DREAM BOY
Sunday, January 31st, 2016
Nine years after a pair of gay teen boys fell unforgettably into first love in Jonathan Harvey’s Beautiful Thing, Celebration Theatre and director Michael Matthews reunite for the similarly themed (albeit considerably darker) Dream Boy, Eric Rosen’s meticulously faithful adaptation of Jim Grimsley’s haunting Southern Gothic novel, an imaginatively directed, superbly performed, gorgeously designed Los Angeles Premiere marred only by poor sightlines that will often have you craning to see the action.
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AWAKE & SING!
Sunday, January 10th, 2016
Clifford Odets’ Depression-era drama Awake & Sing! has reopened at the Odyssey Theatre for a January extension, exciting news indeed for fans of the kind of big-cast, big-issue Great American Classics that don’t get written anymore.
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A GOOD FAMILY
Sunday, November 29th, 2015RECOMMENDED
A charge of rape lodged against their college student son casts a pall over a Midwestern American couple’s Christmas Eve celebration in A Good Family, Marja-Lewis Ryan’s World Premiere drama that combines several of the elements that made her award-winning One In The Chamber a critical/popular hit last year—crisp writing, outstanding acting, edge-of-your-seat suspense—yet feels incomplete, and not simply for its hour-and-change running time.
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WOOD BOY DOG FISH
Sunday, November 29th, 2015
Imagine Walt Disney’s Pinocchio had Tim Burton been in creative charge and opted for a live-action 99-seat Los Angeles theater staging rather than an animated film and you’ll have some idea of what to expect in Wood Boy Dog Fish, Rogue Artists Ensemble and Bootleg Theatre’s deliciously dark-and-twisted take on Carlo Collodi’s classic childhood tale.
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@thespeedofJake
Wednesday, November 25th, 2015
A grieving father’s attempt to connect with his deceased elementary-school-age son leads him on an unexpected journey towards healing in Jennifer Maisel’s transformative family drama @thespeedofJake, the superbly directed/acted latest World Premiere from Jon Lawrence Rivera and Playwrights’ Arena.
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FRONT DOOR OPEN
Monday, November 23rd, 2015NOT RECOMMENDED
An improbable script, grating characters, problematic performances, lackluster direction, and above all the trivialization of a crippling anxiety disorder afflicting over three million Americans make Tom Baum’s Front Door Open a World Premiere production not worth leaving your house for.
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THE GLASS MENAGERIE
Sunday, November 22nd, 2015
Orange County’s Theatre Out concludes its 2015 season with a mostly quite successful revival of Tennessee Williams’s The Glass Menagerie, a play which, even seven decades after its 1944 Broadway premiere, remains his most timeless work.
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THE PAINTED ROCKS AT REVOLVER CREEK
Tuesday, November 17th, 2015
Premier South African playwright Athol Fugard once again puts a personal face on apartheid in his deeply moving two-act drama The Painted Rocks Of Revolver Creek, now getting a gorgeously-acted West Coast Premiere at Fugard’s Los Angeles home, the award-winning Fountain 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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