Thursday, October 22, 2015
COME YE TO THE FAIR…LADY, THAT IS I’m rather certain one cannot visit enough productions of My Fair Lady. The 1956 musical, based on George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion, tells the tal…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:48PMMonday, October 19, 2015
HOT DOG SUCKING AHEAD You know, it’s funny, I was asking a friend just the other day if he knows of any show in town which has a guy sucking on a hot dog. And it would be great if it w…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 06:34AMThursday, October 15, 2015
TWYLA’S TWILIGHT While most American dance companies go on tour with a “best of” program, Twyla Tharp has refreshingly opted to offer two world premieres for her 50th Anniversary Tour,…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:32PMMARIINSKY BALLET & ORCHESTRA DOUBLE DOSE Russia’s Mariinsky Ballet, one of the world’s most influential and historically rich dance companies, returns to Segerstrom Center for the A…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:32PMWATCH WHAT UNFOLDS AND BE STUNNED In DIAVOLO’s dance/text hybrid piece Transit Space, author Steve Connell writes, “The only way to get there is to go.” The same can be said for what i…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:32PMA TREASURE TROVATORE There’s nothing subtle about Verdi’s ambitiously conceived Il Trovatore (The Troubadour). And David McVicar’s grandly realized, dark and hellish version will be sh…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:32PMGET CARRIE’D AWAY The key words in the title Carrie: The Killer Musical Experience are Killer Experience. Director Brady Schwind has taken a forever-troubled musical based on source …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:52AMVON TOURIST TRAPP The original stage version of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s The Sound of Music was such a crowd pleaser that many are surprised to learn the 1959 Mary Martin vehicle received…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:52AMOOH LA LA FOR LA CAGE AUX FOLLES If any gay activist ever derides this delightful musical, they would do well to remember just how radical La Cage aux Folles was when it hit Broadway in 1983…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:52AMSUNNY AND SCARE You think theater in Los Angeles can be frightening? Well, here’s entertainment that’s intentionally soulless. “It’s so funny, you’ll laugh your head off” takes o…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:52AMMonday, September 28, 2015
ONE SKETCH, TWO STYLES When the National Theatre of Great Britain produced One Man, Two Guvnors, playwright Richard Bean’s 2011 update of Carlo Goldoni’s 18th Century comedy, The Servant…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:59PMA RARE TREAT SERVED PIPING HOT The Stephen Schwartz/Joseph Stein musical The Baker’s Wife never made it to Broadway. The musical folded in Washington. D.C. in 1976 before reaching New York…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:59PMSLIDE INTO THE OLD DISNEYLAND My first visit to Disneyland was 1964, and I still remember many attractions from that day which will be covered when pop culture humorist and author Charles Ph…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:53PMSCHOOLED BY CALLAS If you’ve ever been to a master class, then Terrence McNally’s Master Class (1995) will seem very familiar. If you haven’t, then you’re in for a real eye-opener. A…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:53PMGANGSTER MUSICAL You’ve seen the movie, you’ve seen the car, now see the musical. Meet the most famous robbing, murdering, loving couple in U.S. history. From their first meeting at a We…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 12:53PMThursday, September 10, 2015
RETURN OF A SMART IDIOT It’s always satisfying to see a show that really works get a remount. DOMA, which presented the best version I have ever seen of Green Day’s American Idi…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:05PMBORDERING ON TRAGEDY There is a lot to like about playwright Luis Alfaro’s Mojada, a modern retelling of Medea which sets the main character as an undocumented immigrant and seamstress in …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:05PMDOUBLE DUTY DOMINGO The biggest names in opera, cinema, and classical music converge for the opening of LA Opera’s impressive 30th anniversary season. The double bill which opens Saturday …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 06:54AMSunday, August 30, 2015
AMERICAN CLASSICS WITH AUDRA MCDONALD & AMERICAN BALLET THEATRE The last time I saw the captivating singer and actress Audra McDonald in concert, she sang the Bernstein/Comden/Green tun…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 04:47PMThursday, August 20, 2015
COMEDY TONIGHT More like side-splitting by side-splitting by Sondheim, Impro Theatre–the masters of long-form improvisations in the style of famous authors and genres–are gearing…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 05:32PMFriday, August 14, 2015
GREAT, BUT NOT ALWAYS CLASSIC According to TimeOut London, the term “cabaret” represents an overlapping group of constantly mutating forms of performance that can’t be pinned down�…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:38PMTIS THE SEASONS Not unlike Timothy Leary and LSD, I have been turning people on to ACB for similar reasons. In an increasingly complicated world, one needs a stimulant to reinforce a sense o…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 06:28PMTuesday, August 11, 2015
THERE’S NOTHING GOING ON UP HERE It’s an idea whose time has already come this summer, and with far superior results. In fact, the character of Lindsay, a t-shirt designer who ha…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 06:56AMMonday, August 10, 2015
YOU CAN GO HOLMES AGAIN It turns out that you can teach an old dog new tricks, proven by The Old Globe’s contemporary stage-spoof treatment of the 1901 Sherlock Holmes classic novel The Ho…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:46PMMonday, August 3, 2015
A FINE CLINE Patsy Cline couldn’t be more fondly or accurately recalled than by Cori Cable Kidder in Robert Marra’s production of Always…Patsy Cline, the oft-produced 1990 paean to th…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 03:45AMSaturday, August 1, 2015
THE HOLY GRAIL OF SILLINESS It’s been 40 years since the release of the landmark comedy film Monty Python and the Holy Grail and 33 years since the British sketch comedy troupe recorded …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 09:47PMDACHAU DELIVERANCE TO THE MAX More than six million Jews were slaughtered by Nazis. When Martin Sherman wrote Bent in 1979, the yellow star that emblazoned the clothing of Jews was well-know…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 10:38AMTuesday, July 28, 2015
GIRLFRIEND, PLEASE! While it’s being sold as a rock musical, Todd Almond’s gay two-hander is really a play; the songs from Matthew Sweet’s 1991 breakout album Girlfriend are indiscri…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 06:43AMFriday, July 24, 2015
A FULL-ON KISS Everything is so dang perfect about the construction of Kiss Me, Kate that it’s doubly amazing when a revival comes along to match that perfection. With some of the most bof…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 07:16AMThursday, July 16, 2015
THE MUSIC MAN BEHIND THE MUSIC MAN When Moonlight Stage Productions announced their production of The Music Man, which opens this week at the Moonlight Amphitheatre in Vista, I actually got …
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 08:50AMSALUTING SONDHEIM IN SOLANA BEACH Stephen Sondheim is so beyond merely good and light years away from conventional that some may view his musicals as pure art and overlook the slathers of so…
SOURCE: Stage and Cinema at 08:50AM 
