TUCUMCARI
Wednesday, February 2nd, 2011RECOMMENDED
A rundown motel on Route 66 in Tucumcari, New Mexico was the last thing Lillian expected as a honeymoon present, but that’s precisely what the young newlywed finds herself the co-proprietor of in Riley Steiner’s old-fashioned romantic drama Tucumcari, now playing at Beverly Hills’ Theatre 40.
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THE BUSY WORLD IS HUSHED
Saturday, January 22nd, 2011
As an antidote to the strident, demonizing voices of the “Christian” Right, Keith Bunin’s The Busy World Is Hushed comes as manna from playwriting heaven. Bunin’s 2006 off-Broadway hit not only spotlights a gay-affirming branch of Christianity, it also features a lead character who is both a refreshingly open-minded member of the clergy and a mother so accepting of her son’s sexual orientation that she actively encourages his quest for Mr. Right.
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TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD
Friday, January 14th, 2011
If adapting a novel for the stage provides a writing challenge for any playwright, imagine how daunting the task becomes when the novel in question has been voted the “Best Novel Of The 20th Century.”* Christopher Sergel took on this challenge in his 1990 stage adaptation of Harper Lee’s beloved Pulitzer Prize winner To Kill A Mockingbird, and though the resulting script does not rise to the level of its source material, its latest revival reestablishes The Production Company’s standing as one of L.A.’s finest and provides two hours of edifying, thought-provoking, beautifully acted, and ultimately inspiring theater.
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greedy
Saturday, January 8th, 2011
Some of Hollywood’s busiest and best TV/film actors return to their stage roots in the West Coast Premiere of greedy, Karl Gajdusek’s dryly amusing though frustratingly cryptic dark mystery suspense comedy given about as fine a West Coast Premiere as can be imagined by the talented bunch who call themselves Red Dog Squadron.
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ISLAND OF BRILLIANCE
Sunday, December 19th, 2010NOT RECOMMENDED
Eighteen-year-old Evie is reputed to be one of the top students in her New Jersey high school, but you wouldn’t know it from her college interviews. She tells the Princeton interviewer that she applied to the Ivy League school because her guidance counselor “thought I might get in.” She tells the Dartmouth interviewer that he applied there to see if the school is worth attempting suicide for. (Someone she knows tried to off himself when the school rejected him.) As for Yale, she tells the boy next door that she can’t remember whether she applied there or not.
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ELEVATOR
Saturday, December 11th, 2010
Few L.A. theater success stories can rival that of Michael Leoni’s Elevator. Opening last June at the tiniest of the Hudson theaters for a mere seven performances at the Hollywood Fringe Festival, Elevator proved such a hit with audiences that it returned in July for a month-long run. Good fortune then struck with a Critic’s Choice review in the L.A. Times, and Elevator’s producers had themselves a bona fide hit. In September, the show re-reopened at the considerably larger Hudson Mainstage for another month of performances, ultimately re-re-reopening in October at the Macha, where it now heads into the homestretch of a smash two-week-turned six-month run fueled almost entirely by word-of-mouth—though the L.A. Times review certainly didn’t hurt.
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THE BLUE ROOM
Thursday, December 9th, 2010NOT RECOMMENDED
When David Hare’s The Blue Room was staged at the Pasadena Playhouse in 2002, it ran about 90 minutes without an intermission. The same play now being presented at The Moth Theatre on Melrose lets out at about 10:50. Even figuring in an 8:10 start time (par for the course in 99-seat L.A. theater) and a 15 minute intermission, that’s a whopping 55 minutes longer—without adding new dialog.
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GREAT EXPECTATIONS
Sunday, November 21st, 2010
Over the past two decades, Glendale’s A Noise Within has tended to offer three kinds of plays, one each per Fall or Spring season. There’s something by Shakespeare, something by Ibsen, Moliere, Shaw, or an ancient Greek or Roman, and something more contemporary, say a play by Odets, Anouilh, Williams, Miller, or O’Neil. Now, with Neil Bartlett’s 2007 adaptation of Charles Dickens’ 1861 novel Great Expectations, California’s Home For The Classics gets the chance to merge the classical and the modern for an evening of classical contemporary (or contemporary classical) theater at its finest.
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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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