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Tony Frankel
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Music Preview: THE CZECH PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA (Segerstrom Concert Hall in Costa Mesa)
A NEW WORLD OF DVOŘíK AT SEGERSTROM In 2014, Decca released a 6-CD box set by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra (CPO) of the complete symphonies and concertos of Antonín Dvořák. CPO has long been celebrated for their interpretations of their nation’s most beloved composer, but I don’t remember when I’ve been quite so taken with…
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Music Preview: MARIINSKY ORCHESTRA (North American tour with Valery Gergiev at Segerstrom)
THE TRIFECTA OF MARIINSKY, GERGIEV, AND BARíTI AT SEGERSTROM As part of their 2018 tour, Valery Gergiev and the Mariinsky Orchestra will arrive at the Renée and Henry Segerstrom Concert Hall on Saturday October 20, 2018, at 8:00. This is the first stop for the inestimable orchestra, the finest I have ever heard. The program features Debussy’s…
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Music Review: LA PHIL’S CENTENNIAL SEASON, OPENING WEEK (Disney Hall and Citywide)
ONE WAY OR ANOTHER, YOU’LL GET YOUR PHIL It’s been quite a week for our Los Angeles Philharmonic, which starts its second century with a slew of performances that has slathered the city with festivities and honor. Angelinos should be rightfully proud that our orchestra is celebrating all things artistic — musically and socially —…
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Theater Review: ROPE (Actors Co-op in Hollywood)
HERE’S SOME GOOD NOOSE FOR YOU Amid the jukebox musicals and feel-good issue plays of the moment, thank the macabre heavens for two grippingly disturbing entertainments. The first is Echo Theater Company’s Gloria killing them across town at Atwater Village Theatre. The other is Actor Co-op’s splendidly unsettling Rope, Patrick (Gaslight) Hamilton’s 1929 play about…
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Los Angeles Theater Review: GLORIA (Echo Theatre)
IF IT BLEEDS, IT LEADS If anyone should dislike the confrontational and cynical aspects of Echo Theatre’s knockout L.A. premiere of Branden Jacobs-Jenkins’ Gloria, I assert it’s no fault of the artists involved, including the playwright. This 2015 Off-Broadway two-act is unsettling, shocking and funny as it scathingly depicts the poorly-paid, dead-end, “soul-sucking” jobs of…
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Album Review: DISSONANCE (Diderot String Quartet)
NOTHING TO DIS HERE For utterly superb technique and ensemble intricacy and expression, look no further than Diderot (DEE-der-oht) String Quartet’s new release of Mozart’s String Quartet No. 19 in C Major, K. 465, commonly known as Dissonance (1785). Consistently remarkable is the perfect blend of gravitas and lyricism — seriousness without being erudite or…
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Theater Preview: THE OTHER PLACE (Chance Theater)
THE PUZZLE BOX OF THE SOUL Sharr White’s riveting and affective play, The Other Side, concerns Juliana, a neurologist and holder of a billion-dollar patent, whose life suddenly starts crumbling before her eyes. The show begins with her — confident, sophisticated, impregnable — lecturing to a convention hall full of doctors. By the end she…
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Concert Preview: HILARY HAHN PLAYS BACH (Los Angeles Chamber Orchestra)
LACO GIVES YOU A HAHN It’s now practically lore that violinist Hilary Hahn decided that her debut album would not just be solos, but partitas and a sonata by Bach, works that have been held as the zenith of violin composition and the most intangible of objectives for a newcomer recitalist. It was a move…
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Opera Review: DON CARLO: (LA Opera)
DOMINGO A SHINING LIGHT IN SOME DARK STAGING In LA Opera’s production of Verdi’s Don Carlo, which has some cosmic casting but a stifling set and stingy staging, the titular character has had a rather rough time before a note is sung. He has sneaked away from his princely duties to meet his betrothed, Elisabeth…
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Theater Review: BONNIE & CLYDE (Candlelight Pavilion Dinner Theater in Claremont)
A SURE(GUN)FIRE HIT The team of Bonnie Elizabeth Parker and Clyde Chestnut Barrow, the most famous robbing, murdering, loving couple in U.S. history, is as unlikely a subject for a musical as Sweeney Todd. From their first meeting in West Texas through their tumultuous courtship and romance; from their brief, history-making crime spree to their fateful…
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Theater Review: THE BEAUTY QUEEN OF LEENANE (Studio/Stage in Hollywood)
BLACK COMEDY, KITCHEN SINK DRAMA & ONE FECKIN’ MOTHER While the horror and suspense aren’t as delectable as previous productions of The Beauty Queen of Leenane — Martin McDonagh’s 1996 black comedy — the dark humor, bleakness, and romance positively boil over, making Capricorn Eleven Productions’ revival a recommended trip. For 20 years, 40 year-old spinster…
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Music Preview: WYNTON MARSALIS AND THE JAZZ AT LINCOLN CENTER ORCHESTRA & CLAYTON-HAMILTON JAZZ ORCHESTRA (The Hollywood Bowl)
JAZZ, GENIUS AND ORIGINAL COMPOSITIONS Wynton Marsalis’s wildly enjoyable composition, a new dance suite called Spaces, combines modern dance with big band jazz in a playful and entirely entertaining exploration of the animal kingdom. Performed for the first time in 2016, this visually captivating Jazz at Lincoln Center Orchestra production hits the Hollywood Bowl this Thursday,…
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Theater Review: THE HEART OF ROCK & ROLL (The Old Globe’s Donald and Darlene Shiley Stage)
AN EARNEST HEART THAT SHAKES, THROBS, PALPITATES & FLATLINES For all of its sincere heart and driving rock ‘n’ roll, this new jukebox musical inspired by Huey Lewis and the News’s upbeat pop tunes — either original (“I Wanna New Drug”; “The Power of Love”) or covers (Curtis Mayfield’s “It’s Alright”) — remains earthbound. Surprisingly…
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Theater Review: FUN HOME (San Diego Repertory Theatre at the Lyceum Stage)
BETTER THAN BROADWAY SD Rep’s production of Fun Home is more intimate with more heart and fun Wise and warm, funny and tender, this 100-minute family memory-play musical charts the twisted courses of a self-shaming gay father’s suicide and the coming out of his self-affirming lesbian daughter. Based on Alison Bechdel’s 2006 graphic novel, this…
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Theater Review: BEAUTIFUL: THE CAROLE KING MUSICAL (Second National Tour)
BEAUTIFUL, BEAUTIFUL MUSIC If notes make joy, these 150 minutes are the elixir of happiness. Spanning only 13 years of its creator’s career (1958-1971), Beautiful: The Carole King Musical balances life against art. Magnificently. Its wonderful songs both stand on their own and preserve the pain and pleasure that went into their making. Douglas McGrath’s…
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Theater Review: THE WORLD GOES ‘ROUND (REPRISE 2.0)
THE WORLD IS FLAT Musical revues are a tricky business. While highly enjoyable and entertaining, even high profile compilations such as Side by Side by Sondheim and the Fats Waller songbook Ain’t Misbehavin’ amount to little more than glorified cabaret shows. Jukebox musicals a la Smokey Joe’s Café (Leiber and Stoller) and the long running Broadway smash Jersey Boys (Frankie Valli and…
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CD Review: UKRAINIAN RHAPSODY (Anna & Dmitri Shelest on Sorel Classics)
WAXING RHAPSODIC Firmly ensconced in the Romantic period, Ukrainian composer Mykola Lysenko — as with his Czech contemporary Dvořák — wrote many of his pieces based on folk music of his homeland. As did Bartók later in Hungary, he went out into the field, listened to what the people were singing and fashioned an individual musical…
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Theater Review: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (The Old Globe’s Lowell Davies Festival Theatre)
AND NOW, WITH FURTHER ADO… Not only is it one of my favorite Shakespeare plays, but Much Ado About Nothing contains a favorite character: Dogberry. This bumbling constable arrives much later in the play than the famous sparring couple Beatrice and Benedick, and adds an enormous amount of comic energy to a play that is already awash…
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Theater Review: A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE (Coronado Playhouse in San Diego)
A STORY OF IMPORTANCE Unlike manipulative Broadway machines such as Priscilla and Kinky Boots, which shove issues down our throats, the societal consequences for a homosexual in A Man of No Importance resonate more because the story follows a closeted man who compensates for his restrictive 1964 Dublin atmosphere by taking pride in other areas of his life — namely…
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Theater Preview: WASHED UP ON THE POTOMAC (San Francisco Playhouse)
LOOKING FOR PROOF Proofreading: It may be a lost art. As an editor, I have become accustomed to scanning copy everywhere for mistakes, either in grammar or with facts. But lately, the effects of having computers think for us is starting to do irreparable harm to language and communication. Just today, after catching a typo…
Theater Review: ST. NICHOLAS (Black Button Eyes / City Lit / Chicago)
by Croydon Fernandes | July 3, 2026
in Chicago, TheaterFAST PAYOUT CASINOS USA 2026 — 5 BEST INSTANT WITHDRAWAL CASINOS RANKED
by Michael Carr | July 3, 2026
in ExtrasTheater Review: MEN OF SOUL (Black Ensemble Theater / Chicago)
by Mitchell Oldham | July 1, 2026
in Chicago, Theater
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