LITTLE ME
Wednesday, November 27th, 2013
It takes directorial brilliance (and balls) to take a Broadway show with a cast of thirty-six playing more than three dozen roles and stage it with a mere nine performers and no set design other than one comfy armchair and pull it off, but pull it off director David Lamoureux and his cast of nine did on Sunday as Musical Theatre West opened its Reiner Reading Series’ fourth season with the 1962 Broadway gem Little Me.
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VENUS IN FUR
Tuesday, November 26th, 2013
David Ives’ Venus In Fur has come to town, or about as close to L.A. as she’s going to get for a while, which is more than enough reason to head down south to catch San Diego Repertory Theatre’s mesmerizing production of the 2012 Best Play Tony nominee.
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IN THE HEIGHTS
Saturday, November 23rd, 2013
Usnavi, Vanessa, Benny, Nina, Sonny, Daniela, Piragua Man, and all the colorful Washington Heights locals of Lin-Manuel Miranda and Quiara Alegria Hudes’ In The Heights are back in the Heights (Boyle Heights that is) as Teatro Nuevos Horizontes’ multiple Scenie-winning production of the 2008 Broadway hit returns for this year’s holiday season with four of its original stars intact and many of its new principal players living up to memories of last year’s all-around phenomenal leads.
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ILLYRIA
Friday, November 22nd, 2013
A gifted young cast directed by one of SoCal’s finest, a gorgeous score, and romance and comedy in equal measure are several of the best reasons to catch Cal State Fullerton’s blackbox staging of Illyria, Peter Mills’ musicalization of Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night*. Add to that the unlikelihood of a major L.A. theater miraculously discovering Illyria’s existence, and anyone who loves musicals should make it a point not to miss this largely unknown gem.
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SIDE SHOW
Wednesday, November 20th, 2013
Daisy and Violet Hilton, the “Siamese twins” of Bill Russell and Henry Krieger’s Side Show, are back onstage in a heartstoppingly beautiful revival of the 1997 multiple-Tony Award nominee at San Diego’s La Jolla Playhouse, a production which despite a couple too many deleted songs, makes for one powerful “revisal” as re-imagined by its creators and director Bill Condon.
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WONDERFUL TOWN
Monday, November 18th, 2013
From autobiographical short story collection to play to movie to Broadway musical to musical movie (but with different songs) to TV series. Few musical comedies have had as many incarnations as 1953’s Wonderful Town, and though Broadway revived it in 2003, this Golden Era hit has faded a bit too much into obscurity to join perennial 1950s favorites like Damn Yankees and The Pajama Game onto any major theater’s annual season—making it a perfect choice for Musical Theatre Guild to revive for one night only as the first of their 2013-2014 “concert staged reading” treats.
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ON GOLDEN POND
Monday, November 18th, 2013
Cast aside any preconceived notions you might have about “community theater” and head on over to Whittier Community Theatre to catch Ernest Thompson’s On Golden Pond (a play that hasn’t lost an iota of its humor or charm since winning the Drama Desk Award as Outstanding New Play of 1979) in a production that stands comparison to what you might see on one of our local professional stages.
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BARRYMORE
Sunday, November 17th, 2013
Southern California musical theater star Gordon Goodman brings to life stage-and-screen legend John Barrymore in William Luce’s Barrymore, the virtual one-man-show that won its originator Christopher Plummer the Tony and could well earn Goodman equivalent recognition when L.A. award season comes around.
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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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