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Tony Frankel
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New York Theater: 2022 DRAMA DESK AWARD WINNERS
AWARD WINNERS THAT STAGE AND CINEMA AGREES WITH ACROSS THE BOARD Well, well, well. Bless the 2021-2022 Drama Desk Nominating Committee. Not only were their nominations truly for achievement (versus all the awards for so-called “woke” theater from other organizations), but winners were fairly chosen, even in some very very VERY tight categories. The design…
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Off-Broadway Live & Streaming: CIRCLE JERK (Connelly Theater)
IT’S A LOT TO TAKE IN, BUT TAKE IT IN YOU MUST Fake Friends, which co-created the zany streaming event This American Wife (review), are very very bright and insightful, au courant about the internet-age zeitgeist, and as queer as a clockwork orange. This tribe is a lot to take in, but take it in you must. Now, their Circle…
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Theater Review: GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER (Ruskin Group Theatre in Santa Monica)
GUESS WHAT PLAY WORKS Based on the screenplay of the same name, writer Todd Kreidler has updated for the stage Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner, Stanley Kramer’s smash-hit 1967 movie by William Rose, writer of the classic Ealing black comedy The Ladykillers (1955) and It’s a Mad, Mad, Mad, Mad World (1966). A most satisfactory…
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Theater Review: BELOVED (Road Theatre in NoHo)
BELOVED THEATER At first, we think that Beloved is about the tragic state of the internet, that a high school boy at the prestigious St. Albans in Montreal, Canada, would never be in the mess he’s in had he not been able to find child porn online, let alone steal the password on the school’s…
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Broadway Closing: HANGMEN (Golden Theater)
DON’T GET HUNG OUT BY MISSING THIS MASTERPIECE Blimey, friends, you only have two more weeks to see my favorite play on Broadway. And not only my favorite, but the best. Martin McDonough’s thrilling comedy Hangmen contains incredibly well-drawn characters played by jaw-dropping performers, many of whom came from the West End. Additionally, it is…
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Theater Review: MAN OF GOD (Geffen Playhouse)
GODDAMNED MEN Four Korean teen missionaries from Los Angeles — Kyung-Hwa (Ji-Young Yoo), Samantha (Shirley Chen), Jen (Emma Galbraith), and Mimi (Erin Rae Li) — have arrived in Bangkok with their pastor to save the souls of red light district tourists … you know, the Germans who come to piddle with little boys dressed as…
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Review: COME FROM AWAY (North American Tour)
A NEWFOUND(LAND) WAY OF LOOKING AT MUSICAL THEATER This intimate ensemble piece seems to get better and better, yet it’s practically the same show I saw when it first opened at La Jolla Playhouse and then on Broadway (where it remains a hit). The National Tour, which is merely breezing through L.A. for two weeks…
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Music Review: DUDAMEL CONDUCTS BEETHOVEN’S NINTH (Los Angeles Philharmonic at Disney Hall))
LA PHIL’S PRIDE WITH “JOY” Wow, I do believe tonight’s house at Disney Hall was the most packed for a classical concert that I’ve seen since before that stupid COVID rat showed up. And it’s a sure bet that patrons were here for the massive showing of Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. Why, with the greatest chorus…
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Theater Review: HOW TO SUCCEED IN BUSINESS WITHOUT REALLY TRYING (Musical Theatre Guild)
MUSICAL THEATRE GUILD KNOWS HOW TO SUCCEED Reams can and have been written about the glories of How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying. With music and lyrics by Frank Loesser, and book by Abe Burrows, Jack Weinstock & Willie Gilbert, the 1961 musical satire that landed virtually unanimous raves would go on to run…
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Off-Broadway Live & Streaming: CIRCLE JERK (Connelly Theater)
IT’S A LOT TO TAKE IN, BUT TAKE IT IN YOU MUST Fake Friends, which co-created the zany streaming event This American Wife (review), are very very bright and insightful, au courant about the internet-age zeitgeist, and as queer as a clockwork orange. This tribe is a lot to take in, but take it in…
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Broadway Review: HOW I LEARNED TO DRIVE (Manhattan Theatre Club at Samuel J. Friedman Theatre)
HOW I LEARNED TO LOVE THEATER Some plays take time to come into their own but they’re well worth a wait. Twenty-five years after its Off-Broadway debut, Paula Vogel’s seminal wonder How I Learned to Drive is only now reaching full impact. That’s thanks, of course, to the consciousness-raising of #MeToo, among other seismic changes…
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Commentary and Los Angeles Theater Review: TAMBO & BONES (Kirk Douglas Theatre)
N-WORD, PLEASE! In six words, Samuel Beckett devours the human experience: “Birth was the death of him.” This line permeates not just A Piece of Monologue (1979), but all of the master’s works. In a world teeming with greed, terrorism, and unrest, Beckett knew that tragedy is common to all of us. We are born….
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Theater Review: TIGER STYLE! (South Coast Rep)
THIS TIGER IS KING Tiger Style! at South Coast Rep is refreshing for many reasons. First, it’s really funny. Playwright Mike Lew crafts his script like a super-smart teenager, mixing insights about the Asian community with cutting humor, f-bombs, “dude,” “bro” and some other words one would only find on Urban Dictionary. It’s a style…
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Theater Review: KING LEAR (The Wallis in Beverly Hills)
DID EVERYONE AT THE WALLIS NOT REALIZE THAT THE PLAY’S THE THING? One of the greatest travesties in L.A. theater history arrived at The Wallis last weekend, and I still have the emotional scars to prove it. A showcase for Joe Morton, who starred as Dick Gregory in The Wallis’s production of Turn Me Loose,…
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Theater Review: METAMORPHOSES (A Noise Within)
I NEVER MET A METAMORPHOSES I DIDN’T LIKE, BUT THIS ONE IS GREAT Critics often speak of “universal themes” — these are topics to which people in any place and at any time can relate. One of the main reasons that Greek literature, Aesop’s Fables, Shakespeare, and Grimm’s Fairy Tales, to name a few, retain…
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Theater Preview: ANDRÉ & DORINE (Los Angeles Theatre Center)
THERE ARE NO WORDS It was one of those magical evenings in the theater that shall live with me forever. When Kulunka Teatro’s André & Dorine appeared at the Los Angeles Theatre Center back in 2012, I considered myself among the lucky few privileged enough to have witnessed such grace and simplicity. The show which left…
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New York Theater: 2022 DRAMA DESK NOMINATIONS:
Follow the Drama Desk Awards at Drama Desk and @DramaDeskAwards on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook for updates 2022 DRAMA DESK NOMINATIONS: (click links for Stage and Cinema reviews) Outstanding Play Cullud Wattah, by Erika Dickerson-Despenza, The Public Theater English, by Sanaz Toossi, Atlantic Theater Company Prayer for the French Republic, by Joshua Harmon, Manhattan Theatre…
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Pre-Broadway Review: BOB FOSSE’S DANCIN’ (The Old Globe)
IF A SHOW IS CALLED DANCIN’, SHOULDN’T IT BE ALL ABOUT THE DANCING? With seemingly hundreds of thousands of Bob Fosse footsteps in Dancin‘ — now receiving a pre-Broadway updated revival at San Diego’s Old Globe — you’d think this love letter to Fosse’s original 1978 Broadway hit would be as exciting as they come….
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Broadway Review: FOR COLORED GIRLS WHO HAVE CONSIDERED SUICIDE / WHEN THE RAINBOW IS ENUF (Booth)
PLENTY OF RAINBOW BUT LITTLE COLOR In feminist Ntozake Shange‘s 1976 “choreopoem” (a term coined by the late playwright), the experiences of Black women in America are transformed into poetry, music, and choreography. Seven ladies in rainbow colors (Lady in Blue, Lady in Green, etc.) tell stories about joyful sexual awakening, but also about rape;…
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Music Preview: HÉLAS MON COEUR (The Verdi Chorus Spring 2022 Concert in Santa Monica)
EERIE WITCHES AND VOICES OF COURAGE For two performances only this weekend, May 14-15, 2022, The Verdi Chorus is presenting its Spring 2022 Concert at Santa Monica’s First Presbyterian Church. This thoroughly professional outfit always sounds amazing. It’s such a treat to hear up-close opera choruses, as the voices can sometimes be lost when an…
Theater Review: MEN OF SOUL (Black Ensemble Theater / Chicago)
by Mitchell Oldham | July 1, 2026
in Chicago, TheaterWHY A BOX OFFICE HIT CAN STILL LOSE MONEY
by Leslie Rosenberg | July 1, 2026
in Extras, FilmTheater Preview: PROOF (El Portal Theatre / North Hollywood)
by pwsadmin | June 30, 2026
in Los Angeles, Theater
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