THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW

posted on November 4th, 2012 at 12:39 PM by Steven Stanley


What would the Halloween season be without the camp classic Richard O’Brien’s The Rocky Horror Show, the science fiction/horror movie spoof that has become so iconic, it now includes its creator’s name in its official title?
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posted in Musical, Orange County, WOW!

SPRING AWAKENING

posted on November 3rd, 2012 at 3:05 PM by Steven Stanley


More than a dozen talented young Southland triple-threats have brought Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik’s Spring Awakening to the Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center, where they star in a topnotch staging of the Tony-winning musical adaptation of Frank Wedenkind’s groundbreaking 1891 drama.
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posted in Musical, Ventura County, WOW!

HOW TO WRITE A NEW BOOK FOR THE BIBLE

posted on October 31st, 2012 at 8:23 PM by Steven Stanley


I wonder if any son has ever paid greater tribute to his mother than Bill Cain does in How To Write A New Book For The Bible, his extraordinary new play about her death—and her life, told extraordinarily well in its Southern California Premiere at South Coast Repertory.
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posted in Drama, Orange County, WOW!

JILL MORRISON

posted on October 30th, 2012 at 5:53 PM by Steven Stanley

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posted in Interview

EDITH CAN SHOOT THINGS AND HIT THEM

posted on October 29th, 2012 at 8:51 PM by Steven Stanley


How times have changed for gay American teens over the past two decades. Kenny Tolentino could scarcely have conceived of Gay Straight Alliances or “It Gets Better” videos or out celebrities like Ricky Martin and Zachary Quinto (Mr. Spock, no less!) when he was sixteen just twenty years ago, a coming of age now chronicled by A. Rey Pamatmat in his absolutely wonderful Edith Can Shoot Things and Hit Them.
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posted in Burbank/Glendale, Comedy-Drama, WOW!

42nd STREET

posted on October 28th, 2012 at 9:19 PM by Steven Stanley


The audience has only just finished applauding this Broadway classic’s “Greatest Hits” overture when the curtain rises to reveal the legs—and only the legs—of thirty  long-legged hoofers tap-dancing as if their Broadway careers depended on it (as they indeed do) … and the audience erupts in high-decibel cheers.

Anyone who knows musical theater can surely identify the show in question. It’s the Broadway megahit 42nd Street (3486 performances in its original run and another 1524 in its smash revival), now playing to sold-out houses at Long Beach’s Musical Theatre West in a production that sets the bar spectacularly high for any other company with the chutzpah to follow in their foot-taps.
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posted in Long Beach/San Pedro, Musical, WOW!

THE BEAT GOES ON

posted on October 27th, 2012 at 6:02 PM by Steven Stanley


Talent is ageless in The Beat Goes On, Jackie “Pink Lady” Goldberg’s latest senior-citizen song-and-dance showcase designed to entertain audiences from eighteen to eighty (and beyond) .
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posted in Hollywood/West Hollywood, Musical Revue, WOW!

CYMBELINE

posted on October 27th, 2012 at 5:56 PM by Steven Stanley


A plucky young heroine who dons male apparel as disguise. A villain who plots to make our hero suspect his young wife of adultery. A potion that simulates death without that pesky fatal result. A royal father who rejects his beloved daughter. Children separated at birth and reunited at long last in adulthood. An ambitious queen without a moral scruple to her name. A bit of Ancient Roman history thrown in for good measure.

Care to venture a guess as to which Shakespeare play I’m talking about?

The answer, as any true Shakespeare buff will surely tell you, is neither As You Like it, Othello, Romeo And Juliet, King Lear, A Comedy Of Errors, Hamlet, or Antony And Cleopatra (though the abovementioned plot threads appear to have been borrowed from this half-dozen or so of Shakespeare’s Greatest Hits). No, it’s Cymbeline, reputedly Shakespeare’s fifth-from-last play, originally classified as a tragedy, later redubbed a romance, and as performed at A Noise Within under the truly inspired direction of Bart DeLorenzo, about as hilarious a comedic romp as any theatergoer seeking escapist entertainment could wish for.
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posted in Comedy, Pasadena, WOW!

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