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Theater Review: SPRING AWAKENING (Revolution Stage Company in Palm Springs)
TEEN ANGST HAS NEVER LOOKED SO GOOD The first time I saw Spring Awakening was at the Hollywood Pantages Theatre and I hated it. This chamber musical–so dependent on facial expressions–was awful in that 2,700-seat venue (though I love it for big musicals). The intimate production which opened last night at Palm Springs’ Revolution Stage…
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Theater Review: BACK TO THE FUTURE: THE MUSICAL (National Tour at San Diego Civic Theatre)
BACK TO BACK TO THE FUTURE For those of us old enough to remember the summer of ’85, when the movie Back to the Future reigned in movie theaters, here’s a daunting thought: Marty’s 30-year time travel back to 1955 was a shorter leap than going to 1985 from now. For the musical, the Broadway…
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Theater Review: HEAVENBOUND (Wilshire Ebell Theatre)
HEAVENBOUND ROUSES THE SPIRIT AT WILSHIRE EBELL THEATRE In the face of so much destruction from the ongoing Los Angeles fires, a bright event brought a sense of spiritual peace during Heavenbound, a musical written, directed, and produced by Don B. Welch at the Wilshire Ebell Theatre on January 11. Welsh assembled a knockout cast…
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Theater Review: RACHMANINOFF AND THE TSAR: A NEW MUSICAL PLAY (TheatreWorks Silicon Valley)
Hershey Felder has become synonymous with TheatreWorks Silicon Valley, returning year after year from Europe to present his original musical productions. This year, he brings Rachmaninoff and the Tsar, a largely successful exploration of the life of Sergei Vasilyevich Rachmaninoff, the renowned Russian composer, pianist, and conductor. Felder has stated that this marks the final…
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Theater Review: THE HEART SELLERS (North Coast Rep)
YOU’LL BUY THIS HEART In my ninth-grade English class, Mr. Rozran taught that a short story, versus a novel, should aim to capture a small slice of life, leaving much of what happened before and after to our imaginations. That perspective came to mind while watching The Heart Sellers, a play that offers a focused,…
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Theater Review: AIN’T NO MO’ (SpeakEasy Stage and Front Porch Arts Collective at Boston Center for the Arts)
THE ELATION OF NEGATION Written by Jordan E. Cooper and directed by Dawn M. Simmons, the Boston premiere of this Tony-nominated series of provocative satirical sketches explores various facets of Black life in the United States, challenging audiences to consider whether racism can ever truly be eradicated. It’s the kind of humor that leaves you…
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Theater Review: SHUCKED (National Tour)
A SHUCKING DELIGHT The Broadway tour of Shucked by Robert Horn will be cracking up audiences in Chicago’s CIBC Theatre through January 19th before it continues on its national tour. If you look too closely this corny little musical starts to wilt with an aimless protagonist and too many ballads for a lighthearted comedy, but…
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Theater Review: SANTASIA: A HOLIDAY COMEDY (Whitefire Theatre in Sherman Oaks)
A LETTER TO SANTA Dear Santa: Well, what a year 2024 was. With the way things are going, I decided to count my blessings. So I’m writing to thank you for that pair of tickets to see Santasia: A Holiday Comedy — it was the sweetest Kids in the Hall-type, holiday-themed Vaudeville show ever! Managing…
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Theater Review: BACK TO THE FUTURE: THE MUSICAL (National Tour at Segerstrom Hall in Costa Mesa)
THE DELOREAN IS THE ONLY THING THAT FLIES IN THIS DUMPSTER FIRE Since the release of the Stranger Things television series in 2016, the public appeal of all things ’80s has left very few stones unturned. From the lady wrestler phenomenon reimagined in the Netflix TV series GLOW to the surreal neo-noir film Drive, the…
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Theater Review: THE BERLIN DIARIES (Open Space Arts)
EXCAVATING THE PAST TO SOLVE PUZZLES ABOUT THE PRESENT Family is so integral to our identity that it’s difficult not to be enthralled by them. A complicated source of delight, distress, curiosity and mystery, no matter how much they change and evolve, grow or shrink, they remain a source of limitless fascination. The spirit of…
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Theater Review: KALEIDOSCOPE (Circus Bella, Embarcadero)
THIS TRULY IS HOLIDAY JOY Now playing this holiday season through January 5, 2025, down by The Embarcadero: The circus is in town. But not just any circus. Circus Bella, in a colorful Big Top tent at Beale & Howard, puts the circus in your lap with Kaleidoscope. Certainly what is achieved in this one-ring…
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Theater Review: PRICE: A REPRESSED REPERTOIRE (SEQUENCES) (New Theater Hollywood)
ACTS, REPETITIONS AND REPRESSIONS There’s a new theater in town, Los Angeles, aptly named New Theater Hollywood, run by artists Calla Henkel and Max Pitegoff. I discovered it quite by accident in an article in the LA Review of Books, which described it as “sceney.” I simply had to go. I checked out the first…
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Theater Review: LITTLE WOMEN THE MUSICAL (Sonoma Arts Live at Sonoma Community Center)
CLASSIC STORY ENCHANTS Sonoma Arts Live captures the challenges of four sisters growing up in the late 1800s in this adaptation by Allan Knee, based on the classic novel written by Louisa May Alcott. Nate Mercer, Joanna “Lynn” Burt, Dani Innocenti Beem, Hannah Passinisi, and Emma Sutherland Sandra Ish skillfully directs a cast of eleven…
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Theater Review: BROADWAY HOLIDAY (Transcendence Theatre Company in Mill Valley and Sonoma)
HOLIDAY CHEESE The Transcendence Theatre Company is based out of Sonoma County and is known for putting on live theater productions usually in the summer, often in actual wineries. They have combined their efforts with Marin Theatre out of Mill Valley for this production of holiday music featuring performers from various Broadway productions. But instead…
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Theater Review: THE 39 STEPS (Coachella Valley Rep)
39 STEPS IN THE RIGHT DIRECTION Adapted by Patrick Barlow from John Buchan’s novel and Alfred Hitchcock’s 1935 film, The 39 Steps is a comedic thriller blending spy drama, physical comedy, and theatrical ingenuity. In the outrageous, hilarious spoof, now playing at CV Rep, Richard Hannay (Matthew Floyed Miller), a dashing Canadian visiting England, meets…
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Theater Review: A CHRISTMAS CAROL (Center Repertory Company at The Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek)
THERE’S A LESSON HERE: EVEN WITHOUT THE BIG PARTY, THE MESSAGE RINGS CLEAR Charles Dickens’ beloved A Christmas Carol is among the holiday season’s most welcome recurring theater productions. Center REP’s sumptuous show has returned to the capacious Hofmann Theatre at the Lesher Center for the Arts in Walnut Creek through December 22. With A.C.T.’s…
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Theater Review: DIARY OF A TAP DANCER (American Repertory Theater at Harvard University in Cambridge)
TAP INTO JOY AT A.R.T. I felt the first chills early in Diary of a Tap Dancer. It was during an ensemble number set in the Bronx and the birth of hip hop – I got that feeling in my solar plexus which told me this was a show bound for great things. That feeling…
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Theater Review: ONCE UPON A MATTRESS (Broadway Production at The Ahmanson Theatre)
ONCE UPON A MATTRESS LIVES HAPPILY EVER AFTER Almost two hundred years ago, Hans Christian Andersen penned a quaint story about a lonesome prince in search of a woman who can prove to his mother she is a real princess and thereby become his wife. The queen devises a plan for the woman to sleep…
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Theater Review: A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE (The Streetcar Project Tour in LA, NY, SF, DC & more — Highly Recommended)
NOW, THERE’S OH SO MUCH MORE TO DESIRE Since struggle for power among the classes is one of the main themes in Tennessee Williams’ still-shocking A Streetcar Named Desire, it makes perfect sense that director and co-creator Nick Westrate would choose to update the Pulitzer Prize winner for modern times. But wait til you hear…
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Theater Review: LEOPOLDSTADT (Shakespeare Theatre Company at Harman Hall in D.C.)
A TRIUMPHANT SAGA OF A VIENNESE FAMILY Shakespeare Theatre Company, in association with Huntington in Boston, is presenting at Harman Hall an epic, haunting play about loss and survival. Grandiose in scale and complete with 23 actors who portray multiple characters, Tom Stoppard’s Leopoldstadt is incredibly moving in that it speaks of unimaginable loss. Concerning…
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