The songs of Annie Lennox and The Eurythmics provide the musical soundtrack to Stripped, writer-director-choreographer Kelleia Sheerin’s seductively danced love letter to (and cautionary tale about) the City of Angels.

 Dedicated by Sheerin to “the people and communities who have deepened my love, helped me heal, honed not only my craft but my soul and built this life with me,” Stripped opens with Jean (Stephanie Michels) typing on her computer keyboard as the staccato beats of “Here Comes The Rain Again” take control of her body and flash us back to her daughter Vivi (Jennifer Hamilton) as a bullied high school student who soon sets out to begin a new life in Los Angeles.

As “Money Can’t Buy It” segues into “Would I Lie To You Baby” and then into “Walking On Broken Glass” and then into “Legend In My Living Room,” we follow Vivi’s journey from hope to despair to degradation to ultimate triumph over her demons.

Accompanying Hamilton on Vivi’s trek through the highs and lows of La La Land are dance captain Amber Dupuy (Vogue), Sylvie Gosse (Lucky Star), associate director-associate choreographer Scott Hislop (Frank), Nicole Humphries (Nasty), Jul Kohler (Madame 30), Jade Ramirez (Lizzy Bamm Bamm), Victoria Taylor (Battlefield), and Max Teboul (Faith) as assorted Angelinos either good or evil or somewhere in-between.

Popping in from time to time are therapist Dr. D (Yvette Tucker), Vivi’s loving sister Bizzy (Julie Schmid), and the demonic Devious (Paula Venise) the later two of whom vie on opposite sides of the good-evil spectrum for Vivi’s soul.

That Sheerin and her cast of 30something-and-up dancers manage to tell Vivi’s story without a single spoken word is testimony to her storytelling gifts as a choreographer and theirs as dancers, and to a musical soundtrack that seems as if the Annie Lennox songs that comprise Stripped (sixteen in all from her days as half of the 1980s electronic pop sensation the Euthymics to her solo career in 1990s and early 2000s) could have been written for it and not the other way around.

 Hamilton (Emmy-nominated for choreographing Apple TV+’s “Physical”) delivers the most stunning dance performance of the year as Vivi, and there’s not a less-than-spectacular link in Sheerin’s supporting cast, with special snaps to best-sister-ever Schmid and to Venise, whose Devious reveals the seductive power of addiction.

Stripped looks fabulous too, from its striking neon lighting design to its array of 1980s costumes by Last Follies Costumes with additional costumes by Ripley Rader.

Not only that, but its iconic soundtrack (Peter Downing is soundtrack editor) is as thrilling and bewitching as it is nostalgic to anyone who remembers the glitzy, decadent ‘80s.

Nikki Tuazon is assistant choreographer. Joann Sheerin is costume madame and Willow Atkinson is costume mistress. Stella Choe is stage manager.

 Though I’m far from a dance connoisseur, you don’t have to be one to fall under Stripped’s enthralling spell. Los Angeles to its core, this is L.A. dance theater at its most exhilarating.

Hudson Backstage Theatre, 6539 Santa Monica Blvd., Hollywood.
https://strippedballet.square.site/

–Steven Stanley
October 1, 2025
Curtain call photos: Steven Stanley

Visit www.theatreinla.com/nowplayingrs.php for a review roundup of what’s now playing in theaters around Los Angeles.

Tags: Kelleia Sheerin, Los Angeles Theater Review, The Eurythmics. Annie Lennox