ONE IN THE CHAMBER

posted on August 4th, 2014 at 8:38 PM by Steven Stanley

Playwright Marja-Lewis Ryan focuses an up-close-and-personal lens on the epidemic of gun violence plaguing our country in her World Premiere drama One In The Chamber, one of the most powerful new plays I’ve seen in a good long while, and as superbly acted a production as any writer/director could possibly wish for.
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posted in Drama, Hollywood/West Hollywood, Theater Review, World Premiere, WOW!

GODSPELL

posted on August 3rd, 2014 at 11:16 PM by Steven Stanley

It’s not your grandparents’ Godspell anymore, just one of several reasons to catch Actors Repertory Theatre Of Simi’s revival of the 1971 Stephen Schwartz off-Broadway-to-Broadway classic as reconceived for The Great White Way in 2011 and now brought to effervescent life by an impressive young cast at the Simi Valley Performing Arts Center.
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posted in Musical, Theater Review, Ventura County, WOW!

SMOKEY JOE’S CAFÉ

posted on August 3rd, 2014 at 12:31 AM by Steven Stanley

Want to hear “Kansas City,” “Yakety Yak,” “Love Potion No. 9,” “On Broadway” and a few dozen other 1950s rock and pop hits as performed by an all-around splendid young cast and enjoy a yummy dinner to boot? Then head on over to Claremont for dinner and a show as Candlelight Pavilion revives the longest-running musical revue in Broadway history, Smokey Joe’s Café, featuring forty of the greatest hits of rock-and-roll songwriting legends Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller.
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posted in Musical Revue, San Gabriel Valley, Theater Review, WOW!

THE MAX FACTOR FACTOR

posted on August 2nd, 2014 at 2:25 PM by Steven Stanley

Secretly gay 1930s film star Lance Grant falls head-over-heels for the equally famous—and equally closeted—Hoyt Baxter in Adrian Bewley, Joe Blodgett, and Chana Wise’s delightful new musical The Max Factor Factor, a fortuitous first collaboration between New Musicals Inc. and Celebration Theatre.
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posted in Musical, North Hollywood, Theater Review, World Premiere, WOW!

GHOST THE MUSICAL

posted on July 30th, 2014 at 6:09 PM by Steven Stanley

What do you do when the musical you’ve produced ends up flopping on The Great White Way, but has enough going for it to merit a post-Broadway National Tour?

One possible solution is to mount a cost-saving non-union tour, and hope that even without an Equity cast and budget, whatever magic brought the show to Opening Night on Broadway will somehow survive.

In the case of Ghost The Musical, now playing at Costa Mesa’s Segerstrom Center For The Arts, the magic mostly does.
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posted in Musical, National Tour, Orange County, Theater Review, WOW!

INTO THE WOODS

posted on July 29th, 2014 at 5:45 PM by Steven Stanley

Fiasco Theatre Company’s re-imagined revival of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Into The Woods is the most thrillingly imaginative production I’ve seen of the 1987 triple-Tony-winner, and trust me … I’ve seen a forest-ful of Into The Woodses, fourteen in all since the First National Tour stopped at the Ahmanson in 1989.
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posted in Musical, San Diego County, Theater Review, WOW!

IN A DARK DARK HOUSE

posted on July 27th, 2014 at 11:29 AM by Steven Stanley

NOT RECOMMENDED

It’s rare than a single performance can sink an otherwise mostly fine production, but such is the case in the Los Angeles Premiere of Neil LaBute’s In A Dark Dark House, a play consisting of three extended two-actor scenes revolving around a central character who only departs the stage during set changes. Unfortunately, since Aaron McPherson is not up to the challenges of bringing Terry to real, three-dimensional life, In A Dark Dark House fails to get the Matrix Theatre Guest Production it deserves.
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posted in Drama, Los Angeles, Not Recommended, Theater Review

ANDRONICUS

posted on July 26th, 2014 at 2:13 PM by Steven Stanley

”14 killings, 9 of them on stage, 6 severed members, 1 rape (or 2 or 3 depending on how you count), 1 live burial, 1 case of insanity, and 1 of cannibalism” is how critic S. Mark Hulse sums up William Shakespeare’s vengeance-fueled Titus Andronicus, and Coeurage Theatre Company gives us each and every one of the above in a mere two hours (including intermission) in Jeremy Lelliott’s exhilarating new adaptation of Shakespeare’s contribution to the “revenge play” genre, redubbed Andronicus to befit this leaner, zippier incarnation of the 16th-Century classic.
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posted in Drama, Los Angeles, Theater Review, WOW!

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