OTHER DESERT CITIES
Sunday, June 7th, 2015
Jon Robin Baitz’s Other Desert Cities has arrived 175 miles west of Palm Springs at Ventura’s Rubicon Theatre in a production that makes it abundantly clear why the 2012 Pulitzer Prize finalist stands as one of the best written, most thought-provoking, and ultimately most moving plays of the last decade.
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MARY POPPINS
Saturday, April 18th, 2015
Mary Poppins The Broadway Musical has arrived at Cabrillo Music Theatre to enchant audiences of all ages, and though Opening Night was technically rough around the edges, this is one terrifically entertaining production, particularly with Juliana Hansen and Wesley Alfvin filling Julie Andrews’ and Dick Van Dyke’s shoes quite marvelously indeed.
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CATCH ME IF YOU CAN
Monday, March 16th, 2015
Actors Repertory Theatre Of Simi gives its audiences the best big-scale musical I’ve seen at the Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center in their sensationally entertaining mid-sized staging of Broadway’s 2011 Best Musical Tony nominee Catch Me If You Can, a production that requires no allowances to be made “for community theater.” This is topnotch work from start to finish, and a production any professional theater would be proud to call its own.
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THE LAST FIVE YEARS
Friday, January 30th, 2015
Jason Robert Brown’s The Last Five Years is revived to powerful, affecting life at Ventura’s Rubicon Theatre thanks to the combined efforts of director Stephanie A. Coltrin, costars Ashley Fox Linton and Louis Pardo, musical director Brent Crayon, and perhaps most remarkably of all, of scenic, lighting, and projection designer Mike Billings.
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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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THE GIFT OF THE MAGI THE MUSICAL
Saturday, December 20th, 2014NOT RECOMMENDED
The 2000-word classic The Gift Of The Magi might well make a charming twenty-minute one-act musical. Add to it over a dozen characters (none of whom would ever have entered O’Henry’s mind) and a dozen songs (only a couple of which might inspire a second listen), and despite the best efforts of director, choreographer, musical director, and cast, what you end up with is The Gift Of The Magi The Musical.
Rarely has this reviewer found two thirty-five minute acts so endless.
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A CHRISTMAS CAROL
Sunday, November 30th, 2014RECOMMENDED
Alan Menken & Lynn Ahrens’s gorgeous songs are the best of quite a few reasons to catch Actors Repertory Theatre Of Simi’s holiday production of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol despite the disservice its multitalented hometown cast is done by some sour notes emanating from the orchestra pit.
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MEMPHIS
Saturday, November 15th, 2014
Todd Adamson gives one of the year’s truly great performances as DJ Huey Calhoun opposite a sensational SoCal-debuting Lakeisha Renee Houston as star-to-be Felicia Farrell in Cabrillo Music Theatre’s Regional Premiere of Memphis, the fact-inspired tale of a Tennessee disc jockey who made history by daring to play “race music” on white radio back in the still-segregated 1950s.
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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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