THE MELODY LINGERS ON

posted on February 18th, 2011 at 3:48 PM by Steven Stanley

RECOMMENDED
In his 101 years on this planet, Irving Berlin wrote somewhere between 1250 and 1450 songs, 850 of which make up Wikipedia’s “Best Of Berlin” list. From very early 20th Century standards like “Alexander’s Ragtime Band” to 1966’s “An Old Fashioned Wedding,” written for the 20th Anniversary Broadway revival of Annie Get Your Gun, Berlin’s music and lyrics are synonymous with American Musical Theater.
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posted in Downey/La Mirada, Musical Revue, Recommended

THE CRADLE WILL ROCK

posted on February 17th, 2011 at 10:33 AM by Steven Stanley

NOT RECOMMENDED

Corruption and corporate greed are nothing new to the 21st Century. Composer-playwright Marc Blitzstein wrote about both in The Cradle Will Rock, his 1937 “play in music,” now being revived by the company that won the LA Weekly Award for Musical Of The Year for its first production of it back in 1994.
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posted in Hollywood/West Hollywood, Musical, Not Recommended, WOW!

WRINKLES

posted on February 16th, 2011 at 5:10 PM by Steven Stanley


The Fukutani-Komiyamas are your typical middle-class Pasadena family. Mom Nancy is a divorced single mother and successful attorney. Teenaged Jason is a high school student who’d rather listen to his iPod and play video games on his laptop than write the university essay his mom is always on his case about. “Why don’t you just bang me over the head with a blunt object,” retorts his frustrated mom when Jason informs her that his essay is (pointing at head) “up here.” Grandpa Harry shares digs with daughter and grandson, the better to provide Jason with a mature male influence. Yes, the Fukutani-Komiyamas are your typical middle-class Pasadena family with one exception.
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posted in Comedy, Los Angeles, WOW!

DANGEROUS BEAUTY

posted on February 13th, 2011 at 10:38 AM by Steven Stanley


If career options for women were limited in the decades before women’s lib, they were even fewer in the mid-16th Century when Veronica Franco was born, particularly if your mother had at one time been a courtesan, something Veronica found out the hard way when her dreams of marrying her life’s true love were dashed by the realities of Venetian society. For Veronica Franco, there was but one option—to follow in her mother’s footsteps, and if she couldn’t be Marco Venier’s wife, then his mistress she would be.
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posted in Musical, Pasadena, WOW!

“MASTER HAROLD” … AND THE BOYS

posted on February 12th, 2011 at 10:57 AM by Steven Stanley


Sometimes the event of a single day, of a single conversation even, can change a person’s life forever. This is certainly the case for seventeen-year-old Hally in Athol Fugard’s “Master Harold”…and the boys, now playing at Ventura’s esteemed Rubicon Theatre in a couldn’t-be-better production.
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posted in Drama, Ventura County, WOW!

THE DROWSY CHAPERONE

posted on February 11th, 2011 at 10:41 AM by Steven Stanley


With Cupid’s day fast approaching, timing could not be more perfect for The Drowsy Chaperone, Broadway’s Valentine to Musical Theater, to make its West Coast Regional debut in an absolutely splendid production by 3-D Theatricals.
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posted in Musical, Orange County, WOW!

THE WHO’S TOMMY

posted on February 10th, 2011 at 5:06 PM by Steven Stanley


It’s not every day—or even every year—that an intimate theater production gets invited for a repeat engagement by a major Performing Arts Center. On the other hand, it’s not every year that an Orange County intimate theater production scores four Los Angeles Stage Alliance Ovation Award Nominations, wins a special Ovation Award for its spectacular video design, and is currently up for three Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Awards, not to mention its nine Scenies including Best Intimate Theater Musical and Director Of The Year.
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posted in Musical, Orange County, WOW!

TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD

posted on February 9th, 2011 at 4:25 PM by Steven Stanley


As I sat last night watching the lives of Atticus, Scout, Jem, and the rest of the characters created by Harper Lee in To Kill A Mockingbird, I couldn’t help looking at the audience around me, mostly seniors, their ages hovering around 76, give or take a few years, and think of the changes that have taken place in our society since 1935, the year Lee’s novel-turned-play takes place, the year in which many of those audience members first saw the light of day.
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posted in Burbank/Glendale, Drama, WOW!

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