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Michael M. Landman-Karny
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London Theatre Review: STEREOPHONIC (Duke of York’s)
THEATRE TURNED ALL THE WAY UP There are moments in the theatre when everything converges: writing, performance, design, direction, and something indefinable that transforms craft into revelation. David Adjmi’s Stereophonic, now blazing through the Duke of York’s Theatre, is precisely such a moment. This isn’t simply 2024’s finest American play; it’s a seismic shift in…
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Theater Obituary: RICHARD GREENBERG (1958-2025)
A CHRONICLER OF PRIVILEGED ANXIETY In the peculiar ecosystem of American theatre—where earnestness often trumps elegance and message supersedes craft—Richard Greenberg, who passed on July 4, 2025 at 67, occupied a singular niche. His characters were the sort of people who attended the right universities, read the correct books, and still found themselves paralyzed by…
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London Theatre Review: OLIVER! (Gielgud Theatre)
BOURNE AGAIN: A MUSICAL RECLAMATION IN GLORIOUS MINOR KEY After a long absence from the West End, Oliver! has returned with the force of a Victorian street gang bursting through fog-shrouded London alleys. Matthew Bourne‘s revival of Lionel Bart‘s beloved musical at the Gielgud Theatre is nothing short of theatrical gold, a production that honors…
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London Opera Review: SEMELE (Royal Opera House)
THE SERVANT PROBLEM: OLIVER MEARS STRIPS HANDEL’S SEMELE TO ITS DISEASED CORE There’s something deeply unsettling about watching gods behave badly in a conference hotel. Oliver Mears‘ production of Handel’s Semele at the Royal Opera House at Covent Garden, which conquered Paris earlier this year, doesn’t just update the myth; it performs surgery on it,…
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Music Obituary: SIR ROGER NORRINGTON
THE METRONOME REVOLUTIONARY Sir Roger Norrington, who died on July 15th at the age of 90, spent his career making enemies of the right sort. Traditionalists loathed his brisk Beethoven. Period purists found his scholarship insufficiently dogmatic. Modern orchestras discovered, to their dismay, that he expected them to actually read what composers had written in…
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London Review: MY NEIGHBOUR TOTORO (Gillian Lynne)
WHAT THE FOREST KNOWS: TOTORO AND THE RADICAL ACT OF WONDER There’s something profoundly radical about a piece of theatre that trusts its audience to believe in wonder. The Royal Shakespeare Company’s production of My Neighbour Totoro, now enchanting audiences in its West End transfer at the Gillian Lynne Theatre after breaking box office records…
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Album Review: SMASH (Original Broadway Cast on Concord)
They Just Keep Moving The Line: Smash Cast Recording Crosses Into Broadway Gold The alchemy has finally occurred. After thirteen years, Smash has completed its metamorphosis from cult television curiosity to bona fide Broadway treasure, crystallized in its original cast recording released digitally on May 16, 2025. What emerges is theatrical archaeology at its finest….
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Theatre Review: GIANT (Harold Pinter Theatre, London)
A GIANT PEACH OF AN ANTISEMITE There’s something eerily familiar about the way John Lithgow adjusts his cardigan in Mark Rosenblatt‘s haunting new play Giant, now playing in the West End’s Harold Pinter Theatre, having transferred from Royal Court. Like a beloved uncle settling in for storytime, he radiates the practiced charm that made Roald…
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Obituary: CONNIE FRANCIS (Dec. 12, 1937 – July 16, 2025)
THE VOICE THAT BRIDGED WORLDS The obituaries flooding social media following Connie Francis’s death on July 16th focus predictably on her record sales (over 200 million albums worldwide) and her historical firsts—she was the first woman to reach number one on the Billboard Hot 100 in 1960 with “Everybody’s Somebody’s Fool” Yet such statistics, impressive…
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Theatre Review: EVITA (London Palladium)
THE GYM TOOK OVER ARGENTINA AND NOBODY LOOKED BACK Jamie Lloyd’s Evita comes at you like a SoulCycle class that got a state grant for performance art. It’s sweaty, shiny, and occasionally shouts at you in political slogans. The whole thing feels like someone dared the production team to stage a military coup with nothing…
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Album Review: PHILIP GLASS VIOLIN CONCERTO NO. 1 (Anne Akiko Meyers with the LA Phil; Gustavo Dudamel, Conductor)
The Glass House Violin: Anne Akiko Meyers Illuminates a Minimalist Classic In the sprawling landscape of Philip Glass‘s output, his Violin Concerto No. 1 occupies a peculiar position. Written in 1987 as his first major venture into non-theatrical orchestral territory, the concerto emerged from a period when Glass was being nudged by conductor Dennis Russell…
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Highly Recommended Concert: MOONLIGHT MELODIES: AN EVENING WITH THE CROONERS (Pasadena POPS)
CROONING SOON UNDER THE MOON Picture this: you’re sprawled on grass under a canopy of stars, wine in hand, while Michael Feinstein conducts a full orchestra just yards away. Behind him, actual peacocks strut across the stage like they own the place. This isn’t a fever dream, it’s Moonlight Melodies: An Evening with the Crooners,…
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Film Review: THE PHOENICIAN SCHEME (Directed by Wes Anderson)
ANDERSON’S REPUBLIC OF OBJECTS Something has shifted in Wes Anderson’s dollhouse universe. The Phoenician Scheme arrives with all the expected geometric precision, but underneath the familiar symmetries lurks an unfamiliar bite. Arms dealer Anatole “Zsa-Zsa” Korda (Benicio del Toro) has survived six assassination attempts by the time we meet him in 1950. He’s a jaded…
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Theater Obituary: MARK BROKAW (A Tribute to the Director’s “Cry-Baby” on Broadway)
IN PRAISE OF A MISJUDGED MISFIT Mark Brokaw and the Undeserved Fate of Cry-Baby In the wake of director Mark Brokaw‘s untimely passing at 65 yesterday, I find myself returning not to one of his celebrated triumphs, such as How I Learned to Drive, but to a show that critics swatted away with a smirk…
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Theater Review: THE JANEIAD (Old Globe in San Diego)
THE ODYSSEY, IN ASHES AND UPHOLSTERY The chair will not move. That is how we begin. In Anna Ziegler‘s The Janeiad, now in a quietly astonishing production at the Old Globe, which produced Ziegler’s The Last Match in 2016, a woman sits in a green armchair and does not get up. Not because of laziness….
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Book Review: THEATRE KID: A BROADWAY MEMOIR (Jeffrey Seller | Simon & Schuster)
STANDING OVATIONS, INNER DEMONS By the time Jeffrey Seller is having sex in a gym sauna—one of the more unfiltered anecdotes in Theater Kid—it’s clear this isn’t your typical Broadway memoir. The marquee names are there, and the triumphs are big—but what sets the book apart is its detour into raw, unglamorous emotional terrain. This…
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Obituary: ALFRED BRENDEL (1931-2025)
THE LAST OF THE PHILOSOPHERS AT THE PIANO The fingers were careful, almost tentative. Not cautious, a word Brendel would have objected to, but curious. Each phrase felt like a question. The silences in between rang louder than the notes. At the keyboard, Alfred Brendel–who dies on June 20 at 94–did not try to astonish,…
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Dance Review: SWAN LAKE (Miami City Ballet)
NO MIST, NO MERCY, JUST SWAN LAKE Forget what you think Swan Lake is. Forget the gauzy tragedy, the white tutus, the endless fluttering. At Segerstrom Hall tonight, Miami City Ballet, under Alexei Ratmansky‘s choreography, has cracked open the windows. Something sharper moves through the air now. The story’s cruelty remains intact. It is a…
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Highly Recommended Concert: BROADWAY LEGENDS FROM GERSHWIN TO SONDHEIM (Michael Feinstein and the Pasadena POPS at LA County Arboretum)
BROADWAY STARS UNDER THE STARS If you’ve ever wanted to hear Michael Feinstein conduct an orchestra while a pulchritude of peacocks prance in the background, you’re in for one of LA’s most delightfully surreal summer experiences. The Pasadena POPS is back Jun 21, 2025, at the LA County Arboretum with their annual Broadway night, and honestly?…
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Music Announcement and Commentary: ALEXANDER SHELLEY (Incoming Music Director of Pacific Symphony in Costa Mesa)
Alexander Shelley and the Turn No One Saw Coming at the Pacific Symphony When Carl St.Clair steps down, after thirty-four years of quietly shaping the Pacific Symphony, will most people notice? That’s not a dig. It’s just the reality of classical music in Southern California — always slightly off to the side, just out of…
Theater Review: THE PRODUCERS (Ogunquit Playhouse / Maine)
by Lynne Weiss | September 10, 2026
in Regional, TheaterConcert Preview: KUKIEL–LAMCELLARI–GLICKLICH PIANO TRIO (The Music Guild / Los Angeles)
by pwsadmin | September 9, 2026
in Los Angeles, MusicTheater Review: THE ARSONISTS (Skylight Theatre / Los Angeles)
by Michael Landman-Karney | September 9, 2026
in Los Angeles, TheaterTheater Review: SAFE HOUSE (Theatre Row / New York)
by Paola Bellu | September 9, 2026
in New York, TheaterTheater Review: MA RAINEY’S BLACK BOTTOM (A Noise Within / Pasadena)
by Michael Landman-Karney | September 9, 2026
in Los Angeles, TheaterTheater Review: THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA (National Tour / San Diego)
by Milo Shapiro | September 7, 2026
in San Diego, Theater, ToursTheater Review: JOAN CRAWFORD GOES TO HELL (Hell in a Handbag / Chicago)
by Croydon Fernandes | September 6, 2026
in Chicago, TheaterTheater Review: SUNDAY IN THE PARK WITH GEORGE (Kokandy / Chicago)
by Croydon Fernandes | September 5, 2026
in Chicago, TheaterMusic Preview: AMERICAN SOUND TAKES FLIGHT (MUSE/IQUE / Beverly Hills & Pasadena)
by Gregory Bernard | September 5, 2026
in Los Angeles, MusicTheater Review: COME FROM AWAY (Marriott Theatre / Lincolnshire, IL)
by Emma S. Rund | September 4, 2026
in Chicago, Theater-Chicago
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