Los Angeles

WORLD ENOUGH AND TIME …I would Love you ten years before the flood; And you should, if you please, refuse Till the conversion of the Jews – Andrew Marvell It’s a measure of progress that a play about white people can be written by a black guy and directed by an Asian guy on what…

SOMETHING UNSATISFYINGLY APOCRYPHAL There are a few things that might not be entirely true about the Blank’s “World Premiere” of Jeff Tabnick’s Something Truly Monstrous, which opened last night in Hollywood. To begin with a quibble, a two-hour show by Tabnick called Barrymore’s Body, with what sound like most of the same elements, went up…

INHOSPITALITY IN A HOSPITAL A few weeks ago I spent a couple of nights at a hospital waiting for someone to be born. A couple of weeks later I spent a few more nights at the hospital, including time at the ICU, trying to keep the mother comfortable while she tried to stay alive. In…

ME NEXT TIME I’m running up Pico. It’s 7:54 p.m. and I just parked on Rimpau because I’ve only lived in L.A. for 18 years and Google Maps told me Theatre Theater was .1 mile from Rimpau, but it isn’t, it’s like 9 blocks, and I’m running. I was up at 4:30 this morning to…

LOS PECES VIOLENTOS There is a dark parable in the bible, in Luke or maybe John; it’s in the Scheherazade – the tale of the thousandth night, perhaps. Your translation didn’t have every night, anyway you didn’t read that far, but you almost know it. It’s in the Talmud. It’s a legend your grandmother used…

GANGSTER MUSICAL You’ve seen the movie, you’ve seen the car, now see the musical. Meet the most famous robbing, murdering, loving couple in U.S. history. From their first meeting at a West Texas diner through their tumultuous courtship and romance, from their brief, history-making crime spree to their fateful final drive through Louisiana, this thrilling…

“DON’T LOOK AT ME” Jillian Leigh’s second play, Hooked, is extremely ambitious and fairly successful in the hands of director Terri Treas, producer Michael Zand, and a strong cast including the playwright. While the play could use another couple of drafts and at least one scene either more or less, and though the opening-night performance…

A RARE TREAT SERVED PIPING HOT The Stephen Schwartz/Joseph Stein musical The Baker’s Wife never made it to Broadway. The musical folded in Washington. D.C. in 1976 before reaching New York City but has since gained something of a cult status in both the United States and England (listen to the “original cast” CD starring…

WATCH WHAT UNFOLDS AND BE STUNNED In DIAVOLO’s dance/text hybrid piece Transit Space, author Steve Connell writes, “The only way to get there is to go.” The same can be said for what is arguably the most exciting event of the new season: The U.S. premiere of DIAVOLO’s L’Espace du Temps, three individual pieces originally…

RAVE ON Almost a month ago, I went to Rogue Machine’s storytelling night for the first time. You know storytelling nights – they’re like poetry slams, only whiter and less political, and you can be incapable of a rhyme scheme and still do okay. Storytelling nights have replaced karaoke at hipper-than-thou bars, and public radio…

RETURN OF A SMART IDIOT It’s always satisfying to see a show that really works get a remount. DOMA, which presented the best version I have ever seen of Green Day’s  American Idiot is bringing back their extraordinarily successful production for a limited run next month.  Inspired by a 2004 rock album by the American punk rock…

DOUBLE DUTY DOMINGO The biggest names in opera, cinema, and classical music converge for the opening of LA Opera’s impressive 30th anniversary season. The double bill which opens Saturday is one of the fastest selling events in memory, and with good reason: The program begins with director Woody Allen’s riotous staging of Giacomo Puccini’s only…