Posts Tagged ‘Los Angeles Theater Review’

KISMET


A dozen supremely talented musical theater triple-threats and an inspired director-choreographer joined forces this past weekend to bring back the Golden Age Broadway hit Kismet, demonstrating once again that the “concert staged reading” may well be the very best way to revive forgotten musical theater gems.
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ABSOLUTELY FILTHY


For anyone who has ever wondered how the Peanuts gang might have turned out later in life, Brendan Hunt’s Absolutely Filthy now joins Bert V. Royal’s Dog Sees God in answering just that question; and though Royal’s Peanuts-As-Teens satire ends up more to my liking than Hunt’s Peanut-At-Thirty parody, it’s easy to understand why Absolutely Filthy became such a hit for Sacred Fools that they brought it back for five performances at the Hollywood Fringe Festival.
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STEEL MAGNOLIAS


A trio of L.A. busiest community and 99-seat theater veterans, a pair of musical theater triple-threats, and one relative newcomer to our Los Angeles stage scene join forces to bring Little Fish Theatre’s revival of Robert Harling’s Steel Magnolias to effervescent life.
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THE BONEYARD AND TALISMAN

NOT RECOMMENDED

There’s no L.A. actress whose work I enjoy seeing more than Elephant Theatre Company’s Kate Huffman. Elephant artistic director David Fofi is one of the consistently finest directors in town. Timothy McNeil’s Supernova was singled out for a Scenie as one of The Twelve Best Plays Of The Year and McNeil’s performance in The Little Flower Of East Orange won him a Best Lead Actor Scenie. That’s why it’s disappointing to report that their latest collaboration as star, director, and writer/star of the pair of one-acts entitled The Boneyard and Talisman ended up not this reviewer’s cup of tea despite three excellent performances and Fofi’s sharp direction.
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ModRock


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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LOVE SONGS

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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THE FANTASTICKS


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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THE REAL HOUSEKEEPERS OF STUDIO CITY


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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