LOS ANGELES THEATER REVIEWS

The experience of seeing the Grammy and Tony Award-winning stage adaptation of ONCE - THE MUSICAL begins the minute you enter the theatre as you make your way to your assigned seat. It starts with a welcoming, celebratory environment where music is communally enjoyed by both the talented artists on ...

The Ovation-Winning theatre company, Actors Co-op opens up its 28th season with Charles Ludlam's two-person comedy 'The Mystery of Irma Vep - A Penny Dreadful'....

BETWEEN RIVERSIDE AND CRAZY, which makes its Los Angeles debut at The Fountain Theatre, is a hard-hitting drama about wanderers, those unattached, ungrounded people who lack the support to make smart choices, but still deserve grace and hope. Winner of the Pulitzer Prize for Drama in 2015, the play ...

On the evening of October 20, 2019, Los Angeles Opera presented a recital by Javier Camarena and pianist Ángel Rodríguez at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion. Camarena is the Mexican tenor who made news at the Metropolitan Opera when he and the orchestra under Fabio Luisi repeated their rendition of D...

It's amazing to think that it has only been just six weeks since Tony Award winning stage and screen actress Betty Buckley ended her much-lauded 13-month-long engagement starring as the title role in the recent Broadway national tour production of HELLO DOLLY. During that brief stretch of time post-...

Mike Bartlett's COCK presents an unsympathetic take on a man questioning his sexuality as he cheats on his male lover with a woman he keeps running into on his morning route to work. John vacillates between being turned on by M, his hunky, but very mean lover, and being brought to sexual ecstasy by ...

For playwright Adam Bock's endearing new gay romantic comedy THE CANADIANS---now having its infectiously giddy World Premiere production at South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa through October 20, 2019---the typical blueprint for the usual girl-meets-boy trope gets a fresh, heady spin and an inspired...

As the tension mounts to its bloody end, audience members, especially the few who get invited into the scene within Macbeth's castle, are drawn into the characters' lives and motives, all the while experiencing the evocative moody atmosphere of haunted, stone-walled castles. Kudos go out to the enti...

A well-acted ensemble gives THE ABUELAS its relatable humanity. Stephanie Alison Walker has written a unflinching look at realistic, flawed relationships under the most atypical circumstances. THE ABUELAS (THE GRANDMOTHERS) - a follow-up of Walker's THE MADRES (THE MOTHERS) also deals with the Dirty...

On Saturday Evening, October 12, 2019, Los Angeles Opera presented Adam Guettel's THE Light In the Piazza. A musical theater work rather than an opera, Piazza provided the audience with a nostalgic excursion to Florence and Rome in the 1950s. For opera star Renée Fleming it was a tour de force as ...

30 years after its stage debut, experiencing MISS SAIGON nowadays exposes just how outdated and out-of-touch it is with our increasingly diverse world view. The musical's original production---which first debuted in the West End in 1989 before transferring to Broadway in 1991---became a global hit d...

With STEPHEN KING'S IT - A MUSICAL PARODY, Rockwell Musical Parodies assumes the lofty mantle of UNAUTHORIZED MUSICAL PARODY OF... in presenting a well-oiled selection of amazing vocalists singing hit pop songs that cleverly advance the narrative of cult, non-musical films. Familiar Rockwell Table &...

I have been following magician Siegfried Tiber for several years, marveling at his mind-boggling sleight of hand magic and illusions. His latest show, RED THREAD presented by Atlas Obscura, offers a theatrical exploration of the concepts of chance and chaos, with Siegfried guiding participants throu...

For those too young to remember, from 1957 to 1962 The Everly Brothers sold more than 35 million records and had 35 Billboard top-100 singles, 26 in the top 40, and to this day, carry the record for most Billboard charting hits of any American Duo. Their success at that time was only rivaled by Elvi...

At its core, the original production of LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS (and the movie adaptation it spawned) unabashedly celebrated its campy outlandishness. But unlike the original source material which was filled to the brim with sassy sight gags, cartoonish mannerisms, and pulp thrills, this new, gloriou...

The IAMA Theatre Company's west coast premiere of playwright Daniel Pearle's A KID LIKE JAKE is very blessed to have the sturdy acting talents of Sharon Lawrence, Tim Peper and Sarah Utterback. Jennifer Chambers ably directs the naturalistic, every-day dialogues, explosive arguments and confrontatio...

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THE DROWSY CHAPERONE with music and lyrics by Lisa Lambert and Greg Morrison, book by Bob Martin and Don McKellar, offers audiences a toe-tapping trip back to the golden age of musicals, and took Broadway by storm, winning five Tony Awards. It spoofs musical-comedy fanatics and the genre itself, oft...

The Groundlings, as always, bring the hilarity and the latest news-worthy topics to their current Friday and Saturday night show ALL THE LEAVES ARE GROUNDLINGS. Michael Naughton quite ably directs his very talented cast of eight (Matt Cook, Josh Duvendeck, Ryan Gaul, Patty Guggenheim, Kiel Kennedy, ...

Elton John has been a powerful name in music for more than 40 years, and is currently enjoying another wave of popularity. Now, more than ever, there is demand and desire to step back in time and experience the sights and sounds of this amazing artist. In tribute to his greatness, Kenny Metcalf has ...

Directors for MAMMA MIA! at the Simi Valley Cultural Arts Center, Keenon Hooks and Fred Helsel, with Fred Helsel as Producer, Keenon Hooks as Choreographer, and Mazie Rudolph as Musical Director, prove beyond a shadow of a doubt that this musical is just as much fun in a smaller theater thanks to th...

Told in three separate one-act stories, the World Premiere of Leda Siskind's play THE SURVEILLANCE TRIOLOGY explores the ways in which private citizens have become victims of ever-present eavesdropping by forces able to be kept secret until the damage has been done. Directed by Amanda Conlon at The...

During the thought-provoking 90-minute play, made even more visually intense via attention-grabbing historical projections of news headlines to forward the progression of time on Rachel Myers exquisitely transformational scenic design, Feldshuh and Faracy fully embody not only the physical presence ...

IN CIRCLES is a feast for the eyes, even if Gertrude Stein's texts as lyrics seem nonsensical at times. Just go with the flow and let the atmosphere of the avant-garde 1968 theatre scene set your mind free! If only Stein's lover Alice B. Toklas was there to hand out her special recipe brownies to en...