ARRIVAL & DEPARTURE
Monday, July 16th, 2018
A deaf New York film professor and a hearing-impaired bookkeeper fall head over heels into adulterous love in Arrival & Departure, playwright Stephen Sachs’ 21st-century updating of Noel Coward’s über-romantic cinematic classic Brief Encounter, a compelling, excitingly staged, terrifically acted Fountain Theatre World Premiere whose script could still use some work.
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THE HUMANS
Wednesday, June 27th, 2018
Laughter and fears go hand in hand at Thanksgiving dinner in Stephen Karam’s justifiably honored Best Play Tony-winner The Humans, now playing at the Ahmanson with its Tony-winning stars Jayne Howdyshell and Reed Birney (and all but one of its original Broadway ensemble members) intact.
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MEXICAN DAY
Saturday, June 16th, 2018
Following the hallucinogenic surrealism of Plunge and the real-time fireworks of Tar, playwright Tom Jacobson concludes his mammoth Bimini Bath Trilogy with no less than an old-fashioned 1940s-style screwball comedy (with dramatic overtones) called Mexican Day, like its predecessors an enthralling, enlightening look at 20th-century L.A. history.
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CLYBOURNE PARK
Monday, June 11th, 2018
White flight circa 1959 and urban gentrification five decades later fuel Bruce Norris’s button-pushing, political-correctness-be-damned comedy Clybourne Park, winner of both the 2011 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and the 2012 Tony Award for Best Play, the finest production I’ve seen at Laguna Playhouse and one of the year’s very best.
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RED SPEEDO
Monday, May 28th, 2018
Obie-winning Tony-nominated playwright Lucas Hnath (The Christians, A Doll’s House, Part 2) takes on Sex, Drugs, and Olympic Sports in Red Speedo, the theatrical equivalent of a Raging Waters thrill ride now getting a gold-medal Southern California Premiere at the Road on Magnolia.
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CULT OF LOVE
Friday, May 25th, 2018
There’s no place like home for a dysfunctional family Christmas as playwright Leslye Headland makes abundantly clear in her gripping, talk-provoking, edge-of-your-seat hilarious Cult Of Love, the long-awaited final installment of her Seven Deadly Plays, the series of vice-based black comedies that put both Headland and IAMA Theatre Company on the map.
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FOREVER BOUND
Tuesday, May 22nd, 2018
Expect the unexpected from the money-making scheme concocted by the cash-starved protagonists of Steve Apostolina’s astonishing Forever Bound, now getting a rock-your-socks-off World Premiere at the Atwater Village Theater
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ELEVADA
Monday, May 21st, 2018
A rather nonsensical premise is all that’s holding back Sheila Callaghan’s Elevada from being the unqualified smash romantic comedy it sets out to be. Even so, romcom lovers like this reviewer will find themselves captivated by its terrifically acted, stunningly designed Chance Theater West Coast Premiere.
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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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