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Theater Review: SOME LIKE IT HOT (National Tour, Hollywood)
EVERYONE WILL LIKE IT HOT It wouldn’t be a valid review to simply write, “I loved it!” a hundred times and ship it off to my editor. However, if you’re looking for a bottom line or a simple recommendation, that’s exactly what this review will come down to. Leandra Ellis-Gaston and the company Evoking the…
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Theater Review: JUST TO BE CLOSE TO YOU (Broadwater Stage)
DÉJÀ LOUCHE Just to Be Close to You opens with an immaculately coiffed and mustachioed Cam Poter stepping before the packed audience at the Broadwater Studio as his alter ego, the renowned lounge singer, Carl Poteraychke, and immediately announcing, “For my last song – ” And we are off to the races. Poter is a…
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Theater Review: BEAUTY AND THE BEAST (Kick-Off of the 2025 North American Tour at Chicago’s Cadillac Palace Theatre)
THE BUSINESS OF NOSTALGIA: BEAUTY AND THE BEAST ALL DRESSED UP WITH NOWHERE TO GO Last Thursday night, a rainy July 10th, ensconced in the stunningly beautiful Cadillac Palace Theatre, I finally took in a Disney stage musical. Fittingly, it was the very first one they’d produced in 1994, Beauty and the Beast. While a…
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Theater Review: ONE MAN POE (Stephen Smith on Tour)
A MONODRAMA OF SHADOWS AND SHATTERED SANITY Stephen Smith’s One Man Poe at the Broadwater Studio comes in two one-hour servings, with each serving offering two of the author’s most macabre and disturbing pieces. The first part consists of “The Tell-Tale Heart” and “The Pit and the Pendulum.” The second part comprises “The Black Cat”…
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Dance Review: PILOBOLUS: OTHER WORLDS COLLECTION (Tour at The Joyce Theater, NYC)
DEFYING GRAVITY… AND CONVENTION Since its founding in 1971, Pilobolus has made a name for itself by celebrating the expressive potential of the human body—its weight, balance, connectivity, and vulnerability. Now, 54 years later, their mission continues to resonate with vitality, humor, and heart. Currently in residence at The Joyce Theater (June 24–July 13), the…
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Theater Review: ONE MAN POE (Stephen Smith on Tour)
MADNESS MADE FLESH I’ve seen several performances of Edgar Allan Poe’s poems and short stories over the years, but none compare to the artistry, intensity, and total immersion Stephen Smith brings to Poe’s descent-into-madness characters in One Man Poe at the 2025 Hollywood Fringe Festival. The production is divided into two one-hour shows, each featuring…
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Theater Review: MOULIN ROUGE (2025 Touring Production)
CAN THIS SHOW LIVE UP TO THE MOVIE? YES, IT CAN CAN! The 2001 film Moulin Rouge told its La Bohème-like story with tremendous use of cinematography and computer animation, pulling off an other-worldliness while also portraying turn-of-last-century France. Without those skills to fall back on, musical playwright John Logan had his hands full in…
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Theater Review: A LETTER TO LYNDON B. JOHNSON OR GOD: WHOEVER READS THIS FIRST (SoHo Playhouse & Edinburgh Fringe)
WAR IS FOR CLOWNS Xhloe Rice and Natasha Roland join the thrilling ranks of clown-trained performers (Julia Masli is another) reshaping the boundaries of theatrical storytelling. A Letter to Lyndon B. Johnson or God: Whoever Reads This First is an electrifying 65-minute performance that plays only through June 29 at the Soho Playhouse (formerly the…
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Dance Review: SWAN LAKE (Miami City Ballet)
NO MIST, NO MERCY, JUST SWAN LAKE Forget what you think Swan Lake is. Forget the gauzy tragedy, the white tutus, the endless fluttering. At Segerstrom Hall tonight, Miami City Ballet, under Alexei Ratmansky‘s choreography, has cracked open the windows. Something sharper moves through the air now. The story’s cruelty remains intact. It is a…
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Theater Review: PARADE (National Tour, Ahmanson Theatre)
NEITHER FOOLS NOR COWARDS Michael Arden is a Renaissance artist. He approaches his work with a humanist curiosity, an intricate yet organic perfectionism, and a keen eye for composition, movement, and light. He’s a two-time Tony Award-winning director, the first of which was for his 2023 Broadway revival of Parade. This production is now on…
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Theater Review: SMILE: THE STORY OF CHARLIE CHAPLIN (Broadwater Main Stage)
NOT A DETAILED BIO, BUT MARCEL COLE IS THE REEL THING Smile: The Story of Charlie Chaplin is wildly successful for many reasons, only not for the reasons it would succeed with me. As a major film geek, I confess to being a certified PITAP (“Pain In The Ass Purist”). For me, the show was…
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Theater Review: BOOK OF MORMON (National Tour)
A MUSICAL SALTIER THAN SALT LAKE ITSELF Let’s start the actual religious text called The Book of Mormon, published in 1830. Without going into all its details about other planets, Jesus visiting America, and more–suffice it to say that if you weren’t raised with it, it sounds a bit bizarre. So when you give already-unconventional…
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Concert Review: A QUIET CELEBRATION (Paul Simon on Tour With “Seven Psalms”)
A QUIET BENEDICTION FROM A MASTER SONGWRITER Paul Simon is not done speaking softly. At a time when much live music clamors for attention, his recent performance felt like a whispered benediction—one that asked the audience to lean in, listen closely, and reflect. The evening, A Quiet Celebration, was structured in two halves: the first devoted…
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Theater Review: LIFE OF PI (National Tour at Segerstrom Hall)
TIGERS, TRAUMA, AND THEATRICAL MAGIC: LIFE OF PI ROARS TO THE STAGE Piscine Molitor “Pi” Patel’s story has found enormous commercial success — first in Yann Martel’s Booker Prize–winning novel, and then in Ang Lee’s visually stunning film adaptation. Now, in its national tour, Life of Pi makes an ambitious leap to the stage at…
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Theater Review: ECHO (Cirque du Soleil)
ECHO: A CUBE WITH BIG DREAMS IN A SHOW STILL FINDING ITS SHAPE It opens with a cube. Glowing, two stories tall, and unmistakably the star of the show, this bold architectural gesture doesn’t just set the tone; it declares intent. ECHO arrives with a whiff of manifesto, promising reinvention, disruption, a new kind of…
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Theater Review: A BEAUTIFUL NOISE (National Tour)
THIS RETROSPECTIVE ON NEIL DIAMOND SPARKLES When one thinks back to the top solo music acts of the 1970s, the biggest names to come to mind are likely Elton John, Stevie Wonder, Diana Ross, Barry Manilow, Barbra Streisand, and Donna Summer. But one man, with less fanfare perhaps, outsold them all. In fact, he outsold…
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Theater Interview: DAVID DEAN BOTTRELL (New Solo Show “Teenage Wasteland” Now on Tour)
Teenage Wasteland: David Dean Bottrell Brings His New Solo Show to Revolution Stage Company An award-winning actor and writer dives into the awkward, hilarious, and heartfelt moments of adolescence—ages thirteen to fifteen—with his signature wit and warmth. David Dean Bottrell, acclaimed actor and storyteller known for his roles in Frasier, Modern Family, and his work…
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Theater Review: HAMILTON (National Tour in San Diego)
NOT YOUR GRANDMA’S 1776 Until Hamilton, if you’d asked me if I liked rap music, you’d have gotten a pretty quick, “No.” And I still do cringe at the memories of cars driving up my street with offensive lyrics played at sonic boom levels, because that had been my primary exposure to rap. So why…
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Theater Review: HARRY POTTER AND THE CURSED CHILD (National Tour at Hollywood Pantages Theatre)
WE’RE OFF TO SEE THE WIZARDS (AGAIN) The line between fan fiction and canon can be a blurry one. In a world where Twilight fan fiction inspired the best-selling book of the last decade and a Wizard of Oz flip became one of last year’s most prolific movies, it’s clear that capitalizing on existing IP…
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Theater Review: MEAN GIRLS (National Tour in Boston)
PREDATORS IN PINK Tina Fey (book), Jeff Richmond (music), and Nell Benjamin (lyrics) hit all the standard Broadway musical marks with Mean Girls, now in Boston as part of a national tour. It offers an impressive mix of dazzling choreography (Casey Nicholaw) and soaring voices from a young cast bursting with entertainment talent. Ironically, however,…
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