Don Grigware - Page 40

White Christmas, always a treat on film (1954), creates a unique and refreshing glow on stage. The original Broadway and touring productions - the first national tour played the Pantages in 2005 - were gloriously directed by Walter Bobbie and choreographed by Randy Skinner, who turned the second act opener 'I Love a Piano' into one of the most inventive and lively tap sequences ever. Now in a short tour and directed and choreographed by Skinner, White Christmas The Musical finally returns to the Pantages but only for a week, through December 4. This is a sparkling production with terrifically paced staging and superior choreography by Skinner and a sturdy acting ensemble which includes the presence of  the delightfully funny Lorna Luft as Martha Watson. Yes, it's a frothy concoction and weak on plot, but so heartwarming and... with the spectacular Irving Berlin tunes, who cares? Run to get tickets while they are available!

Actor/singer Cheyenne Jackson first appeared on Broadway with Sutton Foster in Thoroughly Modern Millie. Needless to say, he caused a sensation and has since made the TV screen sizzle with his appearances in Glee and American Horror Story. He will be making a concert appearance on December 15 and 17/18 in four Holiday shows with the Gay Men's Chorus of Los Angeles. (GMCLA) Jackson spoke briefly with me about this concert and comments on various points of his illustrious career thus far. As far as his personal life goes, Jackson is openly gay, married to Jason Landau, and they just became the parents of two children.

Till We Meet Again, an independent film from 2015, written by its star Johan 'John' Matton and directed by Bank Tangjaitrong, has been playing film festivals and picking up awards as Best Film. As I read the description, I thought, 'Oh no, not another film about young lovers with relationship difficulties! After five years of living together, this couple have reached the point where they must explore options. They need to find themselves.' This type of story has been done to death, so what makes this film so special?

Film and TV actress Morgan Fairchild needs no introduction. She has been working for the past 40+ years, always recognizable as the glamorous blonde vixen from such series as Flamingo Road, Paper Dolls and Falcon Crest, as well as the soap Search For Tomorrow. Now about ready to start rehearsals for the Lythgoe Family's Christmas Panto, called A Cinderella Christmas at the Pasadena Playhouse, bowing December 8, Fairchild took time out of her busy schedule to chat with us about the role she is playing and her career. Has she been happy or does she long to change her sexy image?

Coeurage Theatre Company are known around town as the rebels, the 'pay what you want' company. Their motto? 'Nobody should have to pay high prices to see good theatre'. Nice reminder in these depression era times where our government is wracked by the entree of a despicably inept political leader and the majority of our middle-class struggle to make ends meet. The locale of this satirical musical comedy Urinetown, which had its Broadway run in 2001 with 10 Tony nominations, is a typical small city in a futuristic time where a drought has caused a water shortage and its citizens no longer have private amenities. They must urinate in public places and pay a fee to do so. The greedy Urine Good Company controls the enterprise, and if people pee in the bushes, they are arrested and thrown into Urinetown. Now in a striking production by the Coeurage Theatre Company at the Historic Lankershim Arts Center, the rarely revived Urinetown strikes s chord in our troubled times, as audiences laugh away problems that, when it comes right down to it, may not be that unimaginable.

Actress/singer Maggie Randolph won the prestigious LA's Next Great Stage Star 2016 last winter. Upon witnessing her amazing vocal range and spunky personality laced with oodles of warmth, it is easy to understand why. On Sunday November 20, Randolph premiered her LA Cabaret show Home Again to an SRO audience at Sterling's Upstairs at the Federal. Accompanying her at the piano were musical director Richard Berent, Kerry Fenster on guitar and Ksenia Rozhdestvenskaya on violin. Needless to say, they all made beautiful music together in the hour long set. The entire evening was directed with great fervor by Peter Welkin.

Laura Ingalls Wilder's classic book Little House on the Prairie (1932) became famous as an hour-long TV drama in the 70s (1974-1983) starring Michael Landon and featuring Melissa Gilbert in her acting debut as Laura. The books, as well as the TV show, are forever popular. In fact, the TV show runs regularly on cable channel Insp Monday through Friday. Sierra Madre Playhouse and its artistic director Christian Lebano have chosen to bring back James DeVita's stage adaptation of the stories as its holiday presentation, first seen in 2014, A Little House Christmas, skillfully directed by Alison Eliel Kalmus and featuring a delightful cast of 10, is now onstage in its revival of a West Coast premiere, through December 23.

For the most part, brilliantly written classic plays make their locale the main character of the piece. Think of Tennessee Williams. All of his plays take place in the American South; poverty-stricken New Orleans sets the background for Streetcar among other plays. In Martin McDonagh's The Beauty Queen of Leenane, the small town of Leenane in Connemara, County Galway, Ireland not only displays the frequent rainy, dismal atmosphere for Mag Folan (Marie Mullen) and daughter Maureen (Aisling O'Sullivan), but it sets the lugubrious tone of isolation that cripples and destroys them. Now on the Taper stage through December 18 the Druid Company of Galway who originated the play in 1996, which went on to win four Tonys on Broadway in 1998, presents a stark portrait that lingers in the mind long after one leaves the theatre.

Playwright Phil Olson that same year. Since then, Doug co-produced Olson's A Nice Family Gathering in 2000, and has been involved in most of the Don't Hug Me World Premiere productions, including directing three of its five world premieres, A Don't Hug Me County Fair; Don't Hug Me, I'm Pregnant; and Don't Hug Me, We're Married. This year, he directed the Group Rep's second revival of A Nice Family Gathering, with an African-American cast. During the day, Doug works for Walt Disney Animation Studios as a custodian of the Studio's animation art legacy, and as an observer of Disney

Broadway actress/singer RENEE MARINO made her feature film debut in 2014 in Jersey Boys as Mary Delgado, Frankie Valli's tempestuous wife. She was seen in the role on Broadway by film director Clint Eastwood, and because of her magnanimous talent, was hand picked by him to repeat the role on film. New York born and bred, fiery Italian Marino performed her first cabaret show at Sterling's Upstairs at the Federal on Monday November 7 to a packed house. Called I Am Me Because of Three, the smart and slick show examined her roots and the three relatives that gave her the drive and spirit that pervade her persona.

For the second year in a row the Pink Lady Jackie Goldberg presented an attention-grabbing Senior Talent Competition. This year's show was very different, as it had two contests on two separate days, one on Saturday November 5 and the other on Sunday November 6 at the Wadsworth Theatre in West LA, and included an endearing salute to our veterans.

The annual dysfunctional family Christmas gathering? Oy! This family lives in Minnesota. Double oy!! Issue at hand: not one of the family members is anywhere near to being happy. Mom (Belinda Howell) is in denial, keeping her breast cancer a secret, her doctor son Michael (Patrick Burke) has been mysteriously separated from wife Jill (Rebekah Dunn) for three months, other son Carl (Greg D. Barnett), a struggling writer, is estranged from his girlfriend Rita, and daughter Stacey (Truett Jean Butler) is gay and separated from her partner, who hasn't yet told her parents about their relationship. Then there's obnoxious intruder Uncle Bob (Fox Carney) who does his best to upset everyone with his disgustingly uber jovial disposition, and Grandma (Marcia Rodd), with a tongue that could cut glass, who sashays around them all with digs, jibes and a whole barrel of insulting fun. Doug Engalla has skillfully directed a superb cast of players who only have to speak Phil Olson's hysterically funny lines to get laughs. It's a howler a la Neil Simon with a laugh about every two seconds, and each character has that dry infectious Minnesota accent that makes you double over every time you hear it.

In a rare revival, Conundrum Theatre Company in its inaugural production, is now presenting the 60s' mega Broadway smash Funny Girl. October 29 was Fanny Brice's birthday. her 125th, in fact. So, we remember the great comedic talent of Miss Brice who took the Zigfield Follies by storm and became a huge Broadway and later Hollywood star.

Actor and President of Celebrity Access, Inc Glenn Rosenblum performed his one-man cabaret Glenn Rosenblum Is 'the Musical Man' at Rockwell Table and Stage Monday October 24 to a packed house of adoring fans. Reminding one a little bit of actor James Coco, who had an undeniably infectious sensitivity and sense of humor, Rosenblum took the stage with great ease, sat on a stool by the piano and proceeded to tell his story. First, of course, there was a full overture of Broadway tunes, under the baton of musical director David J. Kaminski at the piano, Jon Butterworth on percussion and Josh Nyback on bass. The three musicians were terrific.

Winner of the 2010 Tony Award for Best Musical, Memphis is an eye-catching, heart-throbbing musical and fictionalized account of how the music business of the 50s actually changed, and as its lead DJ Huey Carmichael would say, it's 'fantastical'! Memphis is currently being revived by MTW in Long Beach for three weeks only through November 6, and the production is thrilling from top to bottom with a great book, great score, sensational direction and choreography and a truly fantastic cast of triple threat actors, singers and dancers. Memphis is one those rare shows that gives the audience a realistic picture of radio and the emergence of television as it took possession of the nation in the early 50s.

German film-maker F. W. Murnau created the 1922 eclectic silent film Nosferatu based on Bram Stoker's Dracula. It is highly regarded worldwide as an artistic masterpiece, utilizing Expressionistic art. Now in a unique Los Angeles production - unlike any you have seen or are likely to - William A. Reilly has adapted the film to the stage at Crown City Theatre in NoHo. Nosferatu: A Symphony in Terror is a silent film onstage with classical music, ballet and a splendid cast of nine actors, directed with remarkable precision by Reilly.

Actor Marc Kudisch has been nominated for many Tony Awards, including Best Featured Actor in a Musical for Thoroughly Modern Millie and 9 to 5: The Musical. A first time director he has just completed an enormously successful engagement of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat for 3-D Theatricals. In our brief  chat he ruminates about this success and relates the experience to other productions of Joseph in which he has performed. Marc, I understand that this is not your first association with Joseph. Tell us about your Broadway debut in the revival of the show in 1993/94.

Scott Rognlien (Adaptor/Director/Producer) will have a world premiere of his latest work, VONNEGUT, USA running October 14 - November 20, at the Atwater Village Theatre in Los Angeles, CA.  The work is an adaptation of five Vonnegut short stories presented as one continuous 90 minute piece. Members of The Next Arena, a theatre company founded by Scott and friends, are performing in and producing the six week run.  

My favorite part of the evening was the inclusion of the standards all of which are nicely suited to Stolper's voice and delivery. They were Sondheim's 'Move On' from Sunday in the Park with George. a gorgeous rendition of 'Something Good' sung originally by Julie Andrews in the film The Sound of Music, and lastly Carole King's 'Beautiful', all adding uber positive touches to Stolper's creative and personal journey thus far. She concluded as she had begun with Peter Pan, only this time with Scott Alan's lovely contemporary perspective  'Never Never Land (Fly Away)'. 

I have heard this little double couplet poem since childhood, and have always been terrified by it, so, if I see a story depicted about accused murderess Lizzie Borden of Fall River, Massachusetts, I expect two people to end up corpses, her stepmother and her father. In the new musical by Katrina Wood Spindle City: The Lizzie Borden Musical, now playing at the Secret Rose Theatre, only her father's murder is enacted. But... Lizzie loved her father, in spite of his intolerable business tactics, and... despised her money-hungry stepmother. Does this omission of her murder from the retelling of the infamous story make any sense? Hardly. But that's just one of the problems plaguing this uneven musical at the Secret Rose through November 5.