Posts Tagged ‘Musical Theatre West’
STEEL PIER
Monday, November 24th, 2014
Though I’d be hard pressed to pick just one of the fifty concert staged readings reviewed here as the Absolute Best Concert Staged Reading Ever, I can’t recall a more spectacularly staged “reading” of a Broadway musical than last night’s Reiner Reading Series staging of Kander & Ebb’s Steel Pier.
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BIG FISH
Sunday, November 2nd, 2014
A deeply conflicted father-son relationship, a husband and wife’s lifelong love, a spellbinding lead performance, a bunch of captivating supporting turns, some terrific dance sequences, an often quite gorgeous production design, and above all one of the most beautiful scores of recent years add up to an entertaining and often quite moving West Coast Premiere of Andrew Lippa and John August’s Big Fish at Long Beach’s Musical Theatre West.
Still, when a Broadway musical closes less than three months after its opening and fails to score a single Tony nomination or even a non-Equity tour, it is worth asking why.
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BUSKER ALLEY
Monday, August 18th, 2014RECOMMENDED
A pair of stellar lead performances, a topnotch supporting cast, and direction by the musical’s original leading lady bring out the best in the never-made-it-to-Broadway Busker Alley, Musical Theatre West’s Reiner Reading Series 2013-14 season closer. Still, despite some terrific Sherman Brothers songs, it’s hard to become invested in the story of as sad sack a lead character as street entertainer Charlie Baxter, even as played with abundant pizzazz by triple-threat extraordinaire James Leo Ryan.
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DISNEY’S BEAUTY AND THE BEAST
Monday, July 14th, 2014
La Belle et La Bête have brought their “tale as old as time” to Long Beach as Musical Theatre West offers Angelinos an absolutely sensational regional production of Disney’s Beauty And The Beast.
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THE GOODBYE GIRL
Monday, June 30th, 2014
Sunday’s delightful “family-affair” concert staged reading of the 1993 Broadway flop The Goodbye Girl made it abundantly clear why, despite a stellar pedigree, the Neil Simon-Marvin Hamlisch-David Zippel musical was not destined for a long life on The Great White Way, yet proved a perfect choice for Musical Theatre West’s One-Night-Only Reiner Reading Series.
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‘S WONDERFUL
Sunday, April 6th, 2014
Take forty classic George Gershwin tunes, round up five stellar triple-threats to perform them, tie the three dozen-plus songs together into five mini-musicals with the wispiest of plots, add some snappy choreography from an up-and-coming Broadway whiz kid, back the whole thing up with a terrific seven-piece orchestra, and you’ve got ‘S Wonderful: The New Gershwin Musical, the latest charmer from Music Theatre West.
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CARNIVAL
Tuesday, March 11th, 2014
Bob Merrill and Michael Stewart’s 1961 hit Carnival may have run a healthy 719 performances on Broadway, but unlike its fellow early-’60s Tony winners The Sound of Music, Gypsy, Bye Bye Birdie, How to Succeed .., Funny/Forum, and Oliver!, regional revivals of Carnival have been few and far between, hence its inclusion in Musical Theatre West’s Reiner Reading Series as a one-night-only concert staged reading, one that reminded those in attendance on Sunday that even forgotten Broadway gems have much to offer.
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THE MUSIC MAN
Tuesday, February 18th, 2014
Musical Theatre West takes one of the truly great 20th Century musicals and gives it a splendid 21st Century revival, one that would be even more splendid with an age-appropriate leading man.
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Since 2007, Steven Stanley's StageSceneLA.com has spotlighted the best in Southern California theater via reviews, interviews, and its annual StageSceneLA Scenies.
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