LOS ANGELES THEATER REVIEWS

We meet five women in Merri Biechler's new play OCCUPATION - three mothers and two daughters - none related by blood, all connected by something larger. The United States looks completely different than it did five years ago, before the terrorist takeover by an unnamed faction. Martial law is in eff...

Besides the Hollywood Bowl's all-star concert event, THE LITTLE MERMAID also made a splash at the La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts. This visually-gorgeous, fully-staged new production of the film's Broadway stage adaptation---produced locally by McCoy Rigby Entertainment with new staging an...

Last year at the Hollywood Fringe Festival, I discovered CAC Studios and their own unique brand of musical theatre entertainment, musically directed by Dan Sugi who also acts and sings up a storm. So when I discovered his first full length musical creation BROADWAY NOIR was having its world premier...

In Sarah Kelly's new play, WAR STORIES, we meet four of them: Chelsea (Sarah Schreiber), an actress constantly attracted to catastrophe; Sam (Clayton McInerney), a writer whose motto is 'never fall in love with an actress'; Jen (Sarah Kelly) a therapist, and sucker for a good love story; and Jake (B...

A mesmerizing second half more than compensates for a curious first in Sam Shepard's FOOL FOR LOVE, the Los Angeles LGBT Center's entry into the 2016 Hollywood Fringe Festival. With the four characters' relationships peeling open like layers of an onion, the last half explodes with the actors' inten...

A ridiculously talented troupe of singer/comedians totally revel and entertain in THE UNAUTHORIZED MUSICAL PARODY OF THE BIG LEBOWSKI. Staged, not only on the mainstage, but in various nooks and on available bar stools of the Rockwell; director Tye Blue smoothly whips his energy-infectious cast thro...

Playwright Carla Neuss lays it all out there in this autobiographical two-hander, starring Katelyn Schiller as The Virgin and Joshua Bross as a variety of past boyfriends. Schiller narrates the largely comedic piece, which combines the framework of a slide projector presentation with flashback scene...

On June 7, the Rockwell Table & Stage featured the stunning vocals of Michael Longoria. Smartly written by Longoria and his director Taylor James, Broadway standards received re-imagined, re-purposed raison-d'etre in advancing Longoria's fascinating narrative. His verbal accounts (serving as song in...

The Australian Theatre Company's stunning quartet of talented actors elevates playwright Andrew Bovell's very clever SPEAKING IN TONGUES into an entertaining puzzlement. Jeneffa Soldatic firmly directs her gifted cast in their multiple intersecting roles that asks the audience to really, really pay ...

Ibsen's Hedda Gabler steeped in 19th century realism has never been presented with more visual splendor than in Antaeus' current production. It is their last in the NoHo space before moving to a new theatre in Glendale in the fall, but that is hardly the reason to see it. It is memorable all by it...

Steven Robman's strong hand at brisky directing his very talented ensemble at a snappy pace makes this updated 19th century classic whizz by in its two-hour-and-twenty-minute length. Who knew Hedda Gabler was such a BITCH! As beautifully limmed by Jaimi Paige, her Hedda's the original Mean Girl....

Early in May, Gustavo Dudamel—the brilliant music director of the Los Angeles Philharmonic—was booed at the opening of TURANDOT at the Vienna State Opera purportedly for playing too loud. There were no such complaints when he returned to Disney Hall in Los Angeles on May 20, with a grand, finely...

Directed by B'Anca and written and starring singer Sybil Harris, the production is billed as 'a show with songs.' The latter part is certainly true....

In their inaugural collaboration with Clifton's Cafeteria, Creating Arts Studios has produced THE CLIFTON'S CANTEEN, a fitting and entertaining tribute to and for our servicemen and servicewomen during Memorial Weekend. Patterned after a USO show, each member of the troupe played a famous celebrity ...

Does Abe Burrows' now classic show How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying still hold up theme-wise? Well, nepotism will always rear its ugly head and those that climb the corporate ladder will continue ruthlessly to step on those beneath them and on those by their sides as well. So, the ...

Frozen fans will be ecstatic with the way Disney has re-imagined its much-loved blockbuster film for the stage, now that the doors to FROZEN - LIVE AT THE HYPERION are open on the Hollywood backlot of Disney California Adventure. And with its stunning state-of-the-art visual technology and heart-ope...

Now after more than a year, NEWSIES' North American First National Tour is nearing its conclusion, finally stopping at Orange County's Segerstrom Center for the Arts in Costa Mesa through May 29 (the musical will motor down to San Diego the following week). After seeing the original Broadway product...

Loesser Known: The Stories and Songs of Frank Loesser premiered at Sterling's Upstairs at the Federal Sunday May 22 with lovely singer Heather Lundstedt O'Neill doing the honors. Lundstedt O'Neill has a beautiful, classically trained soprano voice that she utilizes supremely, lending her an aweso...

To close out its current season, Orange County's Tony-winning regional theater South Coast Repertory has chosen to mount an opulent, high-caliber revival of Peter Shaffer's 1979 play AMADEUS, which continues performances in Costa Mesa through June 5, 2016. The recipient of the 1981 Tony Award for Be...

On Thursday May 19 consummate singer Pat Whiteman presented An Evening of Pat Whiteman & Grammy nominated songwriter Harriet Schock at the E Spot Lounge at Vitello's in Studio City to a sold-out house of arduous music lovers. Although not as well known as the others, Harriet Schock has been co...

Rajiv Joseph's very tricky to pull off GRUESOME PLAYGROUND INJURIES lands at the Hudson Backstage as a stunning success! Considering the main conceit of GRUESOME PLAYGROUND INJURIES requires two actors playing a 30-year age range from 8 to 38; in less capable hands, this seventy-minute one-act woul...

Clever workshop presentation of the world premiere of playwrights Victor Bardack & Edward Michael Bell's HILLARY & MONICA. Though HILLARY & MONICA contains lots of witty elements still to be tweaked and fleshed out, the winning and steady component that needs no changing or improving's the central, ...

The East West Players' latest, LA CAGE AUX FOLLES, most successfully communicates the heart and humor of Tony Award-winners Harvey Fierstein & Jerry Herman, injecting an Asian flavor as only East West can do. E/W's outgoing Producing Artistic Director Tim Dang deftly directs his very talented cast ...

Lovers of the era of Busby Berkeley movie musicals are getting a double whammy of Golden Age goodness this month with a pair of musicals playing only two blocks from each other in Hollywood. I ONLY HAVE EYES FOR YOU is already running at the mid-sized Ricardo Montalban Theatre on Vine and, very shor...

What a lovely surprise! I know that Bruce Kimmel is quite the clever gentleman and would not expect anything less than superlative work from his camp, but stepping down to the college campus level to review is not something that I particularly savor. These actors, with the exception of Robert Yacko ...