Friday, May 11, 2012
A WAR OF IDEAS For the first forty-five minutes of City Lit’s OPUS 1861, a miracle occurred: I wept. Consistently. The simple but mighty idea is this: six actors dressed in simple army fat…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 04:23PMThursday, May 3, 2012
TIMON ON OUR HANDS OK, raise your hand if you have read Shakespeare’s Timon of Athens. No? Do you even know how to say Timon? It is pronounced TIME-uhn. Have you seen a production? Probabl…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:04PMWednesday, May 2, 2012
TOO MANY THEATER INGREDIENTS SPOIL THE BROTH If there were a Joseph Jefferson Award simply for risk-taking in the theatre, Brandon Bruce would most assuredly win for his direction of John We…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:45AMSaturday, April 28, 2012
ONE FROGGY EVENING Once again, Musical Theatre Guild (MTG), a company of professional performers who present concert-staged readings, has produced a stellar offering of a rarely-seen musical…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:01PMTuesday, April 24, 2012
SIXTY MILES TO NOWHERE The setting for Dan LeFranc’s Sixty Miles to Silverlake is the front seat of a car. Ky (Sean Bolger) has picked up his son Denny (Ethan Dubin) from a soccer game, as…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:47PMSaturday, April 21, 2012
A REFRESHING RAIN When reviving an oft-produced play like N. Richard Nash’s The Rainmaker, the hope is that the director will somehow put a new spin on the production so that the piece doe…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:25PMFEELING A LITTLE BLUE In 1992, a friend insisted that we see Blue Man Group: Tubes at the tiny, cramped Astor Place Theatre in New York City. At the time, people were calling it a new genera…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:38PMFriday, April 20, 2012
THERE’S MUCH TO DESIRE One of the most truly inspiring films of the last year was Joffrey: Mavericks of American Dance, not just for its devotion to Joffrey’s legacy, but because the do…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:59AMThursday, April 19, 2012
GET THEE TO BEING SHAKESPEARE There’s simply no other way to encourage your attendance to Being Shakespeare than to submit my unequivocal good word. Those who fret at comprehending Shakesp…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:58PMSunday, April 15, 2012
AS GOOD AS IT GETS In his extraordinary production of Good People at the Geffen, director Matt Shakman has validated the necessary ingredients of a great show: First: Storytelling. In descri…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:54AMThursday, April 12, 2012
THE IMPORTANCE OF A BIG BROTHER When you hear of Billy Elliot being a phenomenal world-wide success, it is almost shocking that the popular musical (music by Elton John, book and lyrics by L…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 08:54PMAWAKENING TO THE FACT THAT IT’S A POORLY-WRITTEN MUSICAL I feel sorry for the cast and crew of Over the Moon Productions (OTM). The hard-working Broadway-caliber talent in Spring Awake…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:00PMTuesday, April 3, 2012
KILLER HUNK, KILLER SET, AND KILLER STORY MAKE UP FOR BLOODLESS PERFORMANCES As evidenced by his astoundingly beautiful production of Ira Levin’s 1978 comedy-thriller Deathtrap, Jon Impera…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:35AMSaturday, March 31, 2012
THE DISNEYFICATION OF LINCOLN’S DEATH In many ways, Hershey Felder is a theater machine. In his four previous self-crafted one-man shows, the earnest and multi-talented actor/pianist/c…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:36AMTuesday, March 27, 2012
A CHARMING MUSICAL WITHOUT A VIEW Theatre lore maintains that creating a successful new musical for the stage is more difficult and trying than creating peace in the Middle East. Noticing th…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 04:03AMFriday, March 23, 2012
SOMEHOW, IT KEEPS ON WORKING For those who have never seen the 1978 musical Working, the Production Company’s current revival may be somewhat of a revelation. The subtitle of Studs Terkel�…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:18AMWednesday, March 21, 2012
ODD CASTING CHOICE NEARLY SINKS SHOW There is a perplexing and ultimately infuriating casting choice in the Old Globe’s production of Anna Christie that nearly sinks Eugene O’Neill’s 1…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:54PMMonday, March 19, 2012
OH WHAT A TANGLED WEB WE WEAVE While Theatre Unleashed’s cast and crew have a gloriously and unashamedly good time bringing The Spidey Project to the West Coast, it’s a shame that their …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:25PMSaturday, March 17, 2012
AMERICAN NIGHT SUCKS, BUT IT SWALLOWS Juan José, a Mexican cop sick of being on-the-take, has crossed the border in search of citizenship, leaving his pregnant wife behind. Panicking over f…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:48PMThursday, March 15, 2012
HATE THE MUSICAL, BUT LOVE, LOVE, LOVE THE PRODUCTION Whether you love or hate the musical version of The Color Purple, no one, and I mean no one, can or will deny that this is one of the fi…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:00PMFriday, March 2, 2012
ALVIN AILEY – REMEMBER HIS NAME AIDS wreaked havoc on the theater world in all of its incarnations, and the crushing effects of its devastation remain with us today. So many ingenious cre…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:54AMWednesday, February 22, 2012
THREE YEAR SWIM CLUB SWIMS UP STREAM Ever since mankind began telling tales, the “overcoming adversity” story has remained ever-popular. From cave wall pictures depicting a hunter’s pr…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 11:07PMA BLUEPRINT FOR ACTIVISM The Occupy Wall Street movement would do well to take a tip from the longest running show in Chicago, Too Much Light Makes The Baby Go Blind (TML). The event may tak…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:59PMSunday, February 19, 2012
TO STAGE AN IMPOSSIBLE DREAM Now in its 60th season, Musical Theatre West (MTW) is currently reviving Man of La Mancha with the astronomical performance of Davis Gaines as its driving force…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:06AMSaturday, February 18, 2012
3-D THEATRICALS MAKES QUITE A SOUND The 70MM, Panavision aerial shot of Julie Andrews, Christopher Plummer and entourage trekking over the border into Switzerland in The Sound of Music (1965…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 02:36PMWednesday, February 15, 2012
PLAYWRIGHT AWARENESS With three produced plays under her belt, Annie Baker is quickly becoming THE playwright to watch in the American Theatrical landscape. Her first play, Body Awareness (o…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 09:58PMMonday, February 13, 2012
THE GREATEST STORY NEVER TOLD 18 year-old Jesus of Nazareth has heard some distressing news from his sucky carpenter of a father, so he bails Galilee with his whiny, Girl, Interrupted-like f…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 06:41PMSaturday, February 11, 2012
MIST OPPORTUNITY I was troubled after the opening of the West Coast Premiere of Chicago playwright Keith Huff’s A Steady Rain at Marin Theatre Company. I couldn’t shake the feeling that …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 04:37PMFriday, February 10, 2012
ART OR NOT, IT’S A FUN PLAY Yasmina Reza’s oft-produced Art (English translation by Christopher Hampton) may be singularly responsible for the current plethora of new plays today billed …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 01:16AMWednesday, February 8, 2012
WHEN RECOMMENDATIONS DON’T TURN OUT AS HOPED FOR Aaron Feldman, the charismatic, bright, and privileged protagonist of Jonathan Caren’s promising but highly unwieldy new play The Rec…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 08:58PMSaturday, February 4, 2012
THE SHOW ABOUT THE HAND THAT GIVES YOU THE FINGER I get a thrill when I think of the tourists who are milling about Old Town in San Diego. Exhausted from tchotchke shopping and sugary treats…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:13PM 
