Best of 1981

Crimes of the Heart. Three sisters, nurtured in Southern gothic grotesquerie, induce spasms of laughter in Beth Henley's Pulitzer-prizewinning drama. Dreamgirls. A pearl in the strand of notable U.S. musicals. There is dazzling elegance in Theoni V. Aldredge's costumes, and a young belter named Jennifer Holliday can start, stop and steal a show. (See above.) The Dresser. Paul Rogers plays a decrepit provincial Shakespearean actor-manager; Tom Courtenay, his valet. In double image, they are Lear and his Fool--and both are magnificent.

Key Exchange. A trio of free spirits have wry and funny flings at love in the modern mode. A dandy playwright debut for Kevin Wade.

Lena Home: The Lady and Her Music. At 64, she seems to have been around forever, and the energy and heart in this show are the vibrant product of all she has learned.

March of the Falsettos. This astringent, clever, ethnic, New Yorky off-Broadway musical by Newcomer William Finn doffs its top hat to Stephen Sondheim. Nicholas Nickleby. Lustrously acted by the Royal Shakespeare Co., this is a theatrical experience to be savored for a lifetime.

Piaf. The Sparrow's song--brief in ecstasy, extreme pain--was the predawn Paris blues. Tribute in kind was paid Piaf in the searing Tony Award-winning performance of Jane Lapotaire.

Sister Mary Ignatius Explains K All for You. Christopher Durang's damnably funny satire on Roman Catholic education, faith and dogma. Elizabeth Franz is a holy terror as a schoolteacher-nun.

Sophisticated Ladies. Gregory Hines is a dancing, singing, drum-flaying supernova in this stylish tribute to the dandy of the jazz kingdom, Duke Ellington.

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