THE GOODBYE GIRL
Monday, June 30th, 2014
Sunday’s delightful “family-affair” concert staged reading of the 1993 Broadway flop The Goodbye Girl made it abundantly clear why, despite a stellar pedigree, the Neil Simon-Marvin Hamlisch-David Zippel musical was not destined for a long life on The Great White Way, yet proved a perfect choice for Musical Theatre West’s One-Night-Only Reiner Reading Series.
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OTHER DESERT CITIES
Saturday, June 7th, 2014
Jon Robin Baitz’s Other Desert Cities, one of the best written, most thought-provoking, and ultimately most moving plays of the last decade, now arrives at Long Beach’s International City Theatre in a production that no lover of contemporary drama will want to miss.
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NEXT TO NORMAL
Wednesday, April 23rd, 2014
California Repertory and director Joanne Gordon bring Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey’s Next To Normal to the Queen Mary’s Royal Theater in an excitingly imaginative rendition of the 2010 Pulitzer Prize-winner, one featuring a star-turn lead performance by Karole Foreman.
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‘S WONDERFUL
Sunday, April 6th, 2014
Take forty classic George Gershwin tunes, round up five stellar triple-threats to perform them, tie the three dozen-plus songs together into five mini-musicals with the wispiest of plots, add some snappy choreography from an up-and-coming Broadway whiz kid, back the whole thing up with a terrific seven-piece orchestra, and you’ve got ‘S Wonderful: The New Gershwin Musical, the latest charmer from Music Theatre West.
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FLYIN’ WEST
Sunday, March 16th, 2014
12 Years A Slave’s recent Oscar wins make Flyin’ West, Pearl Cleage’s post-Civil-War slice-of-African-American-life-on-the-Kansas-plains, a particularly serendipitous choice as International City Theatre’s latest crowd-pleaser. That director Saundra McClain and her cast of six have come up with a particularly fine production of Cleage’s 1992 hit is icing on the cake, or in the case of Flyin’ West, ice cream on the apple pie.
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CARNIVAL
Tuesday, March 11th, 2014
Bob Merrill and Michael Stewart’s 1961 hit Carnival may have run a healthy 719 performances on Broadway, but unlike its fellow early-’60s Tony winners The Sound of Music, Gypsy, Bye Bye Birdie, How to Succeed .., Funny/Forum, and Oliver!, regional revivals of Carnival have been few and far between, hence its inclusion in Musical Theatre West’s Reiner Reading Series as a one-night-only concert staged reading, one that reminded those in attendance on Sunday that even forgotten Broadway gems have much to offer.
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THE MUSIC MAN
Tuesday, February 18th, 2014
Musical Theatre West takes one of the truly great 20th Century musicals and gives it a splendid 21st Century revival, one that would be even more splendid with an age-appropriate leading man.
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CALL ME MADAM
Tuesday, January 28th, 2014
Musical theater lovers can once again thank Ken and Dottie Reiner and Musical Theatre West’s Reiner Reading Series for bringing back to life a musical theater gem grown too obscure to inspire a fully staged production. (After all, given the choice of the two Tony-winning musicals of 1951, Guys And Dolls and Call Me Madam, which one would you choose to program as part of an upcoming season?)
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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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