CATCH ME IF YOU CAN

posted on June 26th, 2013 at 1:52 PM by Steven Stanley


Charismatic conman Frank Abagnale, Jr. is up to his old tricks again, but this time he’s doing it “Live In Living Color” as the Segerstrom Center For The Arts presents the National Tour of Catch Me If You Can, the Broadway musical adaptation of Steven Spielberg’s popular 2002 biopic, and a wow of a show it is, filled with one catchy tune after another, plenty of pizzazzy production numbers, a castful of sensational performances, and a surprising dollop of heart.
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posted in Musical, National Tour, Orange County, Theater Review, WOW!

ModRock

posted on June 24th, 2013 at 3:18 PM by Steven Stanley


The city was London, the season was Summer Of ’65, and the Beatles had only recently “crossed the pond” to conquer America. Back in the UK, the Profumo Affair and its sexy instigator Christine Keeler was being splashed across British tabloids while at nearby seaside resorts, leather-clad Rockers were clashing in the streets with trendily dressed Mods.

This heady period in 20th Century English history now returns to bouncy, tuneful life in ModRock, Hagan Thomas-Jones’ dandy new jukebox musical that’s a little bit Romeo & Juliet, a little bit Grease, and a whole lot of fun.
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posted in Musical, North Hollywood, Theater Review, WOW!

LOVE SONGS

posted on June 23rd, 2013 at 11:51 AM by Steven Stanley

RECOMMENDED
Six simply marvelous performances and a couple dozen simply gorgeous songs are the best reasons to see Love Songs A Musical, Steven Cagan’s minimal-plot song cycle now getting its World Premiere by Chromolume Theatre at the Attic in a production that comes across more like a low-budget workshop than the fully-staged premiere Cagan’s work deserves and L.A. theatergoing regulars will likely be expecting.
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posted in Los Angeles, Musical, Recommended, Theater Review

THE FANTASTICKS

posted on June 22nd, 2013 at 1:10 PM by Steven Stanley


The Sierra Madre Playhouse revives the world’s longest-running musical The Fantasticks in a production so perfectly cast, so beautifully performed, so imaginatively directed, and so gorgeous to look at that I finally understand why the Tom Jones-Harvey Schmidt musical chalked up 17,162 performances over its 42-year off-Broadway run.

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posted in Musical, San Gabriel Valley, Theater Review, WOW!

THE REAL HOUSEKEEPERS OF STUDIO CITY

posted on June 21st, 2013 at 5:36 PM by Steven Stanley


Divorced Studio City homemaker Ashley Tribbiani has a shot at being picked as one of TV’s Real Housewives Of Studio City. There’s only one problem. As any reality TV fan will tell you, a real Housewife needs to have a real Housekeeper, and with ex-hubby Joey seriously in arrears on his alimony and child support payments, Ashley has hardly been able to hire help since their split. Now, with her Real Housewives audition only an hour away, Ashley (Lani Shipman) and gay best friend Scot (Ryan O’Connor) have exactly sixty minutes to hire the best maid possible out of ten of TVland’s most famous housekeepers.

Fortunately, the Hollywood Fringe Festival has allotted precisely one hour for Joe Green, Heidi Powers, Tom Moore to debut their brand new musical The Real Housekeepers Of Studio City, and what a sixty-minute-musical gem it is.
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posted in Hollywood/West Hollywood, Musical, Theater Review, WOW!

IONESCOPADE

posted on June 20th, 2013 at 2:14 PM by Steven Stanley


An elderly couple who spend the entire evening setting up chairs for invisible guests who’ve come to hear an invisible orator. French villagers transformed one by one into rhinoceroses. A soprano without a single hair on her head. Could there be anything more ridicule?

Welcome to the world of théâtre de l’absurde as epitomized by Eugène Ionesco, the French playwright whose plays The Chairs, Rhinoceros, and The Bald Soprano express the meaninglessness of life in the most amusing of ways … and now form the basis of Ionescopade, Robert Allan Ackerman and Mildred Kayden’s wacky vaudeville currently being revived at the Odyssey Theatre three decades after its Los Angeles debut.
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posted in Musical Revue, West Side/Beverly HIlls, WOW!

[title of show]

posted on June 19th, 2013 at 11:47 AM by Steven Stanley

From Fringe Festival to Fringe Festival with a Broadway stop along the way is hardly the normal trajectory for a Hollywood Fringe Festival entry. Then again, [title of show] is not your average, run-of-the-mill Fringe entry, as Fringe Festivalgoers can now discover at the Hollywood Fringe, where Theatre Unleashed has unleashed a stripped-down-to-basics but highly entertaining [tos].
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posted in Hollywood/West Hollywood, Musical, Theater Review, WOW!

NATALIE PORTMAN THE MUSICAL

posted on June 18th, 2013 at 10:52 AM by Steven Stanley

NOT RECOMMENDED

Natalie Portman The Musical has arrived at the Hollywood Fringe Festival following last year’s successful run (and return engagement) at Chromolume Theatre At The Attic in what appears to be a considerably stripped-down-for-The-Fringe production.
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posted in Comedy, Hollywood/West Hollywood, Not Recommended, Theater Review

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