I LOVE LUCY® LIVE ON STAGE
Monday, October 24th, 2011
Have you ever wondered what it might have been like to be inside Desilu Studios for a taping of the sitcom that revolutionized TV? If so, then let I Love Lucy® Live on Stage be your time machine back to the early 1950s—and ninety of the funnest/funniest minutes you’re likely to have all year.
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SHIRLEY VALENTINE
Wednesday, October 12th, 2011
Chick flick fans of a certain age may recall British actress Pauline Collins’ Oscar-nominated performance as Shirley Valentine in the 1989 movie of the same name. If you’re like me, you sat entranced watching 40something Liverpool housewife Shirley leave the drudgery of her day-to-day existence for a life-altering holiday in Greece, her traveling companion not her inattentive, unappreciative lug of a husband but contest-winning best friend Jane—who promptly abandons Shirley upon arrival. Befriended by an English couple whose xenophobia proves too much to take, Shirley takes off into the night and into arms of a handsome Greek named Costas.
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PSYCHO BEACH PARTY
Monday, October 3rd, 2011NOT RECOMMENDED
No one sends up popular film genres with a campier (i.e. gayer) sensibility than Charles Busch, whether it’s the “Oriental” melodramas of Hollywood’s Golden Era in Shanghai Moon, or those ’50s/’60s Ross Hunter soap operas in Die! Mommy! Die!, or WWII “Women In Peril” thrillers in The Lady In Question, or the red-baiting propaganda films of the late ’40s/early ’50s in Red Scare On Sunset.
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NOISES OFF
Thursday, September 29th, 2011
Imagine a production of one of those hilarious English farces like No Sex Please, We’re British whose actors are still struggling with their lines, have yet to master the requisite comic timing, and still haven’t learned when to enter and exit. Lines will be forgotten, jokes won’t get their payoff, cues will be missed, and the entire production an absolute mess. Certainly not one you’d pay to see, right?
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LOOT
Sunday, September 25th, 2011
No one wrote darker, more subversive comedies than Joe Orton—or funnier ones for that matter. Those requiring proof of the above need only head on over to San Pedro’s Little Fish Theatre to check out their terrific production of Orton’s darkly subversive farce.
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GUIDED CONSIDERATION OF A LAMENTABLE DEED
Saturday, September 24th, 2011
The play may well be the thing, but sometimes “the thing” adds up to considerably more than just the play. Such is the case with needtheater’s World Premiere production of Frank Basloe’s Guided Consideration Of A Lamentable Deed. Though Basloe’s dark comedy is intelligent, entertaining, and thought-provoking enough to stand on its own, when you add a pre-show “kegger” (more about that later), a one-of-a-kind venue, and live music after the show for those who wish to stick around, this brand new play by a relative unknown becomes a “thing” well worth taking a chance on.
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A WIDOW OF NO IMPORTANCE
Friday, September 23rd, 2011
East West Players open their 46th Anniversary Season with the World Premiere of Shane Sakhrani’s infectiously funny and utterly charming A Widow Of No Importance, a generation gap comedy set in Mumbai, India that theatergoers from any ethnic background are likely to embrace as warmly as its core South Asian audience.
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PRIDE AND PREJUDICE
Wednesday, September 21st, 2011
Pride And Prejudice. Is there anyone who isn’t familiar with Jane Austen’s romantic classic in one form or another? True, not everyone has read the novel (and that includes this reviewer), but between the 1980 and ’95 TV adaptations, the 1940 and 2005 movie versions, and the innumerable romcoms (novels, plays, films, TV series, etc.) which have taken Austen’s tale as inspiration, there’s hardly one of us who won’t feel at least a spark of recognition while watching P&P’s latest adaptation at South Coast Repertory, all the way from Elizabeth Bennet and Mr. Darcy’s scrappy first meeting to the blissful happy ending we know awaits them.
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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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