MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING
Thursday, March 25th, 2010
There’s Shakespeare, and then there’s Shakespeare at A Noise Within. No In The Park, Under The Stars, or 99-Seat Plan Shakespeare guarantees the consistent excellence that A Noise Within’s team of world-class actors, directors, and designers deliver, time after time after time. Their current mounting of Much Ado About Nothing is no exception.
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BOEING-BOEING
Sunday, March 21st, 2010
If laughter is indeed the best medicine, then there’s no better cure for the blues than a rollicking romp of a farce. British farces, like the recently reviewed See How They Run and No Sex Please, We’re British, have become a particular favorite of this reviewer. The word farce does come from the French, however, so it should come as no surprise that English masters of farce like Ray (Move Over, Mrs. Markham) Cooney have their Gallic counterparts, most notably the late Marc Camoletti, author of Boeing-Boeing and Don’t Dress For Dinner.
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SWEENEY TODD
Sunday, March 21st, 2010
Downsizing may be the best thing that’s ever happened to Stephen Sondeheim and Hugh Wheeler’s Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber Of Fleet Street. First came the 2004 London-to-New York transfer that had a cast of ten actor-musicians who not only performed the roles but became the show’s onstage orchestra. More true to its source material than that this “high-concept” revival was The Production Company’s brilliant 2009 downscaling (once again to ten actors) in North Hollywood’s 34-seat Chandler Studio Theatre. To this reviewer, at least, The ProdCo’s “Teeney Todd” felt more like the real thing than its West End-Broadway counterpart, and the same holds true with Cygnet Theatre Company’s superb eleven-actor midsized revival down in Old Town San Diego.
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ABOVE THE LINE
Saturday, March 20th, 2010
a•bove-the-line: (ə-bŭv’-THə-līn’) adj. the part of a film’s budget that covers the costs associated with major creative talent: the stars, the director, the producer(s) and the writer(s)
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A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM
Saturday, March 20th, 2010
What a difference a director, a cast, and an orchestra can make! The Reprise! Theatre Company production of A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum is the third I’ve reviewed in less than two years, and though numbers one and two were each excellent in their own way, David Lee’s direction, an all-Equity cast, and a 22-piece orchestra elevate this Forum to a whole new level of brilliance.
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RENT
Friday, March 19th, 2010
Following their outstanding 2009 revival of Stephen Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd, The El Camino College Theatre Department has made Jonathan Larson’s Rent this year’s annual musical theater production, and the result is a thoroughly professional, often exciting staging of the 1996 Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning hit.
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A GIANT ARC IN THE SKYCAPE OF DIRECTIONS
Thursday, March 18th, 2010
Playwright Michael Vukadinovich takes a half dozen or so Biblical characters and stands them on their ear in his lyrical, fantastical new play A Giant Arc In The Skyspace Of Directions Or The Story Of Miracles.
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IN A GARDEN
Tuesday, March 16th, 2010
Middle East Meets West in Howard Korder’s thought-provoking culture clash dramatic comedy In A Garden, now playing to considerable acclaim at South Coast Repertory.
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