LI’L ABNER

posted on August 29th, 2016 at 1:48 PM by Steven Stanley

They don’t write shows like Li’l Abner anymore, and not just because the 1956 musical adaptation of the Al Capp comic strip pretty much defines political incorrectness. With its Original Broadway Cast of fifty-four, only schools and community playhouses could possibly hope to produce this musical behemoth in 2016—which makes it a perfect choice for the theatrical genre known as the Concert Staged Reading, proof positive of which was evidenced at Musical Theatre West’s Daisy Maezing one-night-only Reiner Reading Series latest.
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posted in Concert Staged Reading, Long Beach/San Pedro, Theater Review, WOW!

THE TWO KIDS THAT BLOW SHIT UP

posted on August 28th, 2016 at 12:45 PM by Steven Stanley

Playwright Carla Ching takes a tried-and-true formula (best friends who can’t quite get it into their noggins that they are Made For Each Other) and turns it on its head in her World Premiere dramedy The Two Kids Who Blow Shit Up, not only L.A. theater at its intimate best but a textbook example of how #diversity works.
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posted in Comedy-Drama, Hollywood/West Hollywood, Theater Review, World Premiere, WOW!

PARALLEL LIVES

posted on August 27th, 2016 at 4:29 PM by Steven Stanley


A pair of busy TV actresses prove they can light up the Falcon Theatre stage as brightly as they shine on the small screen in Parallel Lives, the talented twosome bringing character after character after character to hilarious (and occasionally poignant) life while managing at the same time to comment on gender, age, sexuality, and the whole damn thing.
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posted in Burbank/Glendale, Theater Review, Two-Hander, WOW!

TITANIC

posted on August 22nd, 2016 at 3:01 PM by Steven Stanley

Titanic sails again, and breathtakingly so, as Moonlight Stage Productions gives Peter Stone and Maury Yeston’s Titanic the kind of production that might have transformed the 1997 Broadway money-loser into the box office bonanza it deserved to be.
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posted in Musical, San Diego County, Theater Review, WOW!

DRAMA QUEENS FROM HELL

posted on August 21st, 2016 at 10:44 AM by Steven Stanley

NOT RECOMMENDED

Significant trimming and tweaking is needed to make Peter Lefcourt’s Hollywood-spoofing Drama Queens From Hell the comedy hit it aspires to be despite some occasional insider hilarity and several deliciously scene-stealing performances.
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posted in Comedy, Not Recommended, Theater Review, West Side/Beverly HIlls, World Premiere

NEXT TO NORMAL

posted on August 20th, 2016 at 2:26 PM by Steven Stanley

The 99-seat Pico Playhouse proves a just-right setting for a compelling, powerfully-performed intimate staging of Tom Kitt and Brian Yorkey’s Next To Normal, one of only nine musicals in Broadway history to have won the Pulitzer Prize.
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posted in Musical, Theater Review, West Side/Beverly HIlls, WOW!

GO BACK TO WHERE YOU ARE

posted on August 18th, 2016 at 9:20 AM by Steven Stanley

There’s a whole lot of fourth-wall-breaking going on in Go Back To Where You are, David Greenspan’s magical seventy-five minute bit of meta-theatrical romance and whimsy now getting an admittedly brain-challenging but absolutely captivating West Coast Premiere by the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble.
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posted in Comedy, Theater Review, West Side/Beverly HIlls, WOW!

PETER AND THE STARCATCHER

posted on August 15th, 2016 at 12:50 PM by Steven Stanley

Theatrical magic doesn’t get much more magical than the magic being made at the Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center as Actors Repertory Theatre Of Simi enchants audiences of all ages with their supremely imaginative albeit scaled-down production of Broadway’s Peter And The Starcatcher.
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posted in Comedy, Theater Review, Ventura County, WOW!

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