Author Archive
50 SHADES! THE MUSICAL
Wednesday, March 5th, 2014RECOMMENDED
Performances are all-around sparkling, a few of them quite impressive indeed; songs are catchy, their lyrics a mix of cleverness and four-letter-word raunch; a live band provides expert musical backup; and the cocktail-swigging, mostly female audience goes nearly as wild as they would at a bachelorette party. Still, whether or not you decide to see 50 Shades! The Musical, the often outrageously funny spoof of the phenomenally popular Fifty Shades Of Grey, will depend on your wiliness to pay as much as $85 a ticket for an under-90-minute show with all the production values of a Fringe Festival offering produced on the cheap, on the very cheap.
(read more)
TARTUFFE
Tuesday, March 4th, 2014RECOMMENDED
A Noise Within opens its Spring 2014 season with the classical theater company’s own distinctive take on Molière’s classic French farce Tartuffe*, and though not the inspired revival audiences were treated to in Pericles, Cymbeline, and The Beaux Stratgem, this entertaining if at times overly dark production does at the very least make relevant points about the hypocrisy, greed, and corruption of (at least certain members of) the clergy.
(read more)
CLOSELY RELATED KEYS
Monday, March 3rd, 2014
A hotshot young corporate lawyer discovers she has an Iraqi half-sister from her father’s long ago extramarital relationship in Wendy Graf’s riveting Closely Related Keys, a World Premiere drama as topical as today’s headlines.
(read more)
GOING TO ST. IVES
Saturday, March 1st, 2014
A woman wracked with guilt over the unintentional role she has played in her son’s accidental death. A woman tormented by having given birth to a murderous son. These two mothers meet, with life-changing consequences, in Lee Blessing’s powerful two-hander Going To St. Ives, the latest from Hollywood’s illustrious Actors Co-op.
(read more)
MY NAME IS ASHER LEV
Saturday, March 1st, 2014
“Be a great painter, Asher Lev. It is the only justification for all the pain you are about to cause.”
Chaim Potok’s acclaimed 1972 novel My Name Is Asher Lev has now been transformed into a powerfully performed, deeply moving showcase for three of L.A.’s finest acting talents and one of our best directors at the award-winning Fountain Theater.
(read more)
A NICE INDIAN BOY
Thursday, February 27th, 2014
Playwright Madhuri Shekar puts a fresh, multicultural, same-sex spin on the classic romantic comedy in her World Premiere dramedy A Nice Indian Boy, one of the best original plays I’ve seen at East West Players, a romcom that had me at “Hello,” or in the case of Naveen and Keshav, at “Om.”
(read more)
THE RECOMMENDATION
Tuesday, February 25th, 2014
What starts out as an Odd Couple comedy about a pair of mismatched Brown University roommates develops into something considerably more edgy (and edge-of-your-seat) once a third character enters the mix in Jonathan Caren’s The Recommendation, now getting its first Los Angeles production—and its first with a SoCal-based cast—as IAMA Theatre Company introduces L.A. audiences to Caren’s multiple Scenie-winning hit, one guaranteed to keep you guessing from its exhilarating start to its suspenseful finish.
SEX AND EDUCATION
Monday, February 24th, 2014RECOMMENDED
The venerable Colony Theatre enters the 21st Century with a 4-letter-word-propelled bang as it reaches out to extend its subscriber base beyond the blue-hair set with an envelope-pushing production of Lissa Levin’s Sex And Education.
(read more)
Since 2007, Steven Stanley's StageSceneLA.com has spotlighted the best in Southern California theater via reviews, interviews, and its annual StageSceneLA Scenies.
COPYRIGHT 2026 STEVEN STANLEY :: DESIGN BY