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Chicago Theater Review: GYPSY: A MUSICAL FABLE (Porchlight Music Theatre at Ruth Page Center)
LET HER ENTERTAIN YOU! Some people say Gypsy: A Musical Fable is the greatest Broadway musical ever written. And some people are probably right. It isn’t just a stirring story of an ugly duckling turning into a swan, or a stage mother from hell morphing into a humble fan (and admitting that for years she was living…
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DVD Review: KILLING EVE: SEASON ONE (BBC)
THIS SERIES IS A KILLER This spy thriller/crazy-woman drama is full of sly wit and generous amounts of spooky drama in which a spy-catcher (Sandra Oh) has to find a pretty, psychotic damsel (Jodie Comer) before she wipes out most of Europe with her gleeful killing spree. In addition to some extraordinary writing, directing, and…
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Opera Review: IDOMENEO (Lyric Opera of Chicago)
IDOMENABLE After nearly a week of striking musicians and cancelled performances, Lyric Opera is now back on schedule and giving audiences what they want. With Mozart’s Idomeneo, audiences are more likely getting what they didn’t know they wanted because they’ve never experienced this opera before. Last performed at Lyric during the 1997-98 season, Idomeneo is…
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Theater Preview: THE SEAFARER (Laguna Playhouse)
THE DEVIL’S AT THE DOOR “He knows not Who lives most easily on land, how I Have spent my winter on the ice-cold sea Wretched and anxious, in the paths of exile Lacking dear friends, hung round by icicles While hail flew past in showers:” From the medieval poem The Seafarer translated by Richard Hamer…
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Theater Review: FRANKENSTEIN (Remy Bumppo Theatre Company at Theater Wit)
MARY SHELLEY’S ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: FRANKENSTEIN’S TRICK IS OUR TREAT Creating a Halloween story for all seasons in a novel that launched a terror genre, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley named Dr. Victor Frankenstein the “modern Prometheus” (the monster, among other deprivations, has no name). It’s a sardonic slam at this very debatable benefactor for making this re-animator…
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Dance Preview: SUTRA (Alonzo King LINES Ballet at the Wallis in Beverly Hills)
DANCE & MUSIC ROYALTY: KING/HUSSAIN Widely considered a chief architect of the contemporary world music movement, Indian tabla master Zakir Hussain is drenched in Eastern Classicism, yet looks to Western influences to explore and experiment. Meanwhile, choreographer Alonzo King combines principles of transcendental Eastern thinking with the foundation of Western ballet’s classical forms and techniques. Over the past two…
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Theater Review: IT’S ONLY A PLAY (Pride Films and Plays at the Pride Arts Center)
THIS TURKEY IS SO SCARY, YOU HAVE TO KEEP REPEATING TO YOURSELF, “IT’S ONLY A PLAY… IT’S ONLY A PLAY…” There’s a glaring contradiction in It’s Only a Play: Written by the usually crafty Terrence McNally, a 20-time Broadway playwright, this two-act love letter to Broadway theater and its “plays of fools” — depicted in full…
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Music & Dance Preview: ROMEO AND JULIET (LA Phil and L.A. Dance Project at Disney Hall)
A WHOLE NEW DANCE PROJECT WITH LA PHIL Romeo and Juliet is probably Prokofiev’s best dramatic work (I say “probably” because “hearing” the duck being eaten by the wolf in Peter and the Wolf nearly traumatized my childhood). Arguably, it’s his best orchestral work. Positively, it’s his most lyrical, emotional, and deeply moving work. Yet…
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Off-Broadway Theater Review: EMMA AND MAX (Todd Solondz World Premiere at The Flea Theater)
CASTE ASIDE Todd Solondz, one of the most profound filmmakers working today (Happiness, Welcome to the Dollhouse), begins his first play Emma and Max — which he also directs — with a scene right out of a Todd Solondz movie: An affluent white couple, Brooke and Jay, sit uncomfortable and tense in their living room opposite…
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CD Review: BEETHOVEN VIOLIN SONATAS NOS. 6, 7 & 8 (Andrew Wan and Charles Richard-Hamelin)
BEETHOVEN’S VIOLIN SONATAS, OP. 30: SONATA THING WRONG HERE Beethoven composed his Sonatas for Violin and Piano, Op. 30 in 1801-02, completing most of the work between March and May of 1802. Dedicated to Czar Alexander I of Russia, the three sonatas — A major, C minor and G major — were developed during a…
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San Diego Theater Review: HIR (Cygnet Theatre)
WHO DOES HE THINK SHE IS? Him:Her:Them:Zir:Hir? In the transgender and non-binary community, the struggle with pronouns almost rivals the struggle with civil rights. Hir, now in a San Diego premiere, is both the title and a gender-neutral pronoun combining “his” and “her” (and pronounced “heer”). Its world is the creation of singer/songwriter/ performance artist/playwright Taylor Mac…
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Music Preview: ALISA WEILERSTEIN: COMPLETE BACH CELLO SUITES (The Wallis in Beverly Hills)
WEILERSTEIN TO WOW AT THE WALLIS I had been following Alisa Weilerstein for over a decade, but until a few years ago it was only on recordings and YouTube. Having seen her perform live three times since I can assert that the phenomenal American cellist has attracted attention worldwide because her playing combines a natural…
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Theater Review: PIPPIN (Mercury Theater Chicago)
THE HOLY ROMAN EMPEROR AS FLOWER CHILD Some shows stay young by never growing up: Stephen Schwartz’ silly-stupid 1972 musical is the (im)perfect example of a musical that’s saved by its songs and spirit. A sort of ninth-century, one-ring circus crammed with presentational glee, it was practically a tribal sequel to Schwartz’s Godspell (with homage…
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Music Preview: THE CZECH PHILHARMONIC ORCHESTRA (Segerstrom Concert Hall in Costa Mesa)
A NEW WORLD OF DVOŘíK AT SEGERSTROM In 2014, Decca released a 6-CD box set by the Czech Philharmonic Orchestra (CPO) of the complete symphonies and concertos of Antonín Dvořák. CPO has long been celebrated for their interpretations of their nation’s most beloved composer, but I don’t remember when I’ve been quite so taken with…
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Los Angeles Theater Review: SILENCE! THE MUSICAL (Bucket List Theatre at The Actors Company)
HANNIBAL THE CANNIBAL WANTS A WHIFF OF SOMETHING SPECIAL I didn’t know what to expect when I made plans to see Bucket List Theatre’s production of Silence! The Musical, a parody of the multiple Oscar-winning film The Silence of the Lambs, now at the Actors Company in Hollywood. Would it be gross-out humor, a too-long…
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Theater Review: FLYIN’ WEST (American Blues Theater)
FLYIN’ HIGH: THE HEARTLAND SOLIDARITY OF SODBUSTING SISTERS For a while it must have seemed like a black Eden. Founded in 1877, Nicodemus, Kansas was a Reconstruction success story founded on a racial covenant. It offered a second chance for former slaves and future dreamers: The reputedly all-black town was the enlightened creation of the…
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Theater Preview: 42ND STREET (3-D Theatricals)
YOU’VE GOT SOME FEET TO MEET Call us saps or suckers but we can’t, it seems, get enough of “The Understudy Who Becomes A Star.” Not when the sweet and satisfying story is stuffed with thrills like “Shuffle Off to Buffalo” and “Young and Healthy.” Some clichés justify themselves, if only because nothing less than…
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CD Review: WHO’S YOUR BAGHDADDY? OR HOW I STARTED THE IRAQ WAR (Original Cast Recording)
THEY BAGH’D THIS ONE The Iraq War lasted seven years (2003 – 2011) and cost $1.06 trillion, adding more than more than $1 trillion to the U.S. debt. I thought this was going to be a heavy-handed listen, but it’s a hoot to listen to the Original Cast Album about the war’s genesis. Seen Off-Broadway in 2015,…
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Theater Preview: THE BARBERSHOP CHRONICLES (Freud Playhouse at UCLA)
Newsroom, political platform, local hot spot, confession box, preacher-pulpit and football stadium. For generations, African men have gathered in barber shops to discuss the world. They talk, argue, unwind and, of course, get their hair cut. These are places where the banter can be barbed and the truth is always telling. For one weekend only,…
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Theater Review: CRUMBS FROM THE TABLE OF JOY (Raven Theatre in Chicago)
CRUMBS IS A RICH MEAL Much like Lorraine Hansberry and Tennessee Williams, Lynn Nottage is a memory-monger. She sees truth in small stuff that looms larger later. And as with Arthur Miller or Clifford Odets (especially the latter’s Awake and Sing!), she also has the gift of moral magnification: She can make family feuds stand for…
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