THE WINTER’S TALE
Friday, April 25th, 2025
If you’ve ever wished Shakespearean English weren’t so darned hard to understand (I certainly have), then Tracy Young’s modern verse translation of The Winter’s Tale, the sparklingly performed latest from Skylight Theatre Company, is the Shakespeare production for you and for me.
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JANE EYRE
Friday, April 11th, 2025A Noise Within follows their spectacular reimagining of Macbeth with a solid production of Charlotte Brontë’s Jane Eyre, albeit not as effectively staged or as ideally cast as I might have wished.
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MACBETH
Friday, February 21st, 2025
Transposing William Shakespeare’s Macbeth from the bleak moors of Scotland to the sultry streets of New Orleans is just the first of director Andi Chapman’s multiple strokes of genius in re-envisioning The Scottish Play to all-around stunning effect at A Noise Within.
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THE SEAGULL
Monday, January 20th, 2025A TV-star-studded guest production at the Odyssey Theater does a mostly terrific job of reminding audiences that Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull is, as its author steadfastly maintained, a comedy, but falls short of that goal in the play’s downer of a final act.
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THE IMPORTANCE OF BEING EARNEST
Sunday, October 20th, 2024
Inspired direction, pitch-perfect performances, and a gorgeous production design combine to make Antaeus Theatre Company’s 2024 season opener about as perfect a The Importance Of Being Earnest as any Oscar Wilde lover could wish for.
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CYRANO DE BERGERAC
Tuesday, September 10th, 2024
The translation’s the thing, but far from the only thing that makes Pasadena Playhouse’s dazzling staging of Martin Crimp’s “free adaptation” of Edmond Rostand’s French classic Cyrano de Bergerac the latest Pasadena Playhouse winner.
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TARTUFFE: BORN AGAIN
Tuesday, August 13th, 2024
That Bible-thumping scoundrel Tartuffe is once again bound and determined to rob a wealthy family blind, albeit this time in the big-haired, big-shouldered 1980s, in Tartuffe: Born Again, Freyda Thomas’s Baton Rouge-set translation of the 1664 Moliere classic, now tickling audience funny bones under Topanga skies at Will Geer’s Theatricum Botanicum.
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MISALLIANCE
Monday, May 20th, 2024
George Bernard Shaw fans won’t find a more sparklingly performed or exquisitely designed production of Misalliance than the one now playing at A Noise Within, and even if like me you find Shaw plays overly long and talky, this one’s suddenly zippy second act will have you singing its praises.
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Since 2007, Steven Stanley's StageSceneLA.com has spotlighted the best in Southern California theater via reviews, interviews, and its annual StageSceneLA Scenies.
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