LOS ANGELES THEATER REVIEWS

Once in a great while an extraordinary performer comes along, one that not only moves us, but also affects meteoric changes within our culture. Peter Allen, born Peter Woolnough in 1944 in Tenterfield, New South Wales, Australia and who died young in 1992, was one such mega-talented singer/dancer/mu...

Every director has their bucket list of plays they wish to direct or perhaps even appear in someday. Director Alan Mandell has long been enamored with the work of Samuel Beckett and has toured with original productions of Waiting for Godot and Endgame directed by Beckett. With his 80-year career i...

Kristin Idaszak's SECOND SKIN receives a strong and novel mounting on the sands of the Santa Monica Beach. Fueled by the powerful performances of Sarah Halford, Claire Kaplan and Susannah Rea-Dowling, Idaszak weaves the mythical bedtime stories and real life tales of a daughter and her estranged mot...

The premiere of THE SUPERHERO AND HIS CHARMING WIFE as presented by Not Man Apart, the amazing Physical Theatre Ensemble, was born from a dream in which heroes, villains, witches and a changing wife fill the stage with incredible athletic movement performed by a cast of ten. As are most dreams, it ...

Four Clowns' world premiere of playwright David Bridel's LUNATICS & ACTORS wonderfully succeeds as a loving spoof of the acting process. It's to the credit of all involved that what could have been a five-minute Saturday Night Live skit has evolved into 70 minutes of enthralling wit and engaging art...

On Thursday April 21, Prime Time Players presented their second of three Magical Musical Matinees at the Whitefire Theatre. It was a delightful show full of talented people 60 years young or older. There was dancing, singing and comedy all wrapped up with a pink bow in the name of Jackie Goldbe...

Playwright Phil Olson, who is best known for his outrageous Don't Hug Me musical comedies, is taking a look at a typical American family on Thanksgiving Day in A Nice Family Gathering, currently onstage in the black box theatre of Group rep in Noho through May 29....

Adorable, utterly romantic, and thoroughly winsome, this stage adaptation of Rodgers and Hammerstein's CINDERELLA is, admittedly, a wonderful surprise---filled with dazzling stage ingenuity; a dreamy, sweeping classic score by two legendary titans of musical theater; a revised, 21st-Century-tinged n...

Every year, Hollywood studios spend millions upon millions of dollars on TV pilots, the test shows that networks order before deciding which shows should become full-fledged series or wind up being locked away in a vault never to be seen again. For every pilot that eventually airs, there are three...

AGNES OF GOD is challenging theatre at every level. It demands a lot of its audience. It demands its audience be engaged and active at every turn. It is both emotionally and intellectually stimulating and provocative. It is ninety-plus minutes of thought provoking dialogue with minimal action. One m...

Wham! Pow! Boom! Up and away, it's Superman! Growing up in the 50s I couldn't wait for the next weekly adventure-filled installment of Supie and Lois Lane, Jimmy Olsen, Perry White and the Daily Planet on the small television screen. It was thrilling to see a man go into a telephone booth and change...

The longest running musical in the world The Fantasticks is always at its best when produced and performed with simplicity. When I first saw it in New York in the 60s, it was performed in a cabaret space against a brick wall, with the suspension of a paper moon above. You can't get much simpler th...

Pulitzer-Prize winning playwright Suzan-Lori Parks has the uncanny ability to get under your skin and really make you feel the turmoil and misery of the black soul. In her latest play, now onstage at the Mark Taper Forum through May 15 entitled Father Comes Home From the Wars (Parts 1, 2, & 3), Par...

More than ever, Americans are living in a state of fear. Such is the subject searingly explored in playwright Julia Cho's intensely jarring new play OFFICE HOUR which continues its exceptional world premiere performances at Orange County's Tony Award winning regional theater South Coast Repertory in...

ANTON IN SHOW BUSINESS by Jane Martin is a satirical romp across the stage of American Theatre, that holds a hilarious mirror up to the live theatre entertainment from coast to coast. The story focuses on Holly (Gillian Shure), a wildly popular TV star, who needs to get theatrical street cred to be ...

Strong vocals, sharp comedic timing and stunning visuals mark Dutches Theatre's world premiere of THE STORY OF ALICE. Michael Cormier has updated the classic Alice in Wonderland book. Cormier's most clever lyrics appear in 'Keep Your Temper' sung by the charismatic Santino Tomasetti as Admiral Pilla...

I am always interested in seeing a conventional play being presented in an unconventional way. So when I heard about director Blake Silver undertaking a production of Henry James THE TURN OF THE SCREW adapted by Jeffrey Hatcher, produced by Haldane Morris, and presented lit only by flashlights held...

The world premiere of playwright Terry Ray's ELECTRICITY's perfect for those rarefied romantics out there who still believe true love can be found, whatever the obstacles. With a three-decade time span, audiences must check their need for plausibility at the theatre front door in order to accept two...

Occasionally we venture beyond the borders of Ventura County to see what is going on in Los Angeles, and on this occasion, we couldn't resist taking in a performance of A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder, which is currently playing at the Ahmanson Theatre downtown. The 2013 show won Tonys for Be...

The destination for girls' night out in Southern California this month is definitely Plummer Auditorium in Fullerton. That's where 3-D Theatricals' revival of David Yazbek and Terrence McNally's THE FULL MONTY kicks into high gear for the next two weekends....

If it was possible to like... or rather, LOOOVE... the Broadway musical KINKY BOOTS even more so than one already does, the lovable, fresh-faced cast of the musical's current first national tour is certainly making a really good case for it. An all-around spectacular stage show in every sense of the...

Though that comedy device of rewritten song lyrics is (unfortunately) not utilized for the film's musical stage adaptation, still, much of the spirit and basic plot architecture of the original movie remains in SISTER ACT - THE MUSICAL, which features all-original songs by composer Alan Menken and l...

We tell a lot of stories in the theatre. Here in Los Angeles, however, we don't often tell stories that are authentically home-grown. FIGHTING SHADOWS is that rare exception, a deeply personal story of a Mexican-American boy who grew up in east L.A., survived abuse, gangs, prison, and drugs, ultimat...

The battle of the sexes. The battle of sex. Maybe, even, the battle for sex. However it's termed, men and women have scrambled to make sense of their insidious attraction versus spectacular confusion with each other since the Big Bang (ahem)....

For those adverse to sitting through cult orientation lectures, the world premiere of playwright Jesse Mu-En Shao's THE END TIMES might be ninety minutes to avoid. Shao vividly recreates the militaristic recitation of a cult's teachings which all members continuously repeat, either to re-enforce the...