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Theater Review: GASLIGHT (Northlight Theatre)
A THRILLER THAT OUTLASTS ITS TWIST Even when we know what’s coming, the tension holds Let’s talk about the cojones required to mount a production of Gaslight nowadays. Even if we assume — a tall order, that assumption — that most of the audience has not seen, or does not know, the plot of George…
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Theater Review: THE GOLDEN GIRLS LIVE: THE CHRISTMAS EPISODES (Curran Theatre)
THANK YOU FOR BEING A QUEEN Four drag icons, two episodes, and twenty years of perfectly timed shade Now celebrating its 20th consecutive year, The Golden Girls Live: The Christmas Episodes has become one of San Francisco’s most reliable holiday traditions. This drag reinvention of classic sitcom episodes is now a full-scale theatrical event. The…
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Theater Review: CHILDREN OF THE WINTER KINGDOM — A BONKERS HOLIDAY FANTASY (Actors’ Gang in Culver City)
A HOLIDAY PANTO THAT KNOWS WHAT IT’S DOING The Actors’ Gang offers a family-friendly fairy tale with teeth Children of the Winter Kingdom – The Bonkers Adventures of Holly and Spruce, now frolicking at The Actors’ Gang in Culver City, is reminiscent of the beloved British Christmas pantomimes. The family-friendly show is festive and song-filled,…
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Theater Review: MOULIN ROUGE (2025 Touring Production)
TRUTH, BEAUTY, FREEDOM, LOVE — MOULIN ROUGE! LIGHTS UP THE DESERT A pop-fueled fever dream lands at McCallum Theatre Moulin Rouge! The Musical took the stage of McCallum Theatre in all its splendor on Tuesday night, where it runs through December 14. I first saw this tour when it launched in 2022, and it was…
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Theater Review: 89 CARSON JUNCTION ROAD (Compulsion Dance & Theater at Diversionary Theatre)
THE SOUP OF THE DAY IS A DARK BROTH INDEED There’s a game some couples play when they’re out and about: they make up lives about the strangers they see in places like diners. Part of what makes it work is that they’re never actually going to know a thing about those people. Until playwright/director…
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Opera Review: THE MONKEY KING (World Premiere by San Francisco Opera)
THE MONKEY KING LANDS WITH A ROAR A dazzling, design-driven premiere expands what opera can be Every now and then an opera house unveils something that doesn’t just premiere — it shifts the whole conversation about what new opera might be. San Francisco Opera’s The Monkey King is exactly that kind of event: vibrant, imaginative,…
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Theater Review: PETER PAN (Panto in the Presidio)
HOOK, LINE & SEQUINER Presidio’s Peter Pan Panto soars on camp, color, chaos, Christmas cheer, and unapologetic silliness ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ This holiday season, the Presidio Theatre brings back its beloved Panto in the Presidio for a fifth year — that joyful British pantomime tradition where audiences shout…
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Theater Review: INTO THE WOODS (SF Playhouse)
STILL CASTING ITS SPELL Sondheim and Lapine’s fractured fairytales find fresh magic at San Francisco Playhouse Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Into the Woods may be one of the most beloved titles in the modern musical-theatre canon, but San Francisco Playhouse’s holiday-season staging makes a strong case for why it keeps earning its place. From…
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Theater Review: DOG SEES GOD (The Bent)
A DARKER LOOK AT THE GANG WE GREW UP WITH Dog Sees God, Bert V. Royal’s 2004 reimagining of the Peanuts universe, wonders what might happen if those familiar childhood figures stumbled into late high school. The answer is a swirl of drugs, profanity, identity crises, and more than a little homophobia. Though the script…
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Theater Review: DIE HEART: THE DIRECTOR’S CUT (Troubadour Theater Company at The Colony)
TAKE THAT, NAKATOMI The Troubies blow up Die Hard, Heart-style — and it’s pure holiday mayhem The Troubadour Theater Company — the Troubies — has been wreaking musical-comedy havoc around Los Angeles since 1995, and their latest spoof, Die Heart: The Director’s Cut, might be the most gloriously unhinged holiday offering they’ve detonated yet. Their…
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Theater Review: A DOUBLEWIDE, TEXAS CHRISTMAS ⭐️ (Desert TheatreWorks in Indio)
A TEXAS-SIZED CHRISTMAS MELTDOWN This is pure, sugar-spun, deep-fried, glitter-smothered Texas Trashmas — and honey, sometimes that’s exactly what the doctor ordered. If your idea of Christmas cheer involves snowflakes, Victorian carolers, or anything resembling culture, turn back now, sugar. Desert TheatreWorks has hauled a flaming holiday fruitcake onto the stage, delivering a holiday spectacle…
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Theater Review: A CHRISTMAS CAROL (Goodman)
THE OG CHRISTMAS GHOST STORY The Goodman puts the chills back in the chestnuts ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ In some ways, it is remarkable that Goodman Theatre’s annual production of Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol has persisted as a theatrical tradition during the holidays. Theatre is expensive as a…
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Opera Review: CAVALLERIA RUSTICANA and PAGLIACCI (Lyric Chicago)
THE GODFATHER AND FELLINI MEET VERISMO Opera’s most famous double bill is back… again Hundreds of one-act operas have been produced, but few have attained the popularity of Pietro Mascagni’s Cavalleria rusticana and Ruggero Leoncavallo’s Pagliacci. Premiering in 1890 and 1892, respectively, they have been commonly performed as a double bill since 1893. Interestingly, this…
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Theater Review: AN IRISH CAROL (Greater Boston Stage Company in Stoneham, MA)
DICKENS IN AN IRISH PUB ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ The New England premiere of An Irish Carol by playwright Matthew Keenan offers a fresh take on Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol, a familiar and much-performed holiday classic that holds out, again and again, a secular interpretation of the renewal…
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Theater Review: THE BEATRIX POTTER HOLIDAY PARTY (Chicago Children’s Theatre)
NO GROWN-UPS ALLOWED — SORT OF CCT’s Beatrix Potter party charms kids, critics, and everyone in between ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ “Channel your inner three-year-old, not your adult,” was the advice given to me as I settled into my seat at Chicago Children’s Theatre. To which my immediate unspoken…
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Off-Broadway Review: THE SLIDE IS THE NEGATIVE (The Chain Theatre)
ALL TELL AND NO SHOW MAKES FOR A DULL OUTING Jake Shore’s thriller talks itself into submission ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ It’s the middle of the night when Joe (Ryan Tramont) hears pounding at his door. It’s his friend Barry (Brad Fryman), summoned in a panic because Joe claims…
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Opera Review: LA BOHÈME (Los Angeles Opera)
HERBERT ROSS’S BOHÈME RETURNS Beauty polished, questions still lingering Puccini’s tale may be endlessly familiar, yet the recent Los Angeles staging shows how even the most well-trodden path can still feel unsettled and full of open questions. For those new to the work, the opera traces two parallel romances among struggling artists in 1830s Paris….
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Theater Review: A YEAR WITH FROG AND TOAD (Young People’s Theatre of Chicago)
TOAD-ALLY DELIGHTFUL Ribbiting from start to finish, this Year goes by in a flash. ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ Arnold Lobel’s Frog and Toad series has delighted generations of young readers for decades, beginning in 1970. In 2000, his daughter Andrea Lobel (a well-regarded theatrical scenic designer in her own…
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Theater Review: ANNIE (Wheelock Family Theatre)
TRIED AND TRUE ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ ✦ Annie is an excellent choice for Boston University Wheelock Family Theatre’s holiday offering this year. True to the mission of Wheelock Family Theatre (to create professional theatre and educational experiences for artists and audiences of all ages), the audience last night included…
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Theater Review: A CHRISTMAS STORY: THE MUSICAL (San Diego Musical Theatre)
NOSTALGIA LOADED — AND EYE SAFETY ENSURED The 1983 film A Christmas Story may not have been universally crowned a “classic” when it premiered, its near-universal popularity and nostalgic look back at Christmas in 1940 have long since earned it that status. San Diego Musical Theatre brings back the musical version in which we meet…
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