LOS ANGELES THEATER REVIEWS

Theatre 40 is a well-known for presenting superb and very professional World Premiere productions in the Reuben Cordova Theatre on the campus of Beverly Hills High School. Their winning streak continues with APRIL, MAY & JUNE written by Gary Goldstein and directed by Terri Hanauer which continues t...

Directed by Filter Theatre's Sean Holmes, with music and sound by Tom Haines and Ross Hughes, TWELFTH NIGHT is a ferocious reimaging of Shakespeare's classic comedy where nothing onstage is hidden and everything is revealed, from cables, costumes, props and more. Six actors, together with two musici...

There's not a chance in hell that an audience member could fail to be engaged in Not Man Apart Physical Theatre Ensemble's latest new work, PARADISE LOST: RECLAIMING DESTINY. The company has found a tantalizing niche with its athletically rich dance, movement & sensory exploration of stories that li...

The award-winning playwright/drag legend/cabaret artiste Charles Busch displayed the reasons why he's such a creative force to be reckoned with as he had the Rockwell audience easily eating out of his outstretched hands in his THAT GIRL/THAT BOY cabaret show. Busch and his adoring fans most deservin...

Have you ever felt the presence of someone in a room where you are sitting? How about when you are in an ICU waiting room with a loved one just beyond the door, hanging onto life by a thread? Have you ever experienced that person in the waiting room with you, clearing their mind of regrets as they...

The Whitefire Theatre's west coast premiere of playwright Ellen Melaver's MARTHA possesses all the creative elements, exquisitely combined, for a stunning one-woman show on modern dance revolutionary Martha Graham. The incredible Christina Carlisi totally embodies this movement innovator with her ve...

Cupcake Studio's production of Green Day's American Idiot oozes of freshness in Trump's America. There was never a dull moment in this high energy, headbanging, production. The power of this show rests in its pure energy, and the cast certainly delivered....

Cal State Long Beach's Theatre Arts Department practiced two hours of theatre alchemy spinning Kirsten Childs' manure of a script into pure gold. Hats off to Dr. Jaye Austin Williams, and her unbelievably talented cast and team of designers for turning this banal and poorly written story into an en...

EDWARD ALBEE'S AT HOME AT THE ZOO combines Albee's groundbreaking 1959 short play The Zoo Story with his acclaimed prequel Homelife, written in 2004. Together these short plays tell a more complete story of publishing executive Peter, his wife Ann, and Jerry, the volatile stranger Peter meets in the...

A committed group of six actors give depth and much emotions to a collection of correspondence between older mentors and younger mentees of the gay community. Psychotherapist Brian Gleason has cherry picked portions of Rainer Maria Rilke's book 'Letters to A Young Poet' and dramatized them to some f...

As a way to celebrate International Women's Day this year, I attended the World Premiere of Ngozi Anyanwu's new play GOOD GRIEF at Center Theatre Group's Kirk Douglas Theatre. The production is directed by Patricia McGregor, with Anyanwu performing as the lead character, Nkechi. This is the first of...

Often called the greatest set of variations ever written for keyboard, the 33 Variations on a waltz by Anton Diabelli, Op. 120, commonly known as the Diabelli Variations, was written by Beethoven between 1819 and 1823, the time frame of his life which is examined in the play, told concurrently with ...

Over the years, I have seen many productions of COMPANY and am pleased to tell you the current production at the Morgan-Wixson in Santa Monica is by far the best one I have ever seen thanks to the brilliant direction and fabulous casting done by Kristin Towers-Rowles, herself a triple-threat perform...

Attending this show is closer to sitting through a college philosophy lecture, taught by the campus' resident bat-shit insane tenured professor, than it is a night out at the theatre....

Fueled by love, anger, hope and pride, Larry Kramer's masterpiece THE NORMAL HEART centers on a circle of friends struggling to understand and contain a mysterious disease ravaging New York's gay community and one man's fight to awaken the world to the urgency of the situation. The guest production ...

Genuinely one of the funniest musical comedies to ever grace Broadway, A GENTLEMAN'S GUIDE TO LOVE AND MURDER easily proves quite early on---and pretty much throughout its two uproarious acts---why it won the 2014 Tony Award for Best Musical. Filled with hilarious sight gags, wickedly witty banter, ...

American audiences first met Rain Pryor as television's first biracial child on "Head of the Class." Los Angeles audiences can now meet her up close and personal during her new solo play, FRIED CHICKEN & LATKES, in which Richard Pryor's talented daughter shares many of her childhood memories as the ...

If you were amazed and dazzled by the puppetry in War Horse, be sure to grab tickets for the remaining performances 946 before it leaves town! 946 is a tender coming-of-age tale that uncovers the secrets behind World War II's D-Day landings. Set in the idyllic seaside village of Slapton Sands, the l...

FOREVER PLAID by Stuart Ross is a musical that lends itself to offering audiences a goofy, charming musical escape, and is considered one of the most popular and successful off-Broadway musicals in history. Having never before seen a production of it, I have always been curious why those who have e...

Writer, Daniel Sugimoto has always tried to push past our standard social interactions, which are based on the rules of politeness, in order to have real human interactions instead. His latest play, WHITE PEOPLE DRINKING, which is NOT a musical, is all about those honest conversations during a dinn...

Celebrated soprano Julia Migenes has returned to L.A. with the world premiere of DEBUSSY: HIS LETTERS AND MUSIC, her newest musical portrait of legendary French composer Claude Debussy. Her exploration of his life - his youth, his determination to find his own musical path while battling the more co...

Video games get the musical comedy treatment in CLAUDIO QUEST, a clever new musical now having its West Coast Premiere performances at Orange County's Chance Theater through February 26 in Anaheim. Those familiar with the 8-bit characters of games like Super Mario Bros. will be amused by the adventu...

Circle X Theatre Co.'s world premiere of playwright Susan Rubin's LIANA AND BEN presents one of the best technical productions I've seen in small LA theatres. Walking into the Atwater Village Theatre, more than a number of entering audience members do a double take at the optical illusion right in f...

Cal State Long Beach's spring season is off to a strong start, and their upcoming shows have a tough act to follow....

UMPO's continues its winning recipe for a raucous evening of laughs and musicality with its latest production THE UNAUTHORIZED MUSICAL PARODY OF MEAN GURLZ. Take one part cult film favorite. Separate out the funny situations accenting them with witty, new lines. Add hit pop songs, repurposed to adva...