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Theater Review: SEVEN GUITARS (Actors Shakespeare Project at Hibernian Hall, Boston)
SEVEN CHEERS FOR SEVEN GUITARS The Actors Shakespeare Company’s production of Seven Guitars deserves at least seven cheers for this powerful production of August Wilson’s Pulitzer-nominated portrayal of the life and death of a promising blues guitarist. First cheer: Jon Savage‘s scenic design and Abe Joyner-Meyers‘ sound design: Entering Hibernian Hall in Boston’s Nubian…
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Theater Review: MAGIC PEARL (Pinwheel at the Puppet Showplace Theater in Brookline, MA)
A MAGIC AFTERNOON Beautiful music (Christopher Vu, composer; Bo Jones (Lee) flute; Thomas Barth, cello, and Michael Weinfeld-Zell, percussion) and richly colored projected visuals gave a sold-out and extremely intergenerational audience a magical experience. Pinwheel, an ensemble of classically trained musicians and puppet artists, presented Magic Pearl, an adaptation by Veronica Barron, Max Gaylord, and Jones…
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Theater Review: MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (A Noise Within in Pasadena)
SWINGTIME SHAKESPEARE Everyone will make much ado about Guillermo Cienfuego‘s delightful take on Shakespeare’s Much Ado About Nothing, which opened last weekend at A Noise Within. This comedy has it all: sparring partners, deceit, mistaken identities, many overheard conversations, love, and my favorite comedic character in all of Shakespeare: Dogberry, a pompous, scattered constable who…
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Theater Review: NIMROD (Theatre of NOTE)
THIS JOYOUS TRIUMPH IS LIKE A PIG IN SHIT Mixed with the contradictory language of William Shakespeare and Trump-speak, Nimrod is a gut-busting, refreshing, sharp, irreverent, and often cacophonous satirical play delivered by a big, superbly talented cast at Theatre of NOTE. Phinneas Kiyomura is The Bard of our time — writing in the form…
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Theater Review: THE FIRST DEEP BREATH (Geffen)
WAITING TO EXHALE Getting its West Coast Premiere at the Geffen Playhouse’s mainstage Gil Cates Theater, The First Deep Breath, a 2019 play by Lee Edward Colston II, is an overstuffed family drama that left me wanting : less. Directed by Steve H. Broadnax III, this double-intermissioned, 3 hour and 45 minute play takes place…
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Theater Review: BIRDS OF NORTH AMERICA (Moxie Theatre in San Diego)
ANOTHER FEATHER IN MOXIE’S CAP Playwright Anna Ouyang Moench uses the setting of a wooded area — beautifully designed at MOXIE Theatre by Robin Sanford Roberts — as the backdrop of this beautiful family drama. The father, John (Mike Sears), is just about equally bound to his liberal and earth-loving principles, his love of bird-watching,…
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Theater Review: RIDE THE CYCLONE (Chance Theater)
WHAT A RIDE! NOTHING GOES OFF THE RAILS IN THIS CALIFORNIA PREMIERE Ride the Cyclone is a 2008 musical by Canadians Jacob Richmond and Brooke Maxwell. Originally written as a song cycle for the Atomic Vaudeville Theatre Company, it was retooled for its 2015 critically lauded US premiere at Chicago Shakespeare Theater. Since then, the…
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Theater Review: EL HURACíN (Cygnet in San Diego)
A STORM IS BREWING IN THIS FAMILY Perhaps the two most chilling words that can be uttered in a family are “Alzheimer’s” and “dementia.” Physical pain, as horrible as it may be, is something we can relate to and try to bear together, but slowly losing one’s memories, faculties, and function is hell and heartbreaking…
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Theater Review: THE NOTEBOOKS OF LEONARDO DA VINCI (The Old Globe in San Diego)
Boy, did I feel numb leaving The Notebooks of Leonardo Da Vinci at the Old Globe. This co-production with Goodman Theatre is a creation of Chicago’s own Mary Zimmerman, who has perfected dazzling theatrical innovations throughout her career. She is best-known for her trademark cheeky and humorous twists on the classics: The Arabian Nights (my favorite); The…
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Theater Review: BLUES IN THE NIGHT (North Coast Rep in Solana Beach / San Diego)
NO ONE’S WEEPING ABOUT THESE GREAT BLUES Everything comes out in blues music: joy , pain , struggle. Blues is affirmation with absolute elegance. – Trumpeter Wynton Marsalis The blues is a style of music, created in the early 1900s in the deep South. Not surprisingly, The origins of the blues are poorly documented. According…
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Theater Review: THE 25TH ANNUAL PUTNAM COUNTY SPELLING BEE (Wildsong at OB Playhouse)
SPELL “DELIGHTFUL” “D-E-L-I-G-H-T-F-U-L” — DELIGHTFUL! OB Playhouse used to do all of their own productions, but nowadays it is primarily a rental space. When I saw that The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee was going to play there, I wondered if it would be from OBP’s most frequent renter, Wildsong Productions. After all, Wildsong…
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Theater Review: THE ART OF BURNING (Huntington Theatre, Boston)
THE ART OF BURNING WITH RAGE Fast-paced and gripping, laced at times with humor, The Art of Burning opens with an ominous threat: “Sometimes you have to kill the things you love to save them,” Patricia (Adrianne Krstansky) announces, putting the audience on alert. The ominous implications of this statement build when we hear Patricia…
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Theater Review: GREASE (La Mirada Theatre)
GET READY TO BE GREASED UP The year is 1959, when rock and roll was giving birth to the Sexual Revolution and the turbulent 1960s were about to burst on the scene. Record companies were releasing over a hundred singles every week and the country was about to radically change. In its original raunchy incarnation,…
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Theater Review: GUESS WHO’S COMING TO DINNER? (Theatre 40)
GUESS WHAT SHOULD BE ON BROADWAY? A hit at their home theater on the Beverly Hills High School campus, Theatre 40’s production of Guess Who’s Coming to Dinner? has been remounted at the gorgeous Greystone Mansion on a Beverly Hills bluff overlooking L.A., a choice setting for the Bay Area hilltop home of a wealthy…
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Theater Review: BROTHERS PLAY (Legacy LA)
A LOST TRIBE OF BROTHERS Because a child who has been sexually abused often knew and trusted the perpetrator, only about a third of the cases are reported. Many remain silent. As if the act itself wasn’t traumatic enough, childhood abuse often has a wide range of effects in adulthood — drug use, impulsive risky…
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Theater Review: HEAR HER SING FOR FREEDOM (Multicultural Arts Center in Cambridge, MA)
THIS FREEDOM RINGS In a weekend of numerous uplifting events celebrating the life and legacy of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., Hear Her Sing for Freedom stood out for bringing forward the life and role of Coretta Scott King, who married Dr. King in 1953. Coretta Scott was a serious vocalist and political…
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Theater Review: PRELUDES (Lyric Stage in Boston)
PRELUDE TO A BREAKTHROUGH The Lyric Stage Company brings powerful performances to Dave Malloy’s remarkable evocation of the composer Sergei Rachmaninoff’s struggles with a creative block through hypnotherapy. Rachmaninoff himself is portrayed as two characters. One called Rachmaninoff (Dan Rodgriguez) sits at a white baby grand through most of the show, providing a stunning shower…
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Theater Review: MEAN GIRLS (National Tour)
STILL TRYING TO MAKE FETCH HAPPEN The musical adaptation of the 2004 teen comedy film Mean Girls opened on Broadway in April 2018 and was one of the many victims of the Covid-19 pandemic, resulting in an early closure on March 11, 2020. The musical book and the original film are written by veteran comedian…
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Theater Review: THE EMPIRE STRIPS BACK (International Tour)
IT’S OK TO GET SAUCED FOR STUNNING SAUCY STRIPPERS AND SPECTACULAR SAUCERS, OR MAY THE TORSO BE WITH YOU Forget about Broadway or the latest Marvel Comic movie. The fun, hip and cool burlesque Star Wars parody ’” which isn’t just for fans of the franchise ’” is the show to see live onstage. Since the…
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Theater Review: JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR 50TH ANNIVERSARY TOUR (New Cast for 2022-2023 Tour)
ROCK ON I still have the soundtrack album that I bought when I was 14. I saw the movie when I was 16. I saw the Broadway Revival in my late teens. Today, just over fifty years after Jesus Christ Superstar premiered on Broadway, I had the pure pleasure of seeing it again at the…
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