BITTERSWEET The basics of a good story and good drama are here, but Morgan doesn’t provide adequate, convincing heft to these characters, or to the structure of her plot. Oddly, she saves …
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 02:38PMSWEET Cate Caplin directs with flair and imagination, with lively assist from Samantha Whidby’s choreography. Buoyant musical accompaniment by Jeff Bonhiver on keyboard and Tyler Smith on …
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 01:35PMSWEET The play is brilliantly staged. Directed by LATC artistic director Jose Luis Valenzuela, it’s 1940s noir mixed with Sirk-esque melodrama that plays out like some strange mix of Doubl…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 01:09PMBITTERSWEET Set in rural Indiana in the early 1930s, Jim Leonard Jr.’s 1980 play, “The Diviners,” drips with a period regionalism that is almost folkloric in tone. The play require…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 01:51PMSWEET The direction under Catherine Michaels was light and pure. The staging was that of a seasoned ballet choreographer, beautifully seamless. Cheers are to be given to Catherine for allowi…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 06:56PMSWEET This rarely produced revival delivers a blistering indictment of the South’s anti-miscegenation laws against the backdrop of a deeply moving portrait of urban black life in the early…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 04:25PMSWEET Perfect for Halloween or for anyone who enjoys taking a journey into the deep dark woods, “Broomstick” offers a frightfully fun time at the theater that might be especially fun at …
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 01:32AMSWEET Adding depth and dimension to Didion’s script are Juan Sanson’s subtle sound effects and spare, softly ethereal music and Francois-Pierre Couture’s scenic work and color washes, …
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 09:17PMBITTERSWEET It’s a great premise, wonderful set, excellent actors but there is something missing. Maybe it’s the timing, perhaps the situation is too convoluted or maybe the dial…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 05:09PMBITTERSWEET The problem with his acting — and this pertains also to Angelo’s — is that it strives for a relaxed naturalness that often seems artificial. Instead of rising to meet S…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 02:34PMBITTERSWEET The bad singing is handled better than the good jokes and if all the performers could, in the rest of the run, go as over the top as the funny script seems to calls for, then Glo…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 04:26PMSWEET There’s no sugarcoating the relentlessly downbeat mood here. Vivid impressions linger from Frédérique Michel’s fierce staging, which underscores the play’s austere geometric na…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 03:16PMBITTERSWEET The play runs slightly over two hours with no intermission, an incredibly long time to ask an audience to sit and try to stay motivated watching such as disjointed play. The tale…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 08:49PMSWEET The production is somewhat hampered by acoustical imbalances, a problem that has surfaced in past 3-D productions at Plummer Auditorium. This is generally not the case with the company…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 07:30PMSWEET With wild abandon, slick partnering, and sensitive storytelling, Invertigo Dance Theatre presents After It Happened, a multidisciplinary theatre work of dance, acting, live music and s…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 04:15PMBITTERSWEET From a theatrical perspective, unmodulated rage works best in small doses; too much of it stuns the senses. Subtler moments, as when she confesses her dreams of marrying the Iris…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 07:49PMSWEET The erotic gamesmanship is fascinating to track. But by far the most delicious pleasure of “Venus in Fur” comes from watching two actors dazzle us in a psychosexual pas de …
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 05:09PMSWEET It takes a combination of inspiration and chutzpah to reinvent a 58-year-old musical theater classic that’s been reinvented time and time again—but director Gary Lamb has done just…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 04:40PMBITTERSWEET The production’s silliness (in high-octane overdrive) really starts to wear thin by Act 2, though the music and dance routines are a kick, courtesy of Paul Olson’s score, Phi…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 07:13PMSWEET It’s not an easy place to mount a production. As the last resting place of thousands, the space must be treated with respect. The productions themselves use many of the same corridor…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 05:50PMBITTERSWEET The result – a blend of an old-fashioned ghost story and a kitchen sink family drama – has moments of real sweetness, intervals of flagrant family dysfunction and a minute or…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 02:32PMSWEET Overall, “The Importance of Being Earnest” was an absolute delight. The actors suited their respective characters, the scenery was quite beautiful in a simplistic way, and …
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 03:26AMBITTER Abley’s script and direction are vulgar, obvious, derivative, and misogynistic, but that’s apparently a winning combination for his audience, which giggled and guffawed throughout…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 03:26PMSWEET Amy Herzog’s contemporary exploration of kinship, adulthood and self-discovery receives a warm, capable production in its Los Angeles debut at the Sierra Madre Playhouse. Directed by…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 02:58PMBITTERSWEET Director Elina de Santos turns in a polished production (on Sephanie Kerley Schwartz’s sleek, sliding-panel set), but the play’s meandering pace and easy affirmations undercu…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 02:19PMBITTERSWEET The drawbacks of this musical’s backward-glancing manner are most notable in Martin’s book, which is often floridly melodramatic. The action takes place just after th…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 01:44PMBITTERSWEET “This is the void where you make sense of your life,” says Michael when he realizes that he is in a holding pattern. That statement could also be applied to the stage…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 12:44PMSWEET The play ends with the most in-the-head character, Katha, still questioning the reality of her newfound faux world. And, in another masterful stroke by Harrison, backed by director Mar…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 12:14PMSWEET The dilemmas facing the life-battered protagonist of “Good People” are perhaps strategically manipulated, but that doesn’t make them any less relevant, humorous or dramatically e…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 06:46PMBITTERSWEET The cast — Pedersen, Lord, Kulinska, Huff, Uhebe and Tepper — are all experienced actors and performed appropriately. I found Eisenberg’s direction to be slow, as if the au…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 02:58PMSWEET Sick of this accursed heatwave? Longing for the thrills and chills of the Halloween season to commence? No need to pray to the Great Old Ones, just slither on down to the little theate…
SOURCE: Bitter Lemons at 12:53PM
