Posts Tagged ‘Los Angeles Theater Review’
VIOLET
Sunday, May 17th, 2015
L.A. audiences can at last discover one of the unsung treasures of contemporary musical theater as Kelrik Productions presents the Los Angeles County Premiere of Jeanine Tesori and Brian Crawley’s 1997 musical gem Violet, and a superbly performed L.A. debut she makes.
(read more)
THE ELLIOTS
Friday, May 15th, 2015RECOMMENDED
Readers have been rooting for Anne Elliot and Frederick Wentworth to rekindle their long-lost love since Jane Austen’s Persuasion first hit the book stalls back in 1817. L.A. theatergoers can now follow their example as South Pasadena’s Fremont Centre Theatre debuts A.J. Darby’s 2015 adaptation, retitled The Elliots. Yes, both Darby’s play and its World Premiere production could stand some tweaking, but Persuasion fans will find much to enjoy in two hours spent with Austen’s now iconic characters.
(read more)
THE WHO’S TOMMY
Thursday, May 14th, 2015
A fabulous, primarily Asian-American cast, design elements with a Far East flavor, and a 1960s-though-‘80s time frame that inspires a slew of innovative costumes and choreography …
All of this (and more) add up to an exciting East West Players revival of the now iconic The Who’s Tommy.
(read more)
MACBETH
Monday, May 11th, 2015
Macbeth in sixty minutes. What sweeter words are there to those for whom Shakespeare is a taste not quite acquired (or those with only an hour to spare), especially when it’s Zombie Joe’s Underground Theatre Group’s Macbeth, adapted and directed by Denise Devin. Now, that’s my way to see The Scottish Play (or Playlet as the case may be).
(read more)
MUD BLUE SKY
Monday, May 11th, 2015
If three middle-aged flight attendants spending the night with a 17-year-old high school boy in a Chicago hotel room sounds like the setup for a 1960s sex farce à la Boeing-Boeing, think again. Marisa Wegrzyn’s Mud Blue Sky, the latest from The Road Theatre Company, turns out to be not just a laugh-out-loud comedy but a touching look at friendship, parenting, life choices, sisterhood, loneliness, growing older, and coming of age in the 21st Century.
(read more)
AROUND THE WORLD IN 80 DAYS
Saturday, May 9th, 2015
It took legendary Hollywood producer Mike Todd around $50,000,000 in today’s currency to bring science fiction writer Jules Verne’s Around The World In Eighty Days to the Todd-AO 70mm big screen back in 1958.
Actors Co-op does the same in 2015 with maybe about one-half-percent the budget, and I defy anyone to find the Co-op’s supremely imaginative, endlessly inventive small-stage revival any less entertaining than its Hollywood blockbuster predecessor.
(read more)
GUS’S FASHIONS & SHOES
Friday, May 8th, 2015
Plays don’t get much more testosterone-fueled than Gus’s Fashions & Shoes, the grittily dramatic, darkly comedic latest from writer-director Ron Klier, whose Cops And Friends Of Cops kept Vs. Theatre audiences glued to the edge of their seats two years back.
(read more)
CIRCUS UGLY
Tuesday, May 5th, 2015NOT RECOMMENDED
Some plays are so unexpectedly marvelous and/or so deeply thought-provoking that you can’t stop talking about them long after the house lights have gone back up. Gabriel Rivas Gomez’s Circus Ugly, the latest from Playwrights’ Arena, is likely to inspire almost as much post-performance conversation as those, but for a different reason. Yes, several of its performers manage to impress and so does a topnotch production design, but not even a lukewarm recommendation is possible for a play that still has me scratching my head and wondering, “WTF was that?!”
(read more)
Since 2007, Steven Stanley's StageSceneLA.com has spotlighted the best in Southern California theater via reviews, interviews, and its annual StageSceneLA Scenies.
COPYRIGHT 2026 STEVEN STANLEY :: DESIGN BY