WELCOME TO YOUR ALTERNATIVE REALITY
Monday, July 10th, 2017Open Fist Theatre Company gives late-night-TV-style sketch comedy an entertaining go in Welcome To Your Alternative Reality, a more-hit-than-miss collection of Trump-era-inspired sketches that could stand a trim but serves as an often quite funny showcase for company members in SNL-meets-MadTV mode.
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LETTERS FROM A NUT BY TED L. NANCY
Friday, June 30th, 2017Despite its inventive multimedia staging and Beth Kennedy’s kaleidoscopic supporting turn, the Geffen Playhouse’s wacky, wispy Letters From A Nut By Ted L. Nancy, even at a mere sixty-eight minutes, runs about half-an-hour too long, and with full-price tickets going for as much as $85 a pop, anyone minus money/time to burn would do better to order a copy of Nancy’s book from Amazon where used copies start at fifteen cents.
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CRIMES OF THE HEART
Saturday, June 10th, 2017
The Mississippi Magrath sisters have set up housekeeping at Long Beach’s International City Theatre with all their quirks and charms and ups and downs intact in the best of the seven productions I’ve now seen of Beth Henley’s crowd-pleasing down-home comedy gem Crimes Of The Heart.
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THE MONSTER BUILDER
Wednesday, May 17th, 2017A topnotch cast attack The Monster Builder with gusto, but a rather creepy lead character and a bit too much of the quirky and bizarre make Amy Freed’s South Coast Repertory World Premiere satire of architectural pretention more miss than hit despite occasional forays into the weirdly hilarious.
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ARCHDUKE
Wednesday, May 10th, 2017
Leave it to playwright Rajiv Joseph to turn the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand at Sarajevo, the event that led directly to the outbreak of the First World War, into Archduke, not only the year’s screwballsiest comedy but one with contemporary relevance in a world of suicide bombers and suicide voters.
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SYLVIA
Monday, May 1st, 2017
There’s never been a romantic triangle quite like the one that propels A.R. Gurney’s Sylvia, now getting a cheer-worthy Rubicon Theater revival with an irresistible Ashley Fox Linton as the canine homewrecker who gives this alternately hilarious and heartstrings-tugging romcom its name.
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HAROLD AND MAUDE
Monday, May 1st, 2017The strokes of inspiration that made last year’s Private Eyes one of Morgan-Wixson Theatre’s best are occasionally evident in Colin Higgins’ Harold And Maud, but this time around director Brandon Baer is hampered by casting missteps, pacing problems, and a stage too cavernous for the inventive look he and his design team have conceived.
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THE LEGEND OF GEORGIA MCBRIDE
Friday, April 14th, 2017
Two stars are born in the Geffen Playhouse West Coast Premiere of The Legend Of Georgia McBride. One is the Florida Panhandle drag queen whose reputation gives Matthew Lopez’s crowd-pleasing comedy its name. The other is Andrew Burnap, whose revelatory performance as an Elvis impersonator who discovers a whole new love of performing portends huge things ahead for the 2016 Yale School Of Drama MFA grad.
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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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