BOOM
Thursday, May 27th, 2010
From the way Jules and Jo “meet cute” in Peter Sinn Nachtrieb’s Boom, now playing at Pasadena’s Furious Theatre Company, you’d think you were in for the kind of romcom that’s made stars of Meg Ryan, Sandra Bullock, Julia Roberts, and Reece Witherspoon, any one of whom could have played Jo at one point in their careers opposite a young Tom Hanks, Billy Crystal, or Mark Ruffalo.
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SARAH, SARAH
Thursday, May 20th, 2010
“How often do you see a comedy that’s not only consistently hilarious but is also a work of real substance, a play that makes you both laugh and think at the same time? Not often, I’d venture to guess.”
Thus began my review of Daniel Goldfarb’s Modern Orthodox a little under three years ago, and the same can be said of the playwright’s Sarah, Sarah, now delighting audiences as part of West Coast Jewish Theatre’s 2009-10 season.
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CRIMES OF THE HEART
Tuesday, May 18th, 2010
Southern Quirky is a hard act to get right. There’s a tendency to overdo the Southern and overplay the Quirky that can turn characters into caricatures.
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PLAYBOY OF THE WESTERN WORLD
Wednesday, May 12th, 2010
With some rip-roaring performances and a superb production design, A Noise Within’s revival of John Millington Synge’s once scandalous 1907 comedy The Playboy Of The Western World would be all-around wonderful if most of its cast weren’t speaking in a Western Irish accent so thick that it can get downright incomprehensible. Fortunately, the zest with which the performers attack their roles, some terrific physical comedy, and a storyline which (thank goodness) gets easier to follow as Act One turns to Act Two and Act Three make for an entertaining evening of theater directed by Geoff Elliott.
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MATT AND BEN
Wednesday, May 5th, 2010
No one except the co-authors themselves knew the true story behind Matt Damon and Ben Affleck’s Academy Award-winning screenplay for Good Will Hunting until well over five years after Oscar night 1998—not until August 21, 2002, that is, when Mindy Kaling and Brenda Wither’s Matt & Ben opened at the New York International Fringe Festival.
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L.A. NOIR UnSCRIPTED
Sunday, May 2nd, 2010
They’ve done Jane Austen UnScripted, Tennessee Williams UnScripted, and William Shakespeare UnScripted to rave notices and audience cheers. Impro Theatre now turns its talents to L.A. Noir UnScripted, and the 100% improvised result may well be their very best UnScripted yet.
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THE PHILADELPHIA STORY
Sunday, May 2nd, 2010
Fans of 1930s comedies will want to cheer Actors Co-op’s revival of Philip Barry’s 1939 hit The Philadelphia Story, a title quickly recognized by film buffs as that of the Oscar-winning 1940 movie classic starring Cary Grant, Katharine Hepburn, and James Stewart. (Hepburn starred in both stage and screen versions, with the plot of the MGM adaptation sticking much closer to the Broadway original than did, say, the movie versions of You Can’t Take It With You or Stage Door.)
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CRIMES OF THE HEART
Saturday, May 1st, 2010
It’s probably a toss-up as to which group of Southern women are the more famous, the gals who get their hair done at Truvy’s in Robert Harling’s Steel Magnolias or the Magrath sisters of Beth Henley’s Pulitzer Prize-winning Crimes Of The Heart. In either case, those with a fondness for Henley’s quirky Mississippi siblings will be happy to know that they are alive and well and performing nightly at Ventura’s Rubicon Theatre.
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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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