DENTAL SOCIETY MIDWINTER MEETING
Friday, June 27th, 2014RECOMMENDED
Buzzworks Theater Company returns with the often entertaining West Coast Premiere of Laura Jacqmin’s Dental Society Midwinter Meeting, and though the one-act comedy proves a hit-or-miss affair, I’d gladly take it over a January in Skokie, Illinois.
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THE BROTHERS SIZE
Friday, June 20th, 2014RECOMMENDED
The Fountain Theatre follows its multiple award-winning 2012 production of Tarell Alvin McCraney’s In The Red And Brown Water with the Los Angeles Premiere of the 33-year-old playwright’s The Brothers Size, and while the production is as beautifully acted as they get, I am a good deal less enamored with the second in McCraney’s Brother/Sister Plays trilogy than I was with the first.
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DATES AND NUTS
Friday, June 6th, 2014Eve wants nothing more from a man than “a small commitment that will eventually turn into marriage.” Is that too much for a girl to ask?
Such is the conundrum of the 30something heroine of Dates And Nuts, Gary Lennon’s hilarious romantic comedy now getting its West Coast Premiere at Bootleg Theater nineteen years after it debuted at New York City’s now-defunct Theater Off Park.
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BACKYARD
Monday, June 2nd, 2014Some teenagers turn to sex. Others turn to drugs. Still others turn to rock ‘n’ roll. The teenagers in Mickey Birnbaum’s violent but exhilarating Backyard turn to wrestling, and so too do the adults in their lives.
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GRUESOME PLAYGROUND INJURIES
Tuesday, May 27th, 2014A series of Gruesome Playground Injuries (and other assorted wounds, both external and internal) provide the ties that bind two wounded souls from ages eight to thirty-eight in Rajiv Joseph’s aptly-titled Gruesome Playground Injuries, an imperfect play turned into a powerful theatrical experience thanks to the kind of superb performances, direction, and design that have become the hallmark of Rogue Machine.
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BEIJING SPRING
Thursday, May 22nd, 2014RECOMMENDED
A sensationally talented, mostly very young cast of Asian-American triple-threats, exciting, eclectic choreography, and a story that merits retelling are the best reasons to catch East West Players’ season closer, Tim Dang and Joel Iwataki’s Beijing Spring. The musical itself, however, still needs work despite considerable revision since its 1999 World Premiere.
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I TOTALLY KNOW WHAT YOU DID LAST (DONNA) SUMMER
Saturday, May 17th, 2014The wild-and-wacky (and wildly talented) folks who brought you Are You There, God? It’s Me, Karen Carpenter (in the Summer of 2012) and Prairie-oke! (in the Summer of ’13) are back with their latest summer spoof (and who cares that it’s still spring?), the aptly-named “new musical mash-up parody slasher musical” I Totally Know What You Did Last (Donna) Summer, and if its current Cavern Club Celebrity Theatre run is, like, totally sold-out, the good news is that it’s coming back in the Fall!
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HOLDING THE MAN
Sunday, May 11th, 2014The Aussies have set up shop at the Matrix Theatre as a troupe of L.A.-based actors from Down Under aptly-named the Australian Theatre Company present the Southern California Premiere of the true-life coming-of-age/coming-out/coming-to-terms-with-AIDS play Holding The Man, exciting news indeed for Angelinos in search of quality theater Ozzie-style.
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