THE BROWNING VERSION
Saturday, January 9th, 2010
By 2010 standards, not much happens over the course of The Browning Version’s seventy-five minutes, an hour and a quarter which unrolls in real time one evening in the sitting room of an English schoolteacher’s flat.
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HAMLET
Thursday, January 7th, 2010
Just a little over three years ago, a trio of young PaliHi grads with a love of the Bard debuted a new theater company, The Porters Of Hellsgate, with a mission to make Shakespeare come alive for their generation. Their tenth production, Hamlet, once again proves them a force to be reckoned with in Los Angeles classical theater.
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HAMLET
Monday, December 14th, 2009
From its opening moments, it’s clear that this Hamlet will be quite unlike any you’ve seen before. Two young actors (Peter Weidman and Kirsten Kuiken) stand center stage in modern dress and begin reciting Hamlet’s instructions to the traveling players. You know the words. “Speak the speech I pray you as I pronounced it to you, trippingly on the tongue …” These oft-quoted acting tips will serve as advice to the cast of tonight’s performance of Hamlet, and the two actors are soon surrounded by the entire ensemble, joining voices till the final “Go make you ready.”
Lights down. Lights up. The Tragedy of the Prince of Denmark has begun.
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EXTINCTION
Sunday, November 29th, 2009
In Gabe McKinley’s deep-dark world premiere comedic drama Extinction, now playing at the Elephant Space in Hollywood, it is not an endangered species that faces the end of its days but rather the longtime friendship of Max and Finn, best buds since college. These two 30ish compadres have been spending their vacations together in Atlantic City since their undergrad days, drinking, drugging, and girl-hunting, but as Bob Dylan once put it, “The times they are a-changin.’” What happens when best friends’ paths in life diverge, one leaving the other in the lurch? Ask yourself this question: How would you react if your closest friend told you that he’d moved on? How far would you go to save this friendship, or failing that, to destroy it forever?
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EQUIVOCATION
Tuesday, November 24th, 2009
Imagine if you will that on or about the one-year anniversary of 9/11, an emissary from the President Of The United States visited the most popular contemporary American filmmaker (insert whatever name you wish here) with an order—that a movie be made about the events leading up to the terrorist attack on the Twin Towers, a movie which would place the blame on Saddam Hussein and his “weapons of mass destruction.” The President, continues his envoy, has himself written a draft of the screenplay, and our filmmaker needs only spice it up with some dialog—and with witches thrown in for good measure. (Oh, and the President can’t be in the flick.) The filmmaker knows that if he makes the movie the President is demanding, he will be telling a deliberate lie, as well as demonizing “enemies” who just may be blameless. On the other hand, to refuse the President’s demands will mean being accused of treason, and punished accordingly.
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THE TRAGEDY OF KING RICHARD III
Wednesday, November 18th, 2009
No L.A.-area theater company does Shakespeare better than Glendale’s A Noise Within. Fans of the Bard need only check out their latest production, The Tragedy Of King Richard III, for proof positive that ANW is indeed “California’s Home For The Classics.” From its stellar cast of classically trained pros to its masterful direction by Geoff Elliott to its absolutely stunning design, this is a Richard III that’s beautifully acted, brilliantly conceived, and as exciting as any classic Hollywood adventure epic.
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THE VALUE OF NAMES
Monday, November 16th, 2009
Academy Award buffs will recall a dramatic moment in the 1999 Oscar ceremony when 89-year-old Elia Kazan, two-time Best Director winner (for Gentleman’s Agreement and On The Waterfront), was awarded a special lifetime achievement Oscar. Though Warren Beatty, Kathy Bates, Karl Malden, Meryl Streep and Helen Hunt were among those who gave Kazan a standing ovation, others like Nick Nolte and Ed Harris remained seated, not joining in the applause. Nolte, Harris, and those who shared their disapproval of the Academy for honoring Kazan remained unforgiving of the octogenarian director for having named names at the House Un-American Activities Committee in 1952. Even forty-seven years later, Kazan’s decision to aid and abet the blacklisting of some two hundred artists for alleged Communist connections was one that could not be forgotten.
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THE HOUSE OF BESARAB
Sunday, November 15th, 2009
Fans of those 1960s Hammer Films horror classics like Dracula: Prince Of Darkness, Dracula Has Risen From The Grave, and Taste The Blood Of Dracula, all starring Christopher Lee as the blood-sucking Count, will be in Hammer Horror Heaven at The House Of Besarab, now playing at the historic Hollywood American Legion Post 43. Though Terance Duddy and Theodore Ott’s adaptation of the classic Bram Stoker tale does not set out to be Shakespeare, then again, neither did those Hammer screenplays by Jimmy Sangster and John Elder. What lifted the Technicolor/Techniscope extravaganzas out of the ordinary were their stellar casts (Christopher Lee later became SirChristopher Lee, thank you very much) and their lush settings.
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