BULLSHOT CRUMMOND & THE INVISIBLE BRIDE OF DEATH
Sunday, January 2nd, 2011
It’s been nearly four decades since British master police detective wannabe Hugh “Bullshot” Crummond made his stage debut, doing his darnedest to outwit fiendish German villain Otto Von Bruno and his seductive “niece” Lenya to the delight of audiences in England and the United States. Co-creator Ron House now brings back Bullshot, the Von Brunos, Bullshot’s blushing bride Rosemary, and a host of other outlandish 1930s characters in Bullshot Crummond & The Invisible Bride Of Death, getting its world premiere production at North Hollywood’s Whitmore-Lindley Theatre. The result is as hilarious and inventive a show as you’re likely to see this or any other holiday/New Year’s season.
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A CHRISTMAS TWIST
Monday, December 27th, 2010
What Blazing Saddles did to the western, what Young Frankenstein did to the
horror movie, what High Anxiety did to Alfred Hitchcock’s oeuvre, this is what A
Christmas Twist does to Charles Dickens A Christmas Carol … and the result is the
funniest Christmas show of this year’s holiday season.
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THE EIGHT: REINDEER MONOLOGUES
Monday, December 13th, 2010
Jeff Goode’s The Eight: Reindeer Monologues has been entertaining Orange County audiences at the Chance Theater for the past seven Decembers. In my review of last year’s production, I called it “the funniest (and filthiest) Christmas show in town.” As for its plot, “one by one, Santa’s eight reindeer weigh in on the sex scandal that’s been rocking the North Pole. Is it true that Jolly Old St. Nick (aka ‘that fat fuck’) sexually molested Reindeer Number 8 (aka Vixen), or is the sexiest of The Eight merely looking for her fifteen minutes of fame?”
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MURDERERS
Wednesday, December 8th, 2010
Jeffrey Hatcher’s Murderers is a theatrical experiment that works, though at first glance you might have your doubts. You might well wonder, for example, if three monologs delivered one each by a trio of actors can possibly be called a play. After all, the actors appear together on stage only twice, first for Murderers’ opening lines (“I am a murderer.” “I am a murderer.” “I am a murderer.”) and second at curtain calls. In fact, the only thing the monologs have in common is their setting—Florida’s Riddle Key Retirement Community—and the fact that each is being delivered by a murderer. Is this really a play, let alone one given thumbs up by the New York Times?
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COLD LANG SYNE
Saturday, December 4th, 2010
In college, frat brothers Trevor, Perry, Garth, and Mark were known as the Four Musketeers of Sigma Pi, and since then—once every four years for the past twenty years—they’ve been reuniting to catch up on old times. There’s only one hitch. Trevor, Perry, and Garth can’t stand Mark’s guts, and wouldn’t mind at all if he dropped dead.
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FAIRIES WITH CHILDREN
Saturday, November 13th, 2010RECOMMENDED
Gay best friends go underground in a Pomona cul-de-sac in an attempt to change the hearts and minds of conservative America in John Trapper’s Fairies With Children (The Yes On Hate Episode), a World Premiere comedy now playing at the Meta Theatre.
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CRIMES OF THE HEART
Wednesday, November 10th, 2010
East West Players 2010-11 season continues with its second smash hit in a row—an absolutely splendid staging of the quirky Southern comedy Crimes Of The Heart. The third major Southern California revival of Beth Henley’s Pulitzer Prize-winning play since May, East West’s is the first to feature an all-Asian American cast—and why not? As Artistic Director Tim Dang has stated, “Asians do live in the South, Asians do speak with Southern accents and Asians historically have been part of the American landscape for well over a century.” Since Hollywood casting directors remain for the most part blithely unaware of this reality, it’s up to theater companies like East West to give members of the Asian American acting community roles like Henley’s delightfully quirky Magrath sisters—parts which Elizabeth Liang, Kimiko Gelman, and Maya Erskine bring to vivid, authentic, hilarious, and emotionally resonant life.
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BLITHE SPIRIT
Sunday, November 7th, 2010
WWII London had just undergone the eight months of sustained bombing by Hitler’s Luftwaffe (and seen tens of thousands of its citizens killed, and even more injured) when Noël Coward’s Blithe Spirit opened in June of 1941, offering shell-shocked Londoners a welcome escape from the horrors of the night skies and keeping them laughing throughout the war—for a grand total of 1997 performances.
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