Archive for January, 2009:
Critique of the Week
Pippin
by Steven Leigh Morris
GO I know that we’re on the cusp of a Depression and theater audiences ache for frivolity and distraction, but this one really vexes, largely because [...]
“Stormy Weather”: 70% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET
The show is too long, particularly the first act. Horne’s amazing life, both as a performer, and a civil rights pioneer, who often sacrificed her family life for those causes, [...]
“Macbeth”: 0% Bitter
BITTER
The Los Angeles Theatre Ensemble is tackling the Bard’s most superstitiously pondered text at the Powerhouse Theatre, despite scores of tales about ill-fated productions. The show is a mixed-bag of [...]
A Ray of Fog in the Thick of the Night
Daniel Lehman over at Stage Blog seems to think these morsels of news are cause for optimism in the otherwise bleak climate of theatre.
Not I.
He offers these glad tidings:
Bloomberg writer [...]
“Reverb”: 67% Sweet
BITTER
The characters are compelling and well sketched, yet the playwright doesn’t delve perceptively enough into their personalities to make their emotional and psychological fault lines truly convincing.
Lovel Estelle III – [...]
“Pippin”: 73% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET
The production, however, gets off to a bit of a shaky start. The ensemble, boasting a skimpily clad chorus, hits one overly emphatic note after another. But once the company [...]
If There Were No Critics, Would We Have To Invent Them?
What would a theatre community without critics look like?
Would we remain forever “unvalidated”?
Would we forever be dubious of our own opinions and tastes without the “expert” and “authoritative” last word?
Without [...]
“LA’s Theatre Company”
Don Shirley challenges Center Theatre Group’s assertion that they are “LA’s Theatre Company”.
Don offers this lovely roasting:
Is there a speck of evidence to support this latter claim – that CTG [...]
“The Dining Room”: 100% Sweet
SWEET
Direction of this play requires a choreographer’s mind; thus Kay Cole helms the work with mastery of entrances and exits to join the scenes, imbuing the work with a memory-play [...]
“Hunter Gatherers”: 80% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET
If you think that getting in touch with your inner primitive is the ideal antidote to the sterility of modern civilization, San Francisco-based playwright Peter Sinn Nachtrieb’s “Hunter Gatherers” [...]
