LOS ANGELES THEATER REVIEWS

On Monday December 22 the terribly amusing song stylist Cortes Alexander presented his annual Swell Noel to an uber packed house at Sterling's Upstairs at the Federal. Alexander has such frenetic energy and charm that, and I've said this before, you just want to wrap him up. What a joyous Christm...

In Frank Capra's It's a Wonderful Life, an angel in training named Clarence comes back to earth to earn his wings by helping one man recognize his value in the world. The beloved classic is a reminder to all adults that every man matters and every angel has his own special way of helping those in ne...

Move Over Radio City! Stand aside all you Las Vegas Production Shows!! Live It Up Productions' ROCKIN THE HOLIDAYS, playing now through December 28 at the JW Marriott Desert Breezes in Palm Desert, is the DEFINITIVE holiday extravaganza - and well worth the drive in from San Diego, Los Angeles and a...

Filled to the (vacuum-sealed) brim with naughty one-liners and blush-worthy double entendres, DIXIE'S TUPPERWARE PARTY is a one-woman comedy laugh-fest cleverly disguised as the most outlandish Tupperware party you'll ever experience. It is hosted by the flamboyant, ultra-caffeinated Dixie Longate, ...

On Monday, December 15 exciting singer Laura Dickinson brought her CD release party One For My Baby to Upstairs at Vitello's. It was a packed house and Dickinson, needless to say, blew the roof off the joint with her dynamic delivery, oozing charm and warmth from every pore. Not only is she beautifu...

While the kids are busy getting their pictures taken with Santa at the mall and begging for overpriced toys they'll forget the day after the Christmas, adults know that the place they'll get the most bang for their jingle bell bucks is at the Falcon Theater. That's where the latest Troubie show is r...

Noel Coward wrote in a song, 'If love were all, I should be lonely', declaring the impossibility of romantic love. He continued this theme onstage in Private Lives, and on screen in Brief Encounter and once again in his most produced play internationally Blithe Spirit, now onstage in a sterling prod...

For the last few years the uber talented Lythgoe family have been entertaining us at Christmastime, first at the El Portal in NoHo and now at the Pasadena Playhouse with a British style panto. A panto is an interactive entertainment that starts with a very contemporary retelling of a fairy tale such...

I'd have to be, well... a mean ol' Grinch to say anything remotely negative about the new non-equity touring stage production of DR. SEUSS' HOW THE GRINCH STOLE CHRISTMAS! THE MUSICAL, so I'll try my best to keep it to a minimum. Honestly though, it's really not that hard, actually, because---surpri...

The 2014 Western tour of ELF: THE MUSICAL stopped for two performances at Riverside's Fox Performing Arts Center before leaving Southern California. The show is fun, but it has flaws....

Loud repetitious music usually is a turnoff to me, in spite of the fact that the rock and roll of the 60s and 70s constitutes a large part of my musical background. I grew up listening to it and like much of it, but in later years have narrowed my preferences to pop standards, jazz and Broadway fare...

The cast of fantastic singers included Kim Huber, Robert Yacko, Madison Claire Parks, Roger Befeler, special guest Jason Graae, and young singers Sami and Sarah Staitman, Brennley Brown, Paige Befeler and 10 year-old Hadley Belle Miller. Virtuoso pianist James Lent served as musical director for th...

In Almost, Maine, playwright John Cariani brilliantly weaves his witty words into his collection of nine stand-alone short scenes thread together by their home town and the various townsfolk name-dropped throughout....

Shawn Ryan sparkles onstage just by being himself. Of course, he exaggerates a tad. Every actor/comedian does. But, it is Ryan's genuine likability that makes him shine. He is self-deprecating, willing to go all the way with a joke or gag, and within the boundaries that he creates, his four-letter w...

A frequent Leslie Jordan collaborator, David Galligan directs this pint-sized dynamo in an 80-minute mostly funny, but sometimes poignantly heartfelt walk down the Jordan Family's memory lane....

Prepare to be thoroughly enchanted by Oregon Shakespeare Festival's transfer of INTO THE WOODS newly arrived at the Wallis Center in Beverly Hills. It is, without a doubt, the most inventive and inspiring production of this Sondheim musical I have ever seen. Amanda Denhert's direction delights at ev...

Candlelight Pavilion Dinner Theatre's annual Christmas show is an original with concept and script by artistic director John LaLonde incorporating well-known and lesser known holiday tunes and carols. It's Christmas Every Day is a feel-good, forget.your.troubles kind of show. Think the whimsy of Whi...

A Little House Christmas/based on the book Little House on the Prairie by Laura Ingalls Wilder/'adapted for the stage by James DeVita/directed by Emily Chase/Sierra Madre Playhouse/through December 23Laura Ingalls Wilder's classic book Little House on the Prairie (1932) became famous as an hour-long...

The Annenberg Theatre kicked off its' starry 2014-2015 Cabaret Season with four of Broadway's most celebrated leading ladies - Donna McKechnie, Andrea McArdle, Maureen McGovern and Randy Graff - in an unforgettable evening of song and story to a "standing room only" crowd dotted with several other B...

Ah, the art of making art! In an excellent adaptation of the 1999 Broadway production of Stephen Sondheim's Putting It Together, Chromolume Theatre steps up to bat with stellar direction from Cate Caplin and boasting a terrific cast through December 21 at their home the Attic Theatre in West LA....

Joe Orton's insanely insane world in 1960s England is no better displayed than in his third and final play What the Butler Saw now onstage at the Mark Taper Forum through December 21. A terrifically energized cast are on hand as is seasoned director John Tillinger, but things got off to a somewhat s...

As a loving homage to his father, Henry Jaglom wrote Train to Zakopane based on the tales his father told him of his times in Poland during the 1920s....

Once again the uniquely talented Hershey Felder endears his audience to him with his newest presentation, the life and work of the one and only composer Irving Berlin in Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin. Currently onstage at the Geffen Playhouse through December 21, Felder's tribute, although a bit l...

Victor Hugo's monumental romantic/gothic novel of the mid 15th century The Hunchback of Notre Dame centers in, around and on top of Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris, France. The new musical of the same name written by Peter Parnell, Stephen Schwartz and Alan Menken, which is receiving its U.S. premiere...

Slaughter House Theatre Company's West Coast premiere of Dirty wonderfully involves, intrigues, then incites indignation while always keeping its audience interested....