Theater

SAVING FAITH Even with a few blemishes, Bedlam’s revival of George Bernard Shaw’s 1923 masterpiece  Saint Joan  is an immersive and ultimately gratifying theatrical experience. The story, told in six scenes and an epilogue, concerns the last two years of Joan of Arc’s life (1429-31): arrival at court and the discovery of the dauphin; leadership of sieges…

YOU LEAVE SEEKING PEACE AND A PLOT When a play comes along that is entirely different from any play that has preceded it, especially in our era of over-informative white noise and copycatting creativity, it deserves attention. Even Small Mouth Sounds  — Bess Wohl’s 2016 work, now stopping at The Broad Stage in Santa Monica as…

A BROADWAY AMUSEMENT PARK THAT FLIES LIKE A CARPET “Open sesame” indeed. It’s “Abracadabra” times ten as the arrival of Aladdin in Hollywood feels as triumphant as Prince Ali’s magnificent entrance into Agrabah at the top of the second act. A theme park of a musical, Disney Theatrical Productions’ eye-popping transformation of the 1992 film…

MEMORIES OF MEXICO, LUZIA  UNLEASHES A RAIN OF JOY The Cirque du Soleil just made a run for the border ’” and not the Canadian one — as the Montreal-based human circus lavishes its unstoppable imagination on our neighbor to the south.  Luzia, the latest (ad)venture under the redesigned white-and-gold Grand Chapiteau (its tent planted in the…

SOMETHING SILLY; NOT QUITE ROTTEN BUT HARDLY FRESH What is it about William Shakespeare that inspires lesser authors (namely, everyone else) to try to take him down? George Bernard Shaw spent his life seeking to supplant or at least discount that  other  playwright. In  Shakespeare in Love, Tom Stoppard imagines the world’s greatest writer as an opportunist who…

DETECTING LOVE A 15-year-old math whiz, Christopher is an only child with Asperger’s Syndrome. The anomaly is enough to push adolescence way beyond awkward. His autism manifests in manic multi-tasking, an inability to focus (or to lie), attention deficits, a maddening literal-mindedness, and a disarming directness that both shames and irritates adults with secrets. Afraid…

FAITH IN FANTASY One of the best and certainly funniest shows of this century has returned. Beginning its latest national tour at the Hollywood Pantages last night, The Book of Mormon  remains a perfectly packaged fusion of the satire our world desperately needs and  a sassy musical comedy. From the wizards who concocted the all-offending South Park…

JERSEY CASH COW Jersey Boys, the terrific 2004 jukebox musical inspired by the story of pop sensation Frankie Valli & the Four Seasons, is one of the greatest triumphs in Broadway history, spawning a spate of companies around the globe and a slew of national tours. So what’s a producer to do since the Broadway…

REQUIEM FOR WHITNEY Even if you’ve never seen the 1992 film that gave birth to the musical in 2012 in London’s West End, the story is familiar: A pop superstar falls in love with her bodyguard. He takes a bullet for her. Though they can never be together, their love lingers on in her music….