All Entries Tagged With: "la stage watch"
TOPDOG/UNDERDOG (FREMONT PRODUCTION): 100% – Sweet
BITTERSWEET As Booth, Rider has an appealing intensity that bounces nicely off of Jed Reynolds’ low-key Lincoln. James Reynolds’ simple staging is clear and clean, and the young actors own the play’s many comic moments. They have more difficulty mining the complexity of the material—reaching the depths it demands—and at times handling the heightened language. [...]
A WITHER’S TALE: 91% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET A Withers Tale is a nice change of pace for the Troubadour Company but as they are so cosmically gifted at side-splitting silly stuff, let’s hope that their next production is more seriously funny. Lynne Bronstein – Santa Monica Mirror SWEET The somber saga builds to Walker’s showstopping rendition of “Ain’t No Sunshine,” enhanced [...]
TOPDOG/UNDERDOG (LILLIAN PRODUCTION): 71% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET In an intimate space re-creating the size of the original off Broadway production, Martin Papazian’s direction doesn’t allow for a moment’s respite in the escalating chaos of jealousy and confusion. The ritualized partitioning of the room and the relationship between the two figures — one a former card shark haunted by death, the other [...]
Downer Don Still Arm Wrestling with the LA Times
Don Shirley continues to keep the LA Times on its toes in his latest offering What’ll the Times Think of Next?. His main beef here has become a continuous crusade for Don: Where’s the love for the mid-size theatres in Los Angeles? It’s a good question. The Times did a story earlier in the year [...]
Downer Don Continues to Turn the Screws on the Times’ Lack of Local Coverage
Where the McNulty/Morris “dialogue” in the Los Angeles Times was a veritable love-fest, Don Shirley keeps the pressure on the Los Angeles Times’ lack of theatre coverage in its own back yard. Especially of the Shakespearian variety. Check out his wee article over at LA Stage Watch here. This is my favorite snippet: So apparently [...]
JUST 45 MINUTES FROM BROADWAY (Extended Run): 60% – Sweet
SWEET Start with quite possibly the most gorgeous set ever designed for a 99-seat theater production, add to that an intelligent, witty script which reads like a 21st Century version of Kaufman and Ferber’s The Royal Family, cast it with some of L.A.’s finest stage and screen talent—and the result is Henry Jaglom’s Just 45 [...]
FABRIC: 100% – Sweet
SWEET A strong ensemble effort, with some stellar performances in the way of multiple roles. Feodor Chin’s military clad Thai politician with distinct and despicable mannerisms and a depth of emotion from Jolene Sarah Kwang-Ai Kim (Jaidee), Jully Lee(Lampha) and Jennifer Chang (Rotchana). Within Mr. Ong’s story are moral issues of how we treat people [...]
BECKY’S NEW CAR: 100% – Sweet
SWEET The play’s genesis is worthy of some note: The work was a personal commission by a Seattle arts patron as a gift for his wife. As such, the material occasionally tries a little too hard to please, with a narrative that occasionally emulates the mood of 1930s screwball comedies — a style that is [...]
PROCREATION: 33% – Bitter – UPDATED
BITTER My theater companion said afterward that he kept waiting for the large cast to break out into a musical number. I was just hoping that the humor would kick into a higher gear. But whatever the expectation, “Procreation” fails to deliver. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET Tanner’s satire of behaviors roasts not so [...]
Don Shirley Calls out LA Times for its Lack of Theatre Coverage
Rightfully so. Downer Don, in his excellent article INCREDIBLE SHRINKING COVERAGE, SUMMER SHAKESPEARE SHIFTS over at LA Stage Watch, is concentrating mostly on the short shrift that the mid-size theatres are getting lately. And amazingly he gives us some props over here at the Lemon! Kinda. More on that in a second. But check out this [...]
Downer Don and his Merry Band of Fringsters
Check out Don Shirley’s LA Stage Watch re-cap of his experience at the Hollywood Fringe Festival here. But even more interesting, check out the comments after the article. Sizzle. Don took some heat at the Critic’s Panel cuz he didn’t get on the Happy Bus. Here’s some of his reasoning: Yet too often we hear [...]
OPUS: 80% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET Levy and his accomplished cast almost manage to sell Hollinger’s unnecessary excursions into overwrought soap, particularly in the final scene. It’s the smaller moments that compel, creating an intimacy that make “Opus” a stylish midsummer date night. Charlotte Stoudt – LA Times SWEET The world of classical chamber music easily evokes images of grace [...]
YELLOW: 100% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET The seriousness bubbling under all of Del Shores’ campy southern Gothic farces takes center stage in his latest play “Yellow,” as personal catastrophe pulls a family out of its complacency. Shores might’ve been wiser to hand off helming chores to someone inclined to trim the fat and steer clear of bathos. Its roughness and [...]
FOUR PLACES: 100% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET The manner in which Drake tells this story — blending humor and stark ugliness, while exploring themes of sibling rivalry, marital infidelity and even euthanasia — is thoroughly engaging and held in sharp balance by director Robin Larsen. The characters are fully fleshed out, both in the writing and the performances, as disturbing for [...]
SUPERNOVA: 100% – Sweet
SWEET Director Lindsay Allbaugh’s fantastic ensemble sells us on each individual scene, even if the play as a whole doesn’t add up to more then some well-acted catharses. Kelly Elizabeth and Joe Wiebe join in for the furious climax as two fellow high schoolers who bear witness to what even the adamantly optimistic Mabel admits [...]
1951-2006: 100% – Sweet
SWEET The nicely paced love story and history lesson dovetail in Freed’s sharp dialogue, though his staging overindulges cleverness. As the pair trade quotes from Shakespeare, Beckett and pop culture, they often seem to be performing for each other rather than conversing. There’s more poignant, natural chemistry in Meg’s occasional scenes with her other lover [...]
Critique of the Week
THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO Review by Don Shirley – LA Stage Watch But class distinctions just aren’t what they used to be, as indicated by Frederique Michel’s and Charles Duncombe’s new adaptation of The Marriage of Figaro, at City Garage. Class in the 18th century was much more rigorously defined than it was in the [...]
DEMENTIA: 100% – Sweet
SWEET José Luis Valenzuela’s production for the Latino Theater Company feels like a defiant affirmation, despite the imminence of death. On another level, it works as a metaphor for the Latino Theater’s presence itself at LATC. Despite the crippling blows of the economy that have prevented the company from fully activating the facility as intended, [...]
FULL DISCLOSURE: 33% – Bitter
BITTER Ultimately the evening is an exercise in Sunny’s self-pity, and audiences may feel that they’ve been trapped in an airplane with a seatmate who won’t stop talking about her problems, all of which so obviously stem from her self-absorption, and who fails to recognize how her poor judgment and faulty ethics have been the [...]
HOW THE OTHER HALF LOVES: 78% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET I try never to miss either an Ayckbourn farce or an ICT production or anything directed by Todd Nielsen. When the three intersect, as in How The Other Half Loves, I know I will be treated to an evening of laughter and fun. My advice to you: Sit back, relax, and enjoy the mayhem. [...]
The Song and Dance of Tony V and the Happy Raigosa’s
Check out Don Shirley’s razor sharp dissection of Tony V’s latest fiasco over at LA Stage Watch. We touched on it here at the Lemon, but Don takes it up a notch, basically accusing Tony V of playing favorites and warning of the dangerous precedent he could be setting. Check out this de-boning of one [...]
BENGAL TIGER AT THE BAGHDAD ZOO (TAPER REVIVAL): 100% – Sweet
SWEET Derek McLane’s Middle Eastern sets are as spare as they are atmospherically rich. The scenic design may have worked better on a more compact stage, but the magical sense that anything can occur has been vitally left intact. David Lander’s pockets of lighting certainly enhance this quality, as do David Zinn’s simple yet transformative [...]
SICK: 100% – Sweet
SWEET Playwright Erik Patterson admits to personal hypochondria in the program notes for this resplendently twisted effort—yet another in his string of hilariously wicked and glaringly contemporary plays gloriously sending up the communal sickness that affects us all as our country becomes progressively more immune to wellness. Sandra Burns’ clever design uses every corner and [...]
THE MARRIAGE OF FIGARO: 50% – Bitter – UPDATED
BITTERSWEET This new translation, by director Frederique Michel and Charles Duncombe, is serviceable and fairly traditional. It is also a tad overlong, and a bit of discreet editing would not be amiss. Michel has pitched her production as broad farce, with sometimes-obtrusive stylized movement, which can be distracting. Playing artificial comedy artificially seems like overkill. [...]
SEE WHAT I WANNA SEE: 80% Sweet – UPDATED
BITTER You might wanna see something else. Cynthia Citron – LA Examiner SWEET Exciting, imaginative, gripping, and musically adventurous—See What I Wanna See is all this and more. With Henning at the helm and a cast and band more than up to the task, this is innovative, modern musical theater at its best. Steven Stanley [...]
More Pulitzer Drama: “The awards are supposedly for the script, not the productions”
Says Don Shirley over at LA Stage Watch. And he makes a strong case that the Pulitzer Board may not have been following that Shirley credo. Check it: What’s disturbing is the report in the New York Times that at least several board members – “a lot of them,” according to one unattributed Times source [...]
THE ARSONISTS: 100% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET The performances, as well as the flames, crackle in Ron Sossi’s slyly sardonic staging — performances that combine perfect comic timing with dense, rich personalities. Weisser’s nervous (and increasingly delusional) Biedermann and Hogan’s uptight wife are hilarious — but the true scene-stealers are Achorn’s rubber-faced, diabolical Schmitz and Bottitta’s ghoulish Eisenring, who are simultaneously [...]
THE LANGUAGE ARCHIVE: 88% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET Director Mark Brokaw, an experienced hand with adventurous American playwrights (he’s had an especially fruitful history with Paula Vogel and Craig Lucas), stages the whimsy in an exaggerated manner that doesn’t diminish the work’s underlying streak of tragicomic tenderness. If the humor at times seems strained, that’s probably because Cho is better at imagining [...]
LASCIVIOUS SOMETHING: 91% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET Callaghan finds the madness in each of her characters. It’s not apparent but it’s there, as it is in each of us. This gives the play its strength, as each of the characters is strong, too, and the three of them stubbornly fight to defend their turf. August is weak and unlikeable and, as [...]
THE SECOND CITY: CAN YOU BE MORE PACIFIC?: 100% Sweet
SWEET To celebrate 50 years of renowned comedy, Chicago’s Second City has dispatched a talented troupe of seven to the Laguna Playhouse in order to transform Orange County tropes into a satirical revue entitled “Can You Be More Pacific?” Though overlong and somewhat toothless, the show is a sure mirth-maker for natives of all ages [...]