A VIEW FROM THE BRIDGE

posted on September 15th, 2016 at 11:07 PM by Steven Stanley

Arthur Miller’s A View From The Bridge, this year’s Best Revival Tony winner, has arrived at the Ahmanson in a production likely to leave audience opinion split between “brilliantly innovative” and “pretentiously boring.” Though it took me a while to get there, I ended up veering towards the former point of view. Still, unless you’re lucky enough to be sitting either onstage (an option here) or up close (if you’ve got the bucks), the Ahmanson proves far too large a venue for a production as intimate as this one.
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posted in Drama, Los Angeles, Theater Review

ALL THE WAY

posted on September 14th, 2016 at 2:22 PM by Steven Stanley

Robert Schenkkan’s Best Play Tony-winner All The Way arrives at South Coast Repertory in what is sure to be one of the coming year’s finest productions, a locally-cast, locally-directed, locally-designed gem that sets the record straight on LBJ, our nation’s 36th President, brought to explosive, warts-and-all life by Hugo Armstrong in one of the year’s great star turns.
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posted in Drama, Orange County, Theater Review, WOW!

THE FANTASTICKS

posted on September 13th, 2016 at 6:25 PM by Steven Stanley

The world’s longest-running musical (aka The Fantasticks) makes for a crowd-pleasing Pasadena Playhouse season opener thanks not only to its time-tested appeal but also to an excitingly contemporary director’s concept and cast choices that celebrate diversity in the most refreshing of ways.
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posted in Musical, Pasadena, Theater Review, WOW!

ARCADIA

posted on September 12th, 2016 at 11:53 AM by Steven Stanley

Tom Stoppard’s Arcadia can prove quite a head-scratcher when not done right. Fortunately, despite brain-teasing elements that can challenge even the sharpest intellect, all-around superb acting and incisive direction make A Noise Within’s 25th-season opener as entertaining and accessible as Arcadias get.
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posted in Comedy, Pasadena, Theater Review, WOW!

ANDREW LIPPA’S WILD PARTY

posted on September 11th, 2016 at 9:17 PM by Steven Stanley

Kristina Miller ignites the stage as Queenie in Quentin Garzón’s passion-project intimate staging of the 2000 off-Broadway musical adaptation of Joseph Moncure March’s 1928 epic poem The Wild Party, one which Garzón and company have redubbed “Andrew Lippa’s Wild Party,” the better to distinguish it from the Michael John LaChiusa Wild Party that played on Broadway the same year.
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posted in Hollywood/West Hollywood, Musical, Theater Review

CHARM

posted on September 10th, 2016 at 12:53 PM by Steven Stanley

Edward J. Olmos’s Jaime Escalante did it in Stand And Deliver. Michelle Pfeiffer’s Louanne Johnson did it in Dangerous Minds. Sidney Poitier’s Mark Thackery did it in To Sir With Love. And now Lana Houston’s Mama Darleena Andrews does it in Charm, transforming the lives of a classroomful of rebellious teens, only this time round the teacher in question is a transgender sexagenerian and her students an unruly bunch of homeless LGBT teens. Talk about a setup for an edgy, funny, and (you guessed it) heartstrings-tugging crowd-pleaser, the latest all-around winner from Celebration Theatre.
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posted in Comedy-Drama, Hollywood/West Hollywood, Theater Review, WOW!

NOSFERATU, A SYMPHONY IN TERROR

posted on September 9th, 2016 at 1:52 PM by Steven Stanley

A silent horror movie classic inspires Crown City Theatre’s excitingly original Nosferatu, A Symphony In Terror, arriving just in time to greet the Halloween season with its stunning blend of movement and dance performed to a gloriously symphonic soundtrack.
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posted in Dance, North Hollywood, Theater Review, WOW!

LIKE BLOOD FROM A CHEAP CIGAR

posted on September 7th, 2016 at 9:24 AM by Steven Stanley

An effective use of reverse chronology and a luminous Genevieve Joy are the two best reasons to catch Like Blood From A Cheap Cigar, Joy’s short, bittersweet look at love gone bad, now concluding a limited run at Hollywood’s Hudson Guild Theatre following its Hollywood Fringe Festival debut this past June.
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posted in Hollywood/West Hollywood, Short One-Act, Theater Review

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