ANNIE
Friday, May 18th, 2012
Rarely has a hard-knock life made for more delightful family entertainment than the one led by a little orphan named Annie in the multiple Tony Award-winning musical bearing her name. Now, beating the projected Fall 2012 Broadway revival by several months, Glendale Centre Theatre stages its very own in-the-round rendition of the much-loved Broadway megahit (2377 performances from ‘77 to ‘83!).
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A LITTLE NIGHT MUSIC
Friday, May 18th, 2012
East West Players continues its love affair with Stephen Sondheim with a fresh, new Asian-Pacific Islander take on A Little Night Music, one which follows in the footsteps of past EWP-SS collaborations begun back in 1979 with Pacific Overtures. Company, Follies, A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum, Into The Woods, Marry Me A Little, Merrily We Roll Along, Passion, and Sweeney Todd have all gotten East West Players makeovers since then, and now Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler’s 1973 adaptation of Ingmar Bergman’s Smiles of a Summer Night at last makes its East West debut.
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THE CHILDREN
Wednesday, May 16th, 2012
When Susan Smith confessed to having drowned her two small children back in 1994, it was hard not to draw parallels between this murderous mom of today and that lethal lady of mythology known as Medea. Though their motives were different (Susan wanted to get rid of her kids, the better to fool around with a man who didn’t want a “ready-made” family; Medea killed hers to punish her husband for an adulterous affair), the results were tragically the same.
Perhaps inspired by this tale as old as Greek tragedy and as recent as today’s headlines, playwright Michael Elyanow has written an extraordinary (if a tad too intricate) new play, The Children, which Theatre @ Boston Court is now World Premiering under the inspired direction of Jessica Kubzanky.
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A CHORUS LINE
Monday, May 14th, 2012
Before 1975, most Broadway theatergoers probably hadn’t given much thought to “the chorus,” those anonymous singers and dancers who backed up the stars that locals and out-of-towners were paying big bucks to see. For most, these chorus boys and girls were simply the nameless/faceless citizens of River City, Iowa, or Covent Garden, London, or Anatevka, Russia.
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LOVE STRUCK
Saturday, May 12th, 2012
Playwright Dale Griffiths Stamos follows her 2011 collection of family-based one-acts, Thicker Than Water, with an even bigger and better bunch for 2012, an octet of love-themed playlets aptly titled Love Struck.
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THE SCOTTSBORO BOYS
Tuesday, May 8th, 2012
Racism in the early 20th Century South may seem an unlikely subject for a Broadway musical—let alone two—yet wonder of wonders, just as Jason Robert Brown and Alfred Uhry’s Parade draws to a close at San Diego’s Cygnet Theatre comes the West Coast Premiere of John Kander and Fred Ebb’s The Scottsboro Boys at the Old Globe, and as was the case with its predecessor, this is indeed cause for celebration.
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PIPPIN
Monday, May 7th, 2012
Picture a hundred thirty or so dancing, glow-in-the-dark fingertips spiraling and swirling around on an otherwise pitch-black stage as the orchestra launches into “Magic To Do” and you’ll have some idea of just how fresh and new the Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center revival of Pippin is. Then again, few musicals lend themselves to as many different interpretations as the Stephen Schwartz classic. Reprise did it sexy and Chicago-esque some years back, East West Players took an Asian hip-hop approach to the material, and Deaf West at the Taper featured not one but two Pippins, one deaf and one hearing. SCVAC describes their Pippin as taking place in the “intriguing and wacky world of Steampunk Carnivale,” and an exciting new interpretation it is.
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SPRING AWAKENING
Friday, May 4th, 2012
Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik’s Spring Awakening has awakened once again, this time as a showcase for a group of very talented, mostly college-age performers and a director whose vision has already impressed this reviewer on more than one occasion.
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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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