RANSOM, TEXAS
Sunday, January 11th, 2015RECOMMENDED
San Francisco’s Virago Theatre Company has come south to offer L.A. its production of William Bivins’ edgy psychological thriller Ransom, Texas, and there is much to recommend in it, particularly Dixon Phillips’ intensely raw lead performance, though Phillips’ costar’s vaguely non-native accent makes it hard to buy the pair as a West Texas father and son.
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WIT
Monday, January 5th, 2015Too much meddling with a Pulitzer Prize winner, along with an otherwise effective Kelly Carlton’s unwillingness to “go all the way,” make Stage Against The Machine’s revival of Margaret Edson’s Wit a no-go despite co-director Carlton’s often quite moving work as Vivian Bearing PhD and a couple of terrific supporting turns.
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THE PENIS CHRONICLES
Sunday, January 4th, 2015RECOMMENDED
The eight largely unrelated monologs about sex and love (from a male point of view) that comprise The Penis Chronicles: Every Man’s Journey make Tom Yewell’s World Premiere drama seem at times more acting class showcase than full-fledged play. Still, there are enough fine performances in its mostly well-written one-man playlets to make The Penis Chronicles worth a look-see by those who don’t mind its lack of character interaction or cohesive storyline.
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POSSUM CARCASS
Saturday, January 3rd, 2015
The love triangles of Anton Chekhov’s The Seagull return to wild-and-crazy 21st-century life in David Bucci’s Possum Carcass, the 120-year-old Chekhov classic retold as graphic novel … and the latest from the always intriguing Theatre Of NOTE.
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HELLCAB
Thursday, December 18th, 2014
When Jean-Paul Sartre wrote “L’enfer, c’est les autres,” the “others” he was referring to could easily have been the passengers who make a Chicago cab driver’s life a living enfer in Will Kern’s hilarious (or should that be “hellarious”) Hellcab, back at the Elephant Theatre for the first time since its smash 2005 run with its director and cab-driving star once again along for the ride.
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THE SANTALAND DIARIES
Sunday, December 14th, 2014
Matt Crabtree returns as David, Crumpet, and a host of other colorful characters in The SantaLand Diaries, neither understudy nor across-the-country Elf this time round but the centerstage star of his very own, all-around splendid production of David Sedaris’s holiday one-man show.
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ALMOST, MAINE
Saturday, December 6th, 2014
Plays don’t get any more magical, nor any more unabashedly romantic (with just enough salt to keep things from getting sappy) than John Cariani’s Almost, Maine, the record-breaking Most Produced Flop in off-Broadway history, now getting what well may be its first fully-cast professional Los Angeles production since its 2006 New York debut—and an absolutely wonderful one at that.
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TRUE WEST
Saturday, November 1st, 2014
A quartet of USC grads have joined forces in “Let’s put on a show” tradition (with some 21st-century Kickstarter help) to bring Los Angeles theater lovers an excitingly performed revival of True West, Sam Shepard’s 1980 contemporary-classic tale of brotherly love and hate.
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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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