Tuesday, October 14, 2014
A CONFESSION ABOUT SWEENEY TODD Bless me, Father, for I have sinned. It’s been four days since my last confession. I saw Porchlight Music Theatre’s production of Sweeney Todd at Stage 77…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:23AMMonday, October 13, 2014
MISSING MECHE Although Nobel Prize-winning writer Vargas Llosa is known primarily as a novelist, he has also written nine plays spanning a period of sixty years. La Chunga,written in 1986, i…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:57AMThursday, October 9, 2014
SOME MAGIC IS ADDED, SOME MAGIC IS TAKEN AWAY South Africa’s Isango Ensemble is undoubtedly full of talented actors, singers, and musicians, but doesn’t quite have the specialized skills…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:01PMPARTY LIKE IT’S 1928 A riot from start to finish, Bailiwick Chicago’s The Wild Party is a breathless, exuberant, fast-paced production running for an hour and forty minutes without pause…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:50PMTuesday, October 7, 2014
THIS CAPRICCIO IS NO CAPRICE The brooding romanticism of Capriccio’s opening sextet sets the tone for the introspection that is to follow. Instead of a dramatic overture and crowd-pleasing…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:52PMMonday, October 6, 2014
PUZZLING THROUGH THE CRYPTOGRAM IS WORTH THE EFFORT The title alone should have been clue enough that this was going to be a difficult play, but nothing could have prepared me for the lack o…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:07PMFriday, October 3, 2014
A VANDAL OF AN ENDING Thirty-something actor and writer Hamish Linklater’s The Vandal is one of those plays that starts well and ends poorly. It begins with a middle-aged woman waiting at …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:27PMMonday, September 29, 2014
THE MANY LOVE(S OF) DON GIOVANNI Why does Chicago love Mozart’s Don Giovanni so much? Well-received as Lyric Opera’s first production back in 1954, and revived many times over the ensuin…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:39AMSunday, September 28, 2014
THIS MAGIC FLUTE IS ALL TOO ORDINARY South Africa’s Isango Ensemble is undoubtedly full of talented actors, singers, and musicians, but doesn’t quite have the specialized skills required…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:34AMSaturday, September 27, 2014
MAD ABOUT JOHN DOE Trap Door Theatre is entered via a long narrow gap between two Bucktown restaurants. Upon arrival, Artistic Director Beata Pilch assigns audience members a number and Mike…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:44PMFriday, August 29, 2014
REASONS TO BE CRITICAL Neil LaBute seems to have a penchant for ironic titles. His 2002 play The Mercy Seat was anything but merciful; LaBute described it as a “kind of emotional terrorism…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 04:36PMTuesday, August 26, 2014
THIS SHOW’S ON FIRE “Ich bin ein Biedermann” isn’t what President Kennedy famously said in Berlin in 1963, but it’s something playwright Max Frisch might have said while writin…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:38PMFriday, August 15, 2014
A TRAGEDY OF EPIC PROPORTIONS Writing a play of more than 800 pages that takes twelve hours to perform is both an act of hubris and an act of genius. Written and directed by The Hypocrites�…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:47PMMonday, June 16, 2014
A BUTTERFLY WITHOUT WINGS Madama Butterfly (1904) is understandably one of the most popular operas in the world. Not only does it boast a tragic story that is incredibly moving, but the dram…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 09:29AMMonday, May 5, 2014
BAROQUE AND LOVING IT It begins innocently enough with two nymphs singing, swinging and blowing bubbles—until the gods intervene and mayhem ensues. There are transvestites, lusty satyrs, a…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:10AMFriday, April 25, 2014
A NAIL IN OPERA’S COFFIN As the opera’s West Coast premiere, A Coffin in Egypt is frankly disappointing. As the first opera production at the new Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performi…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:41AMTuesday, April 8, 2014
SAN DIEGO OPERA’S SWAN SONG SPEAKS TO DREAMING IMPOSSIBLE DREAMS Don Quixote (“Don Quichotte” in its original French spelling) serves as a fitting final production with which to cl…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 08:47PMWednesday, March 26, 2014
A FISHY MONSTROSITY What is it about the story of Jonah that has so captured the world’s imagination? Is it the stupidity of a man trying to run away from God, as if that were even possibl…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:11PMTuesday, February 25, 2014
ORANGE COUNTY GOES GREEN, I.E. VERDI Opera is alive and well in Orange County! Since the demise of Opera Pacific (1985-2008), Pacific Symphony, aided by Pacific Chorale, has emerged as the c…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:36PMTuesday, February 18, 2014
THIS ELIXIR IS A TONIC FOR WHAT AILS YOU Some artistic works are such a product of their time that it is difficult for later generations to understand them without spending a considerable am…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:31PMSaturday, January 25, 2014
ONE STEP FORWARD, TWO STEPS BACK To open their second season, the Independent Opera Company (IOC) is performing Franz Lehar’s 1905 operetta The Merry Widow. It appears to be a scaling back…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 09:18PMThursday, January 16, 2014
A TURN FOR THE BETTER A Henry James novella first published in 1898, The Turn of the Screw tells one of the most ambiguous ghost stories ever written. It involves a brother and sister (Flora…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:58AMSaturday, June 22, 2013
VERDI ON THE VERGE Hearing Giuseppe Verdi’s Macbeth is a rather disorienting experience, at least at the beginning. The difference is that we’re used to Shakespeare’s English, even if …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:17PMMonday, June 17, 2013
FALLING FOR DONIZETTI’S VALLEY GIRL Opera in Los Angeles seems to be thriving these days. In addition to established companies like LA Opera and Long Beach Opera, there are smaller compani…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 05:21PMWednesday, June 12, 2013
OFFENBACH’S REQUIEM Just as Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart died in the middle of writing his famous Requiem so did Jacques Offenbach die composing his fantastical opera Tales of Hoffmann. Both wo…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:09AMTuesday, June 4, 2013
BOTTOM IS TOPS Unlike Shakespeare’s tragedies and histories, which are mostly named for their main character, his comedies have rather different kinds of titles. These differing titles ale…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:06PMMonday, April 15, 2013
A MARRIAGE MADE IN HEAVEN Less than a month after its pop-up production of The Barber of Seville, Pacific Opera Project (POP) continues Beaumarchais’ trilogy with Mozart’s The Marriage o…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 08:13PMSunday, March 31, 2013
SCHOOLED BY CALLAS If you’ve ever been to a master class, then Terrence McNally’s Tony Award-winning play Master Class (1995) will seem very familiar. If you haven’t, then you’re in …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 04:05PMFriday, March 22, 2013
A MATCH MADE IN HOLLYWOOD Last year, the Pacific Opera Project (POP) put on a show about a serial killer who also happened to be a barber: Sweeney Todd. This year, they have staged a product…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:11PMTuesday, March 12, 2013
SALVATION IN A STORM Who is the titular Flying Dutchman? Is he a mythological figure, a type of the wandering Jew bound to traverse the earth in travail until his day of salvation comes? Is …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:57AMTuesday, March 5, 2013
A RESTRICTED BUT RIVETING ROOM Novelist Ira Levin may be best-known for Rosemary’s Baby and Stepford Wives, both made even more popular by their film adaptations, but as a playwright, Le…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:09PM 
