1,387 stories by "Tony Frankel"
EVEN GOD CAN’T SAVEÂ THIS FROM ITSELF Dear God (if I may quote Alice Walker): What’s going on with the theater these days? Oh, that’s right, you already know. In fact, yo…
MAGIC CAN STRIKE TWICE IN THE SAME PLACE In 2013, a new production of The Magic Flute from Berlin's Komische Oper became a sell-out sensation, courtesy of the Los Angeles Opera. Now, it retu…
AÂ HOLLYWOOD MUSICAL AS YOU’VE NEVER SEEN IT In 1993, H.R.H. the Princess of Hanover appointed Jean-Christophe Maillot as the head of Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo. Backed by his experi…
AÂ FUNNY AND NOT-SO FUNNY THING An irresistible mix of Roman "new comedy," commedia dell'arte, and vaudeville, A Funny Thing Happened on the Way to the Forum rivals The Producers as the fu…
COLORFUL COLORATURA IN A CLUNKY CANDIDE There isn't much I could say about the musical Candide that hasn't been written about before. Leonard Bernstein created one of our greatest Broadway s…
CENSORSHIP COMES TO LOS ANGELES The Wooster Group has let Stage and Cinema know that Samuel French, Inc., which manages the United States rights for Harold Pinter's work, has bannedÂ�…
THE TROCKS ROCK! As part of their worldwide tour, one of the most original troupes on the globe is coming to Carpenter Center in Long Beach this weekend. Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte C…
A MUSICAL THAT REACHES FOR NEW HEIGHTS Built during the Depression between 1930 and 1931, the Empire State Building became the world’s tallest office building"surpassing the Chrysler B…
YOUR PAL IS COMING TO TOWN Sassy and brassy Pal Joey is a wondrous rouser that spins the tale of a roué gone rotten in Depression-era Chicago. As part of its Reiner Staged Reading …
THAT WAS THE YEAR THAT IS When the meek and paranoid everyman Winston Smith scribbles “Down with Big Brother” in his journal, he soon blossoms into a determined and impassi…
WHAT/EVER Saved from total disregard by a libretto that occasionally manages to engage with humor and knowingness, this brave attempt to examine the subject of fate versus choice utterly fai…
CROSSFIRE Between religious zealots, especially those who use the word of God to control the populace rather than to create peace, and the liberation of a new world"gay marriage, Roe v. Wade…
ME SO FELIZ A friend mentioned that three comediennes–a Cuban American from Miami, a Mexican American from Texas, and the daughter of an “over-dedicated Mexican mother and …
APOLLO EARTHBOUND; SHOSTAKOVICH SOARS Rollicking, mysterious, and adventurous may be attributes of Britten’s Young Apollo,but these adjectives also describe the outcome, respecti…
DO I FEAR A WALTZ? Musicals are generally "lost" for any one of a number of reasons: the libretto may be filled with once topical socio-political humor now meaningless to contemporary audien…
IF STORYTELLING’S YOUR THING, SKIP SCOTCH French poet and essayist Charles Pierre Péguy wrote, “It is the essence of genius to make use of the simplest ideas.” Yuval Sharo…
FALLING IN LOVE WITH LAUGHS AND LEAPS Sadly a review of record, but this experimental, eclectic mash-up from Chicago looks to have a life beyond its short runs in the cities of wind and ange…
HOW BROWN WAS MY VALLEY? The San Fernando Valley has always creeped me out. My family moved from Anaheim to Canoga Park (now West Hills) in 1971 (two weeks before the earthquake, thank you).…
NEED TO KNOW MORE Since moving into my six-unit apartment eight months ago, I have encountered the loveliest neighbors a man could hope for. But just two weeks ago, a tall, gangly, middle…
THE FUTURE OF AMERICAN OPERA IS HERE I shudder when the time comes to see a "New American Opera." The majority of new works are frustratingly inaccessible. Instead of reinventing opera, most…
SHORT ON WICKED; SHORTER ON LIT While Knott's Scary Farm has been doing it for decades with its haunted mazes, interactive theater is gaining ground nationwide as a way to address dwindling …
GOD HE’S GOOD A belated but welcome revue, Sondheim on Sondheim offers both songs and personal musings from one of Broadway’s best composer/lyricists. This inside look is rich wi…
ROSENCRANTZ AND GUILDENSTERN ARE ALIVE AND WELL AND WAITING FOR GODOT Rajiv Joseph's surprisingly complex and touching two-hander concerns a couple of guards assigned to stand watch at the w…
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 tale …
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…
