UNCANNY VALLEY
Friday, April 28th, 2017
Hot topics don’t get much hotter than artificial intelligence, whether in headline news, or movies like Ex Machina, or Jimmy Fallon interviewing “Robot Sophia” on late-night TV, or in Thomas Gibbons’ fascinating, discussion-prompting, edge-of-your seat two-hander Uncanny Valley, now getting its Los Angeles Premiere at Long Beach’s International City Theatre.
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PURE CONFIDENCE
Sunday, April 16th, 2017
Pure confidence is just one of the qualities distinguishing Simon Kato from his fellow Kentucky slaves in the year 1860. Another is the champion jockey’s talent for winning any race he sets his mind to, and these days what Simon wants to win (or more precisely to buy) is his freedom.
Welcome to the world of Carlyle Brown’s Pure Confidence, the latest from Lower Depth Theatre Ensemble and quite possibly the most purely entertaining (and elucidating and emotionally powerful) show in town.
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LORD OF THE UNDERWORLD’S HOME FOR UNWED MOTHERS
Saturday, April 15th, 2017Unplanned pregnancy yields ghastly consequences in Louisa Hill’s Lord Of The Underworld’s Home For Unwed Mothers, a Skylight Theatre Company World Premiere whose cast, director, and production design succeed as often as not in overcoming the memory play’s abrupt second-act tonal shift, some cardboard supporting characters, and too much narration throughout.
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PUNK ROCK
Thursday, April 13th, 2017
The Breakfast Club’s all-American teen quintet may have found themselves holed up in the high school library like the seven English “sixth-formers” of Simon Stephens’ Punk Rock, but the world inhabited by those 1980s John Hughes archetypes seems positively Disneyesque compared to the dystopia their contemporary UK counterparts call home in Stephens’ riveting slice of middle-class private-school life, now being given an edge-of-your-seat Los Angeles Premiere by the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble.
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BUILDING THE WALL
Tuesday, March 28th, 2017Donald Trump’s campaign promise to rid America of its millions upon millions of “illegal aliens” reaches extremes that would do a certain WWII dictator proud in Building The Wall, Robert Schenkkan’s ham-fisted “It darn well could happen here!” two-hander now getting the first of a series of rolling World Premieres at the usually laudable Fountain Theatre.
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LITTLE CHILDREN DREAM OF GOD
Tuesday, March 28th, 2017
Miami reality meets Haitian black magic in Jeff Augustin’s Little Children Dream Of God, a stunningly directed, designed, and performed Road Theatre Company West Coast Premiere.
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CAT’S PAW
Monday, March 27th, 2017
Suspense dramas don’t much more edge-of-your-seat nor subject matter more hot-button than William Mastrosimone’s 1986 eco-terrorism thriller Cat’s Paw, updated by the author in 2011, more relevant than ever in 2017, and the terrific latest from Actors Co-op.
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CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF
Saturday, March 25th, 2017
Cameron Watson directs two equally sensational ensembles in Antaeus Theatre Company’s pitch-perfect intimate revival of Tennessee Williams’ Cat On A Hot Tin Roof, not only one of the finest productions now playing around town but (sound the trumpets!) the very first to grace the brand-spanking-new Kiki & David Gindler Performing Arts Center in Beautiful Downtown Glendale.
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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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