RED HARLEM

An intriguing truth-is-stranger-than-fiction premise (Stalin-era Soviets’ recruitment of African-American performers for a movie expose on racism in the U.S. to be shot in the USSR) and some inventively stylized staging by director Bernadette Speakes are two major pluses in Kimba Henderson’s Red Harlem. What it needs to achieve full impact is a trim.
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HERE LIES LOVE

Center Theatre Group’s sensationally designed and performed West Coast Premiere of Here Lies Love, aka the Imelda Marcos Disco Musical, has everything an entirely sung-through show ought to have except one vital element–songs you’d want to listen to a second time.

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INCITATION TO THE DANCE

An intriguing premise—sultry queer Millennial insinuates himself into the lives of a couple of gay married Boomers—falls flat in Theatre West’s overlong, overwrought, credibility-defying World Premiere melodrama Incitation to the Dance.
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THE CIRCLE

Issues of familia, cultura, and política come to a head over the course of one tumultuous weekend in Stacey Martino Romero’s powerful if overlong World Premiere dramedy The Circle, now playing at the Greenway Court Theatre.

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BROWNSTONE


The walls of a century-old Upper West Side apartment have much to talk about in Catherine Butterfield’s Brownstone, a trio of fascinating tales all taking place in a single residence but at three distinct periods of time.
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KID GLOVES


Reality TV competitions don’t get any more entertainingly cutthroat than the one theatergoers get to witness in Matthew Leavitt and Nathan Wang’s delightful new musical comedy Kids Gloves, now getting its World Premiere at the Skylight Theatre.
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HEISENBERG


Heisenberg, Simon Stephens’s odd-couple romcom with philosophical underpinnings, now makes for a fascinating and ultimately quite moving ninety minutes of intimate theater in Los Feliz under Cameron Watson’s inspired direction.
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A SLEIGHFUL OF SONGS


Over a half dozen Theatre West member and a bevy of special invited guests joined vocal talents for four performances only of A Sleighful Of Songs, and at the risk of repeating myself, like So Many Stars two Decembers ago, this was the most glorious seventy-five minutes of songs, songs, and more songs I’ve seen and heard all year.
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