Gil Kaan - Page 36

Playwright Ayad Akhtar's Pulitzer Prize-winning DISGRACED will be preserved for wide audience accessibility in a series of live performance recordings by Susan Albert Loewenberg's L.A. Theatre Works April 19 through April 22, 2018. We had the chance to pick the mind of a very frequent collaborator of Ayad Akhtar, actor/producer/activist Behzad Dabu who will be reprising 'Abe' at the L.A. Theatre Works production, in the role he originated.

JTK Productions mounts a strong, involving production of the west coast premiere of playwright Jeff Tabnick's THE INTIMACY EFFECT. Director Eric Hunicutt tightly reins his talented cast of five in a very quick-paced 75 minutes. Smart and timely dialogue flows out of the impassioned actors all.  These four characters, totally inhabited by the skilled artists playing them, volley and return sharp barbs and stinging taunts like a well-oiled tennis match of top pros.

Playwright Joshua Harmon is finally returning to the Geffen Playhouse, the scene of his 2015 runaway hit BAD JEWS. This time he's bringing his SIGNIFICANT OTHER, after having finished successful runs both on Broadway and Off. We got the chance to catch cast members Will Von Vogt and Melanie Field during their final rehearsals.

Bedlam, a New York City audience-favorite and award-winning theatre group has been touring select cities across the nation bringing their unique brand of minimalism for distinctly innovative interpretations of selected theatre classics. Bedlam's co-founder and current artistic director Eric Tucker spared a few minutes of his multi, multi-tasking schedule for some insights into his juggling of directorial projects with his families, theatrical and personal.

Ensemble Studio Theatre/LA's world premiere of playwright Marek Glinski's PIGS AND CHICKENS presents a vivid send-up of exaggerated composites of co-workers Glinski at one time had to work with (as he writes in the program notes). Hard to imagine having to spend forty hours a week working with these unlikeable people, after the two hours in the theatre watching Glinski's PIGS AND CHICKENS.

The world premiere of playwright Yusuf Toropov's AN UNDIVIDED HEART receives a stunning mounting by The Echo Theater Company and Circle X Theatre Co. Director Chris Fields sure-handedly guides his talented cast through the involving story of a passionate young priest striving to do the right thing. In this case, publish an expose on the pedophilia prevalent in the Catholic church.

Actress/playwright Lois Robbins will be world premiering her candid one-woman show L.O.V.E.R. April 15, 2018 at the Zephyr on Melrose. We grabbed a chance to chat with Lois on the topics she'll be covering and how her family reacted to her racy subject. 

The latest artful collaboration of Stewart Copeland and Jonathan Moore, the co-world premiere of THE INVENTION OF MOREL, will be presented by the Long Beach Opera at the Beverly O'Neill Theater for three performances beginning March 17, 2018. Actor/director/playwright Jonathan Moore took a few moments of his busy schedule to provide us with a few details on teaming up with the co-founder of The Police.

The Skylight Theatre Company's National New Play Network Rolling World Premiere of THE MADRES most effectively succeeds in personalizing the plight of Argentinean mothers of 'disappeared' children during the height of La Guerra Sucia (The Dirty War) in 1978. Anchored by the two incredibly strong performances of Margarita Lamas as Josefina and Arianna Ortiz as her daughter Carolina, THE MADRES involves and mesmerizes whenever these two interact.

The Groundlings is bringing back THE GALE, their sold-out LGBTQ-focused improv from last year, scheduling at least five evenings of gay gaiety for 2018. THE GALE, 90-minute improvisations of much hilarity by the troupe The Gale, created by Chris Eckert, feature gay and lesbian Groundlings members, as well as, special funny guests from other improv communities.

The SRS Production Wing is currently reviving playwright Noah Haidle's 2005 hit MR.MARMALADE. Wondering what changed from that hit production to this current most nonsensical, two-hour puzzlement. Wanted so much to buy into the conceit that Lucy, a four-year-old (played with much commitment by the pig-tailed, adult Kaitlin Sullivan), would have such a vivid imagination, with such dire consequences as making herself miserable, unhappy, abused and with child.

The combined creative genius of director Michael Michetti and dramaturg Fanshen Cox DiGiovanni have re-imagined the Tennessee Williams' classic A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE into a stunning, relevant update to present time. With a very talented cast of many racial backgrounds, Williams' words of insult and prejudice take on new significance to our present culture.

World premiere of playwright Jeff Dinnell's WICKED PAGAN GAYS showcases Dinnell's clever quips, as well as, his natural acting style portraying the main character Jeff, an atheist. Kiff Scholl ably directs his accommodating cast at a smartly quick clip with punchlines and disses coming fast and furious on such targets as religion, using people and gay culture.

One must applaud Tim Robbins and his Actors' Gang troupe for their passionate, timely presentation of the immigrant plight in their struggles to reach a better life in America. Currently world premiering at The Actors' Gang, Robbins and his cast of twelve performers have created twelve characters they each have familiarity with in THE NEW COLOSSUS. This production may best be described as a performance art piece with the vital message of inclusion

ALLEGIANCE, George Takei's chronicles of his unimaginable family imprisonment in internment camps, makes its L.A. premiere February 28 at the JACCC's Aratani Theatre. During previews, we managed to grab a chance to talk with George on ALLEGIANCE's too-long, incredible journey from his all-too-vivid childhood memories to its decades-later try-out at San Diego's Old Globe, through its Broadway engagement, to its Los Angeles premiere with the East West Players.

Most people know Del Shores as the creator/writer/director of the play and film SORDID LIVES, which morphed into the TV series Sordid Lives: The Series. Del also has utilized his producing and writing talents on Showtime's Queer As Folk and ABC's Dharma & Greg, among others. Del has been touring his various stand-up acts since 2009. Del's latest theatrical opus SIX CHARACTERS IN SEARCH OF A PLAY finds the man himself onstage in his west coast premiere, beginning at the Celebration at the Lex on February 25, 2018.

Kate Pazakis, executive producer of the UNAUTHORIZED MUSICAL PARODY OF... series ably does triple duty in her latest wildly entertaining, two-hour production of THE UNAUTHORIZED MUSICAL PARODY OF JURASSIC PARK. For UMPO JURASSIC PARK, Pazakis not only produces and cleverly writes this enthralling, very witty musical homage to Michael Crichton and Steven Spielberg's 1993 classic film Jurassic Park; Pazakis joins her talented cast onstage singing her ass off as the dinosaur T-Rex.

Martyna Majok wrote IRONBOUND to share the story of the everyday challenges and hurdles of a Polish immigrant surviving in America, basing this theatrical piece on her own mother's experiences. Already in previews, IRONBOUND officially opens February 7, 2018. Martyna took some time out to answer my inquisitive questions in much depth.

In their current side-splitting, pee-in-your-pants, Friday & Saturday night show SWEET VALLEY GROUNDLINGS, the very talented Groundlings troupe just keeps coming up with original, funny skits revolving around the foibles of flawed characters. Director Kevin Kirkpatrick has mined the very best out of his eight-member cast, keeping the lines (and resulting audience laughter) coming at breakneck speed.

WICKED! alumni Shoshana Bean will be celebrating her latest musical project release Spectrum with a one-night concert at The Ace Theatre in Downtown Los Angeles. We had the wonderful opportunity to chat with the powerhouse songstress before prepping for her L.A. engagement.