RUTHLESS! THE MUSICAL

posted on May 7th, 2015 at 4:37 PM by Steven Stanley

The Bad Seed meets All About Eve meets Gypsy as the musical theater majors of Cal State Fullerton’s illustrious BFA program bring the murderously funny off-Broadway cult spoof Ruthless! The Musical to lethally hilarious life on the intimate stage of Santa Ana’s Grand Central Theatre.
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posted in Musical, Orange County, Theater Review, WOW!

CIRCUS UGLY

posted on May 5th, 2015 at 3:18 PM by Steven Stanley

NOT RECOMMENDED

Some plays are so unexpectedly marvelous and/or so deeply thought-provoking that you can’t stop talking about them long after the house lights have gone back up. Gabriel Rivas Gomez’s Circus Ugly, the latest from Playwrights’ Arena, is likely to inspire almost as much post-performance conversation as those, but for a different reason. Yes, several of its performers manage to impress and so does a topnotch production design, but not even a lukewarm recommendation is possible for a play that still has me scratching my head and wondering, “WTF was that?!”
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posted in Drama, Los Angeles, Not Recommended, Theater Review

SPRING AWAKENING

posted on May 4th, 2015 at 11:13 AM by Steven Stanley


Master director Richard Israel joins Cal State Fullerton choreography whiz William F. Lett and CSUF’s phenomenally talented Musical Theater BFA majors for as fine a production of Duncan Sheik and Steven Sater’s Spring Awakening as any professional theater could hope to present.
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posted in Musical Revue, Orange County, Theater Review, WOW!

A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM

posted on May 3rd, 2015 at 8:24 PM by Steven Stanley

The theater company whose recent reinvention of Kander & Ebb’s Cabaret for the intimate stage earned it both critical and audience raves now returns with a “downsized” staging of the Stephen Sondheim classic A Funny Thing Happened On The Way To The Forum, and the result is one of the funniest—and most ingenious—Forums ever.
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posted in Musical, North Hollywood, Theater Review, WOW!

ABIGAIL/1702

posted on May 2nd, 2015 at 12:11 PM by Steven Stanley


When last we saw her in Arthur Miller’s The Crucible, teen temptress Abigail Williams was about to flee Salem, Massachusetts and its infamous witch trials, leaving in her wake twenty hanged (or otherwise executed) victims of her venomous, vile, trumped-up accusations.

Playwright Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa now imagines Abby’s life ten years later, and fascinatingly so, in Abigail/1702, a play and production no Crucible lover will want to miss, and the latest from Long Beach’s International City Theatre.
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posted in Drama, Long Beach/San Pedro, Theater Review, WOW!

I AND YOU

posted on May 1st, 2015 at 5:28 PM by Steven Stanley

When was the last time you saw a contemporary teen dramedy that not only featured a pair of complex, non-stereotypical characters but added something to the genre and in its final moments left you breathless?

Lauren Gunderson’s I And You is that play, at once funny, captivating, and profoundly moving, a powerful piece of theater now getting its Los Angeles Premiere in a production highlighted by Jennifer Finch’s and Matthew Hancock’s star-making performances under Robin Larsen’s inspired direction.
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posted in Comedy-Drama, Los Angeles, Theater Review, WOW!

MURDER FOR TWO

posted on April 30th, 2015 at 4:18 PM by Steven Stanley

Who says you need a dozen performers and a full orchestra to create a supremely inventive, thoroughly delightful (Ladies’ and) Gentlemen’s Guide To Love And Murder? As Joe Kinosian & Kellen Blair’s Murder For Two makes abundantly clear, all it takes is a pair of gifted quadruple-threats, four hands, a baby grand piano, a nifty plot, an inventive book, and some clever, catchy songs to come up with an award-winning off-Broadway hit.
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posted in Musical, National Tour, Orange County, Theater Review, WOW!

BOY GETS GIRL

posted on April 28th, 2015 at 5:48 PM by Steven Stanley

NOT RECOMMENDED

Terrific performances by a thoroughly engaging Ivy Khan and a riveting if miscast Jim Martyka highlight Theatre Unleashed’s ill-advised fifteenth-anniversary revival of Rebecca Gilman’s Boy Gets Girl, one which leaves this reviewer wondering how Gilman’s pseudo-thriller ended up named Time Magazine’s #1 Play Of The Year.
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posted in Drama, North Hollywood, Not Recommended, Theater Review

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