RODGERS & HAMMERSTEIN’S CINDERELLA
Wednesday, December 5th, 2007
December is family time at the theater. I can’t help wondering how many of
the talented performers in Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities’ production of
Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Cinderella first said to themselves, “That’s what I
want to do!” while attending a Christmas season show. Certainly, children
exposed to this magical production of R&H’s Cinderella will want to re-
experience musical theater again and again.
(read more)
LOVE SWEET LOVE
Tuesday, December 4th, 2007
Burt Bacharach and Hal David’s greatest hits comprise several dozen of the
most memorable songs of the 1960s. Beginning before the British invasion and
continuing through their 1968 Broadway smash Promises, Promises, Bacharach
and David wrote some of the most timeless hits of the decade. Bacharach’s
melodies and rhythms were complex but accessible and David’s lyrics told stories
that listeners could easily identify with.
(read more)
TWIST
Saturday, December 1st, 2007
The Tony and Oscar winning family classic Oliver and the recent award-
winning off-Broadway musical Twist share the same basic Charles Dickens
plotline. For those living under a rock, it goes as follows: An orphan boy named
Oliver Twist, abandoned at birth, raised in an orphanage, later sold to a
mortician, and eventually taken in by the rapscallion Fagin finds ultimate
wealth and happiness. That’s where the resemblance ends. Unlike the G-
rated, Focus on the Family approved Oliver, Gila Sand and Paul Leschen’s
Twist gives the Dickens classic a subversively gay S/M musical twist. I loved it!
(read more)
THE FULL MONTY
Saturday, December 1st, 2007
I’ve seen five (count’em) five productions of The Full Monty, and I have to tell you,
this is a show I just keep liking more and more. My love affair with TFM (well, it was
just a “like affair” at first) began with the first national tour and continued a couple
years later with a fine non-Equity tour. Then came two large-theater regional
productions, including this year’s superb Musical Theater West version, and finally,
yesterday, my first 99-seat TFM, a production which marks a hugely successful
debut for the just formed Theatre7.
(read more)
ATLANTA THE MUSICAL
Thursday, November 29th, 2007
Atlanta The Musical is a gorgeous new theatrical work, both intimate and
epic, historical and immediate, filled with powerful performances,
memorable tunes, and a timeless story of love in the time of war.
(read more)
ANNE OF GREEN GABLES: THE MUSICAL
Sunday, November 25th, 2007
Young girls in Orange County will love The Chance Theatre’s production of Anne
of Green Gables: The Musical. Based on the first and most famous of Lucy Maud
Montgomery’s eight Anne Shirley books, this adaptation by Joseph Robinette and
Evelyn D. Swenson adds songs to what has already been a 1919 silent movie, a
1934 Hollywood film (starring interestingly enough Anne Shirley), a 1956 TV
production, a British mini-series in 1972, a four-hour TV movie in 1985 which
spawned two sequels, and even a Japanese anime series. (And who knows how
many other versions are out there?)
(read more)
ALL THIS AND HEAVEN TOO
Friday, November 23rd, 2007RECOMMENDED
All This, And Heaven Too is an entertaining look at gay life over 40 viewed through a musical comedy lens. As the production’s soft shoe opener “Trolls” (the show’s original off-Broadway title) proclaims, gay men past a certain age are considered “mean and crabby, soft and flabby.” As All This, And Heaven Too reveals, they also have a zest for life, and more of an appreciation for the freedoms and the greater acceptance society has granted them post-Stonewall than “those little twits who don’t even know who Ethel Merman was.”
(read more)
RAY CHARLES LIVE
Wednesday, November 14th, 2007
Combining the appeal of the Oscar-winning hit film Ray with the dynamic live
theater format of Jersey Boys, the Pasadena Playhouse has a surefire hit on its
hands with Ray Charles Live!, written by Suzan-Lori Parks, directed by Sheldon
Epps, and featuring over two dozen hits made famous by the man of soul himself.
(read more)
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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