THE DRAWER BOY
Wednesday, April 7th, 2010
In the early 1970s, a group of Canadian actors traveled to rural South Ontario to interview local farmers and their families about their lives, and the result was a theatrical event called The Farm Show. Twenty-five years later, one of those actors, Michael Healey, wrote a play about what this experience had meant to him. His resulting 1999 dramedy The Drawer Boy has since become a regional theater favorite, and the nigh-on perfect production now playing at Beverly Hills’ Theatre 40 makes it clear just why The Drawer Boy has tickled so many fancies and touched so many hearts.
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A GIANT ARC IN THE SKYCAPE OF DIRECTIONS
Thursday, March 18th, 2010
Playwright Michael Vukadinovich takes a half dozen or so Biblical characters and stands them on their ear in his lyrical, fantastical new play A Giant Arc In The Skyspace Of Directions Or The Story Of Miracles.
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TRYING
Saturday, March 13th, 2010
There are times when all it takes is two actors to fill a stage, to fill it with humor and drama and heart. Trying, Joanna McClelland Glass’s much-loved two-hander, provides a pair of actors with just such an opportunity to shine.
WIREHEAD
Sunday, February 21st, 2010RECOMMENDED
Anyone thirty-five or older can remember a time in their teenage or adult lives when they functioned quite well without the Internet or a cell phone. Those days are long gone, prompting most of us of a certain age to wonder how we ever did without. Our lives have become so technology-dependent that that if a person’s cell phone doesn’t have Internet access (heaven forbid!), he or she is seriously behind the times. (I need to get with it on this!)
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COUSIN BETTE
Saturday, February 20th, 2010
Who would ever have thought that a 164-year-old French novel would provide the basis for the juiciest, funniest, most twisted 3-act, 3-hour family saga since Tracy Letts’ August Osage County? But that’s precisely what Jeffrey Hatcher’s delicious adaptation of Honoré de Balzac’s Cousin Bette has turned out to be, particularly under the brilliant direction of Jeanie Hackett and as performed by the superb troupe of actors who make up the Antaeus Company, “L.A.’s Classical Theater Ensemble.”
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COULD I HAVE THIS DANCE?
Wednesday, February 3rd, 2010RECOMMENDED
To the outside world, sisters Monica and Amanda would seem to have it made. They’re attractive, successful 30something businesswomen with active sex and/or love lives. Together they run Grapevine, the successful showbiz p.r. firm passed down to them by their mother Jeannette. Monica has a long-term boyfriend who adores her, while Amanda prefers to play the field dating much younger men on a one-night-stand basis. What could possibly be wrong with this picture?
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LOST IN YONKERS
Sunday, January 31st, 2010
Back when Neil Simon started writing plays like Come Blow Your Horn and Barefoot In The Park for the Broadway stage, few could have imagined that the author of such lightweight fare would go on to one day be awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Drama. Then came Brighton Beach Memoirs and the rest of the “Eugene Trilogy” and critics were forced to admit that Simon was a playwright of unique, remarkable gifts. His 1991 masterwork Lost In Yonkers impressed audiences and reviewers alike and from that play forward Simon would forever be referred to as Pulitzer Prize Winner Neil Simon.
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SEASCAPE WITH SHARKS AND DANCER
Thursday, January 28th, 2010
A young man pulls a young woman out of the ocean and brings her back to his rundown Provincetown beach house. He says she was drowning; she says she was dancing. From the get-go, romantic sparks seem to be flying between them. Their repartee recalls those screwball comedies of the 1930s, but the year is 1975 and there are hints that the young woman’s playfully argumentative nature hides a darker side. There’s also the engagement ring she finds hidden in a desk drawer that suggests that the young man too may carry emotional baggage.
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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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