LOS ANGELES THEATER REVIEWS

Truly inspirational stories allow you to believe anything is possible if you trust in your own judgment, dreams, and will to succeed. Award-winning stage star Kristin Towers-Rowles shares her remarkable life story doing just that in her critically acclaimed cabaret show, A Lovely Lineage, directed ...

Come an hour early to the El Portal Theatre and take a peak inside the lovely small Marilyn Monroe Theatre lobby, adjacent to the Mainstage and peruse the myriad of photos adorning the walls. They represent a delicious collection of candids of the iconic star. Then proceed on in to the Mainstage pla...

The West Coast premiere of Annie Baker's translation of Anton Chekhov's classic UNCLE VANYA receives a brilliant mounting from the Antaeus Theatre Company.  Robin Larsen directs her talented cast in a steady, flowing pace with just enough quiet moments to contrast the volatile, high emotional ones....

Groundlings' latest laugh-packed Friday & Saturday night show, GROUNDINGS STAKEOUT, keeps the audience in stitches in their ever new and original sketch ideas, providing each of the incredibly talented six-member cast their individual moments to shine....

s I was waiting for my theatre guest to arrive at the Pantages Tuesday night for the opening of ANNIE, a school bus pulled up. Within seconds, a gaggle of little girls spilled out onto the sidewalk shrieking in anticipation and taking pictures of the sparkly marquee on their smart phones. They were ...

Full of the Obie-winning playwright's amusingly observant and stirringly poignant portraits of ordinary people in extraordinary flux, Samuel D. Hunter's 2010 play A BRIGHT NEW BOISE is now being staged in a terrific production currently in performance at Orange County's Ovation-winning Chance Theate...

The undeniable chemistry between Ali MacGraw and Ryan O'Neal is on full display again in Love Letters, a special theatrical tour that officially launched this week at the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills. From the moment these two entered the stage holding hands, the...

Carrie the Killer Musical Experience/book by Lawrence D. Cohen/based on the novel by Stephen King/music by Michael Gore & lyrics by Dean Pitchford/directed by Brady Schwind/choreographed by Lee Martino/Los Angeles Theatre/through November...

Another outrageous original Halloween production has come out of New Jersey. For several years at 6 Flags in the Garden State, Pete Carter developed the character of The Ghoulmaster and his production of 'Ghoulmaster's Ghosts' ran for 6 seasons at Six Flags Great Adventure's Fright Fest in Jackson,...

An incredibly talented cast populate the West Coast premiere of Gretchen Cryer's I'M STILL GETTING MY ACT TOGETHER (AND TAKING IT ON THE ROAD). This production actually includes the original 1978 I'm Getting My Act Together and Taking It On the Road as the first act with the newly written second ...

In the world premiere of his WATCHING O.J., playwright David McMillan deftly balances both sides of the black and white/innocent vs. guilty/jubilant and angry reactions of a multi-racial neighborhood in their varied responses to the infamous O.J. Simpson verdict in 1995. A cross-section of races and...

Into the turmoil of a marriage in trouble comes the enigmatic and apparently deaf Mr. Poulos, a quiet man who rents a room in the Meadows' apartment to assist them in staying afloat while Jimmy looks for work. But who is he really since he never speaks and just sits at the kitchen table all day read...

On Monday October 5, zany comedienne/singer Diane Vincent brought her act: Diane and Lucy & Betty: A One Woman Show to an SRO room at Sterling's Upstairs at the Federal. The best way to describe Vincent is off.the.wall, wound up tightly like a coil that will spring loose at any second. Watch out...

Transgender actress/singer Alexandra Billings has done quite remarkable work on LA stages over the last decade, as well as being one of the stars of the current amazon TV hit Transparent. She holds nothing back; her acting style is brutally honest. Now through next Sunday only October 11, you can...

Branden Jacobs-Jenkins is a young, upcoming playwright whose Neighbors back in 2010 was an alluring eye-opener about racism and the human condition. It declared that race is just an illusion, so the outrageous display of some black characters wearing black face and other blacks sublimating their h...

So does FIRST DATE---the relatively new musical comedy now playing its Southern California regional premiere at the La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts through October 11---merit an outing? Sure! If you're looking for a cute, charming little musical that's giddy and entertaining and features a...

Legends about Hollywood stars are often difficult to prove or disprove. Such is the case about what happened to famous Shakespearean actor John Barrymore after his death. What can be substantiated is that on May 19, 1942, while recording a line from Romeo and Juliet for the show, Barrymore collaps...

The West Coast premiere of playwright Martin Zimmerman's involving SEVEN SPOTS ON THE SUN receives a splendid, mesmerizing mounting with all the artistic elements artfully converging into one of the best and riveting theatrical experience I've seen in the Los Angeles theatre scene this year....

birthday. He is dying of cancer but is told that he is suffering from a spastic colon. Mendacity. Margaret (Madeline Fair) denies gossip that she and husband Brick (Daniel Kaemon) are sleeping apart. The denial is a lie. Gooper (Todd Andrew Ball) and wife Mae (Kyra Schwartz) swear to have Big Daddy'...

CINDERELLA WALTZ investigates the archetypal origins of the world's more popular fairy tale, contrasting the familiar and charming Perrault version with the darker, more ancient and disturbing tale recorded by the brothers Grimm. Grotesque farce and romantic fantasy blend in a fairy tale for adults....

The 20th anniversary revival of the Odyssey production of Clifford Odets' classic AWAKE AND SING! receives a raw and reverential mounting. As directed by Elina de Santos, most characters in this two-hour-and-fifteen-minute three-act portray their roles in bold black-and-whites with little shades of ...

The Pasadena Pops held their final event of the summer at the Los Angeles Country Arboretum and Bontanic Garden on September 12, 2015. Michael Feinstein, performer and principal Pops Conductor led the full orchestra and featured soloists Shelea Frazier and Broadway's Jeremy Jordan....

Perhaps the best known musical of all time Rodgers' and Hammerstein's The Sound of Music has remained a family favorite since the 50s. Number one, the score is to die for; secondly, the book is dramatically fulfilling with a real life family being torn asunder by the ravages of fascism. Touches o...

To put it succinctly, be ready to laugh your ass off. A brilliant, witty melange of slapstick, sight gags, silly absurdity, hyperbolic acting, and even bits of good ol' reliable audience participation, ONE MAN, TWO GUVNORS, Richard Bean's exceedingly hilarious comedy of errors, misdirections, and mi...

It's not often you get to share a rare moment in time with a music legend, listening in on a conversation as if it were taking place in her living room with a good friend as she shares memories of her incredible career in the music industry. Such was the case on Tuesday evening, September 29 at the ...