All Entries Tagged With: "edge los angeles"
WHISPER HOUSE: 83% Sweet – UPDATED
BITTER Composer Duncan Sheik’s voice, which entered the world of stage tuners with a roar in 2004′s “Spring Awakening,” is reduced to a whisper in “Whisper House,” the somnolent chamber musical now world premiering at the Old Globe. Sheik’s sophomore slump doesn’t mean his vastly popular, Tony-winning debut was a fluke. But it does suggest [...]
CIRCUS WELT: 75% Sweet – UPDATED
BITTERSWEET It’s an intriguing idea, as is the decision to launch each of the play’s four acts with chilling 1933 news updates performed as satirical clown routines. But Cerny lacks the production resources and acting talent to bring his vision fully, hauntingly to life. Daryl H. Miller – LA Times SWEET Grenrock makes a touching [...]
F*CKING MEN: 86% Sweet
SWEET With a title like F*cking Men and the promise of full frontal male nudity, the latest Celebration Theatre production will have no problem attracting audiences. Joe DiPietro’s modern gay twist on Arthur Schnitzler’s 1900 classic La Ronde has been filling seats in London for the past two years and counting. What WeHo theatergoers will [...]
Critique of the Week
PALESTINE, NEW MEXICO by Trevor Thomas – EdgeLosAngeles “Nobody’s happy here. Nobody knows who they are.” So says one character in Richard Montoya’s Palestine, New Mexico now onstage at the Mark Taper Forum. Amen to that. Army Captain Catherine Siler (Kirsten Potter) is an unwelcome presence on the New Mexico reservation shared by the Suarez [...]
PALESTINE, NEW MEXICO: 38% Bitter – UPDATED
BITTERSWEET This curious development leads to a fantasy sequence featuring, among other harebrained shenanigans, a golem in the shape of a cactus. The high jinks have a fatuous air that aims to translate the zaniness of the Marx Brothers and Aristophanes into Culture Clash’s unique brand of tomfoolery. But the plot is convoluted in a [...]
BONNIE & CLYDE: 50% Bitter
BITTER It’s theoretically possible to turn the “Bonnie & Clyde” saga into a conventional musical play, but the eponymous tuner at La Jolla Playhouse hasn’t found the magic formula. Flummoxed by the challenge of creating likable, sympathetic protagonists while remaining truthful to the facts of their vain, pointless Depression-era death spree, the creative team falls [...]
TREE: 100% Sweet
SWEET In “Tree,” there is no true love without pain. Hébert suggests that real families are the people who know you well enough to push you into becoming someone new. Now there’s an idea to bring to the Thanksgiving table. Charlotte Stoudt – LA Times SWEET The play finds its stride through people clashing, even [...]
“Oleanna”: 100% Sweet
SWEET “Oleanna” still fills me with reservations — artistic as well as political. Yes, the debate is tendentiously rigged. But you can’t argue with a play that retains the power to get theatergoers arguing with each other as they head home. Charles McNulty – LA Times BITTERSWEET The only line of defense against this play’s [...]