a past master at navigating that fine line between realism and exaggeration, especially in B&B’s entertaining comedies. But doing so in the Vault’s intimate confines demands a much subtler approach.
A master of misdirection (in the good, non-hyphenated sense!), Palmer accentuates the sense of unease with expert little touches — a sidelong glance here, a raised eyebrow there, slightly melodramatic music and light cues — that create an atmosphere of what might be called wry ominousness. We’re nervous and chuckling, surprised and knowing, all at the same time. It’s a Deathtrap for the post-Simpsons generation that plays off the fact that the script’s pioneering self-awareness is now common currency in all kinds of entertainment…
Palmer’s skill actually best appears not in a line but in a silence — a single unscripted long pause in the midst of a dialogue between Sidney and his lawyer that in the opening weekend performance I saw produced both an explosive audience laugh — and a crucial aha! moment. Like so much else here, to say more would spoil it, but it perfectly captures the play’s ingenious blend of humor and homicide…”
- Brett Campbell on Deathtrap
“Director Scott Palmer is no stranger to Coward’s style of cheerful cynicism, and is thus perfectly suited to shepherd his cast and crew through a fast-paced telling of this supernatural farce that has been raising spirits (literally and figuratively) on stages around the world ever since its debut in war-torn London during the darkest days of World War II.
Blithe Spirit tickets will sell out quickly, so fans of Coward’s beautifully crafted, witty farce and Scott Palmer’s theatrical ingenuity should buy tickets soon.”
- Tina Arth on Blithe Spirit
“Spinning Into Butter at Bag & Baggage’s cool, cozy new home The Vault Theatre is a production that should be seen by anyone in the greater Portland community who’s at all interested in one of the most pressing issues of our time and place. Especially if you’re willing to set your own preconceptions aside for a couple of hours.…
Kymberli Colbourne’s fully realized, yet understated leading performance — should also start a conversation, about the best performance on a Portland stage in this young theater season…
Spinning Into Butter offers a host of important insights about unacknowledged racism that a lot of white folks — maybe especially those of us who think we’re too enlightened to be racist — do need to hear, and does so in a dramatic forum that doesn’t feel like a lecture. It provides a safe place to grapple with these issues, on stage and maybe in after-play conversations…”
- Brett Campbell on Spinning Into Butter
“Go see it. It’s weird, well-acted theater that will make you think. This isn’t a date-night movie. You will be uncomfortable. You will want to mull over your observations on sexism, femininity and the afterlife over a glass of red wine. If you’re brave, you might want to soothe your post-play self with a warm bath...”
- Samantha Swindler on The Drowning Girls
“Poor Richard III. If only Scott Palmer was alive in the 1400s we might remember him differently.
Don’t confuse Palmer’s “Richard III, the Comedy” with the dark, moody and interminable “Richard III” by William Shakespeare. The name may be the same, but Palmer’s version is much kinder to the central character and endows him with the personality and charm befitting royalty. And more than a few laugh lines.
Actually, the current Bag&Baggage production, playing outdoors at the Tom Hughes Civic Center Plaza in Hillsboro, is far more akin to The Three Stooges trying to explain Monte Python by doing a Marx Brothers routine.
The key to enjoying the production is to not try to make more out of it than it is. It’s not traditional Shakespeare. It’s just fun. Or at least until intermission. Then the story grows dark as the newly crowned Richard turns on the ones he loved and they turn on him, and in the end, the king gets exactly what he deserves. Or so history would have us believe…
Palmer has preserved the Shakespearean story of Richard III, but presents it in a manner that even haters of The Bard may find enjoyable.”
- Theresa Myers on Richard III