CLOSER THAN EVER
Sunday, March 1st, 2015
Four of the most gloriously-voiced actor-singers in town, clever musical staging by the Ovation-winning Janet Miller, over two-dozen of Richard Maltby, Jr. and David Shire’s most melodious and insightfully worded songs, and a superbly played 9.5-foot-long concert grand add up to a thoroughly captivating Closer Than Ever at Burbank’s Hollywood Piano. Lighting may be rudimentary, the set may consist simply of a red velvet curtain, four stools, and said piano, and the folding-chair seating as back-challengingly uncomfy as it gets, but oh the performances! Oh the songs!
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I LOVE YOU, YOU’RE PERFECT, NOW CHANGE
Saturday, February 14th, 2015
Men are from Mars and women are from Venus and both sexes (and the battles between them) are as entertaining as male-female battles get in The Los Angeles New Court Theatre’s terrifically performed revival of Joe Di Pietro and Jimmy Roberts’ two-decade-old—but eternally relevant—smash off-Broadway musical revue I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change.
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COMPANY
Saturday, January 24th, 2015
It’s been over a decade since Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s Tony-winning Best Musical of 1970, Company, has had an L.A. (or L.A.-adjacent) big-stage revival, making its arrival at Thousand Oaks’ Cabrillo Music Theater big news indeed, particularly as directed with abundant inspiration and flair by Nick DeGruccio and performed by an all-around fabulous cast, with Cate Caplin’s imaginative choreography giving the show an added dash of pizzazz.
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BUDDY – THE BUDDY HOLLY STORY
Monday, January 19th, 2015
February 3, 1959 may well have been, as Don McLean sang it, “the day the music died,” but the music of Buddy Holly lives on at Candlelight Pavilion Dinner Theater in the crowd-pleasing musical/tribute concert hybrid that is Buddy – The Buddy Holly Story.
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PUTTING IT TOGETHER
Monday, November 17th, 2014
Putting It Together, aka The Greatest Hits Of Stephen Sondheim Volume Two, has made a splendid arrival at Chromolume Theatre, the 1999 Broadway revival version of the original 1992 UK production updating 1976’s Side by Side by Sondheim with songs from S.S. shows as recent as 1990’s Assassins—news which should come as the best end-of-year gift to Sondheim lovers near and far.
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BRIGHT STAR
Wednesday, October 8th, 2014
Some of the most gorgeous songs I’ve heard in a new musical plus a bevy of equally memorable performances bode well for the post-World Premiere future of Steve Martin and Edie Brickell’s Bright Star despite an “original story” so reminiscent of this or that 1930s/40s Hollywood weeper that audience members may find themselves convinced they’re watching the musical stage adaptation of an oldtime Barbara Stanwyck/Claudette Colbert flick. (Not that there’s anything wrong with that.)
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SONGS FOR A NEW WORLD
Wednesday, August 27th, 2014RECOMMENDED
Inland Valley Repertory Theatre celebrates the end of summer with Jason Robert Brown’s Songs For A New World, the song cycle that put the future Tony winner’s name on the map, and if not the inspired vision of Brown’s 1995 debut that I’ve seen previously, a number of fine performances (and one in particular) make this a mostly effective, ultimately affecting revival of the very first JRB hit.
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SMOKEY JOE’S CAFÉ
Sunday, August 3rd, 2014
Want to hear “Kansas City,” “Yakety Yak,” “Love Potion No. 9,” “On Broadway” and a few dozen other 1950s rock and pop hits as performed by an all-around splendid young cast and enjoy a yummy dinner to boot? Then head on over to Claremont for dinner and a show as Candlelight Pavilion revives the longest-running musical revue in Broadway history, Smokey Joe’s Café, featuring forty of the greatest hits of rock-and-roll songwriting legends Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller.
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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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