MASAO AND THE BRONZE NIGHTINGALE

posted on May 2nd, 2022 at 9:37 AM by Steven Stanley

Playwrights Dan Kwong and Ruben Funkahuatl Guevara have quite a tale to tell about post-WWII Little Tokyo and Boyle Heights in Masao And The Bronze Nightingale and an ethnically, culturally, linguistically diverse cast of characters to tell it with, but the World Premiere play-with-songs’ hefty three-hour running time begs the question, how much of a good thing is too much?
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posted in Los Angeles, Play With Songs, Theater Review

HADESTOWN

posted on April 29th, 2022 at 12:17 PM by Steven Stanley


Like Rent, Spring Awakening, and Hamilton before it, Anaïs Mitchell’s Hadestown, the 2019 Tony winner for Best Musical, revitalizes the genre in the most electrifyingly original of ways.
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posted in Los Angeles, Musical, National Tour, Theater Review, WOW!

TOOTSIE

posted on April 27th, 2022 at 3:59 PM by Steven Stanley


Michael Dorsey and his female alter ego Dorothy Michaels share the Dolby Theatre stage in Tootie, the Tony-winning 2019 Broadway adaptation of the 1982 movie smash, a musical comedy as classic in concept and construction as it is contemporary in its attitudes, casting, and execution.
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posted in Hollywood/West Hollywood, Musical, National Tour, Theater Review, WOW!

THE TOXIC AVENGER

posted on April 26th, 2022 at 10:12 AM by Steven Stanley


A power-hungry, moneygrubbing New Jersey mayor, a beautiful, blind librarian, and a bespectacled nerd turned hulking green superhero give bad taste a good name in The Toxic Avenger, the outrageously funny (and very politically incorrect) off-Broadway musical now earning an abundance of “I can’t believe they actually said/sang that!” laughs at Santa Ana’s Grand Central Theatre.
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posted in Musical, Orange County, Theater Review, WOW!

SOMETHING ROTTEN!

posted on April 25th, 2022 at 10:19 AM by Steven Stanley


Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center returns to live programming with a scaled-down but sensational staging of the 2015 Best Musical Tony nominee Something Rotten!
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posted in Musical, Theater Review, Ventura County, WOW!

LEGALLY BLONDE

posted on April 25th, 2022 at 12:35 AM by Steven Stanley

Ragged around the edges but blessed with some terrific lead performances, Cupcake Theatre’s intimate revival of Broadway’s Legally Blonde would have me singing its praises even louder had the show not started thirty minutes late to accommodate walk-ins.
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posted in Los Angeles, Musical, Theater Review

A DOLL’S HOUSE, PART 2

posted on April 19th, 2022 at 9:00 AM by Steven Stanley

Impeccably acted by a admirably diverse cast, Lucas Hnath’s A Doll’s House, Part 2 would be another all-around International City Theatre winner if its midsection didn’t get bogged down in a talky rehashing of past events.
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posted in Drama, Long Beach/San Pedro, Theater Review

JANE AUSTEN UNSCRIPTED

posted on April 17th, 2022 at 9:49 AM by Steven Stanley


Impro Theatre is back with Jane Austen Unscripted, their first in-person show in two-and-a-half years, and that means “new characters, new love stories, and new escapades” twice on Saturdays and twice on Sundays under sunny Toluca Lake skies in the Garry Marshall Theatre Garden.
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posted in Burbank/Glendale, Improv, Theater Review, WOW!

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