Posts Tagged ‘Orange County Theater Review’
HELLO, DOLLY!
Monday, July 18th, 2016Dolly Levi is still glowing, still crowing, and going stronger than ever as 3-D Theatricals debuts its splendiferous 2016 revival of one of Broadway’s Golden Era greatest, the record-breaking 10-Tony-Award-winning Best Musical of 1964, Hello, Dolly!
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ALL SHOOK UP
Thursday, July 14th, 2016A whole lot of shaking’s going on in Laguna Beach this summer as a mix of East-coasters and OC locals join talents to entertain audiences of all ages with All Shook Up, the crowd-pleasingest jukebox musical since Mamma, Mia!
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A CHORUS LINE
Sunday, July 10th, 2016It takes balls to reimagine a classic and an abundance of talent to pull it off, particularly when the classic in question is the 1975 megaclassic A Chorus Line. Fortunately, Chance Theater’s Oanh Nguyen and Hazel Clarke have both, resulting in an A Chorus Line that might provoke protests from purists who’d have Michael Bennett’s direction and choreography set in stone but will likely thrill everyone else, this reviewer included.
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GYPSY
Sunday, June 12th, 2016RECOMMENDED
A weak first act, a considerably more successful second, and a terrific Tara Pitt throughout add up to a mixed bag of a Gypsy revival at Theatre Out, but one still worth checking out for Pitt’s powerhouse performance as (wonder of wonders) an age-appropriate Mama Rose.
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NEWSIES
Wednesday, May 18th, 2016When a flop movie musical becomes a home video hit, what better for Walt Disney Studios to do than turn it into a great big Broadway smash, or at least this is what happened with Newsies The Musical, now thrilling SoCal audiences with Christopher Gattelli’s breathtaking Tony-winning choreography, Alan Menken and Jack Feldman’s eminently hummable Tony-winning songs, and much much more at the Segerstrom Center For The Arts.
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THE BIG MEAL
Thursday, May 5th, 2016The meet-cute sequence that introduces us to 20somethings Sam and Nicole is but the preamble to The Big Meal, Dan LeFranc’s remarkable meditation on birth, death, life, love, and the whole damn thing, now getting a laughter-and-tear-filled Southern California Premiere that is one of Chance Theater’s finest intimate productions ever.
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TORCH SONG TRILOGY
Sunday, April 24th, 2016RECOMMENDED International Stud
RECOMMENDED Fugue in a Nursery
Widows And Children First!
Andrew J. Villarreal gives the year’s most extraordinary performance as flamboyant but mush-hearted Jewish drag queen Arnold Beckoff in Harvey Fierstein’s Torch Song Trilogy, making Theatre Out’s rarer-than-rare revival well worth seeing despite the flawed execution of the first two of its three one-act plays.
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OFFICE HOUR
Saturday, April 23rd, 2016Sandra Oh and Raymond Lee give electrifying performances as a college adjunct professor and the student she suspects just might be capable of mass murder in Julia Cho’s ripped-from-today’s-headlines Office Hour, now riveting audiences in its World Premiere engagement at South Coast Repertory.
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