All Entries Tagged With: "laura hitchcock"
THE LIEUTENANT OF INISHMORE: 100% – Sweet
SWEET This kind of theatrical blood sport won’t be for everyone. (Pity the crew assigned to clean up the mess after each performance.) But if a flincher like me found himself tittering with open eyes, maybe you’ll be tickled by McDonagh’s malign mirth as well. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET Playwright Martin McDonagh taps [...]
KING LEAR (ANTAEUS PRODUCTION): 100% – Sweet
SWEET The Matthews team, featuring Morlan Higgins’ stalwart Kent, Kirsten Potter’s villainous Goneril, Francia DiMase’s vindictive Regan and Drew Doyle’s sly Oswald, ultimately had a larger intellectual impact on me — the play administering a lesson on the dangers of dividing language from truth. The Groener crew, with Allegra Fulton’s sinister Goneril and Jen Dede’s [...]
SOUTH PACIFIC: 100% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET But this “South Pacific” is to be treasured above all for Cusack, whose interpretation of her character’s embarrassment of Rodgers & Hammerstein riches is so stunningly suffused with heart that it was as if I were hearing the songs for the first time. Nellie vainly tries to “wash that man right outta” her hair, [...]
THE CLEAN HOUSE: 50% – Bittersweet – UPDATED
BITTER One cannot blame the actors entirely for their sterile performances, enslaved as they are by Stefan Kruck’s anemic and unimaginative direction. But, then again, a theater does not put a play like The Clean House on its season’s schedule out of a passionate commitment to art, but rather out of an impassionate commitment to [...]
LOVE, LOSS, AND WHAT I WORE: 90% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET Sullivan has the cast occasionally act out bits of dialogue, which adds a sense of theatricality to the reading, and breaking up “Gingy’s Story” adds cohesion to the evening. Even the weakest stories have interesting elements, and performed by this cast, they are engaging and entertaining. Jeff Favre – Backstage SWEET “What I Wore” [...]
ALFRED HITCHCOCK’S THE 39 STEPS: 85% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET Tony Award nominated Director Maria Aitken has successfully transplanted the brilliance of the Broadway production to the incarnation currently running at the Ahmanson Theater in downtown Los Angeles. The production utilizes a sparse collection of set pieces and then challenges the imagination to engage in the world created by the quartet’s tireless Pantomime, a [...]
NIGHTMARE ALLEY: 27% – Bitter – UPDATED
BITTER Although Jonathan Brielle does a neat job of compressing the action into two hours onstage, he fails to capitalize on the terrible implications of falling from grace into a hell beyond the reaches of spirituality or religion, and neither his lyrics nor music is memorable. Laurence Vittes – Hollywood Reporter BITTER But mystery and [...]
GETTING FRANKIE MARRIED – AND AFTERWARDS: 75% – Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET In L.A., Foote’s Lone Star State irregulars can seem close to parody, which makes underplaying essential. Some of the supporting cast in Scott Paulin’s solid production push too hard, working against the fine performances by leads Lacy and Demson. But by the second act, the play finds its groove, and James Spencer’s cheerful living [...]
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 [...]
LIBERTY INN: THE MUSICAL: 100% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET The impeccable set is changed by Faber and the Captain’s Aide (Mark Doerr) in choreographed perfection. Dean Cameron, who designed the set, also did the costumes, particularly outdoing himself in the Revolutionary War uniforms. Ryback plays his own score with dashing brilliance, including an overture and scintillating arpeggios. May and Snow have outstanding voices, [...]
THE BALLAD OF EMMETT TILL: 89% Sweet – UPDATED
BITTERSWEET The problem may be one of taste, but it ties directly back to the compulsion to spill the guts theatrically. Finney’s staging of the abduction starts brilliantly, with a pair of headlights appearing behind a translucent scrim. The production then devolves into a graphic, extended and emotionally exploitative depiction of the fatal beating – [...]
THE SUBJECT WAS ROSES: 70% Sweet – UPDATED
BITTERSWEET All right, given this impressive pedigree, what’s my beef? Well, beyond the play’s passé style, I have trouble with the workmanlike use of the symbolic roses that inspire the title and even more with scenes that sometimes seem like acting workshop exercises. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET Yet traditional dramatic styles needn’t be [...]
SIDHE: 83% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET Full of dark turns, Noble’s story is so packed with tension and conflict that at times it’s hard to believe only four characters are taking part. Not every twist is credible, even given the play’s supernatural standards. And sometimes the heavy Irish brogue makes essential details difficult to grasp. These qualifications notwithstanding, the production [...]
COUSIN BETTE: 100% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET At least one key performance is over laden with shtick, and some fine-tuning of others is in order. Still, Doukas is terrific, delivering a consummate performance that arouses, for her long-suffering deceitful character , pity, disdain — and admiration. Tony Amendola’s licentious merchant is also top-notch. And alongside the story’s bathos is its salient [...]
WRECKS: 100% Sweet – UPDATED
SWEET Yet, thanks to Harris’ Herculean acting feat, the contrived ending almost becomes beside the point. Harris’ portrayal of Edward Carr, a grieving middle-aged Midwestern man at a funeral parlor, sorting through complex feelings following his wife’s death, works on basic human levels that stand apart from the tacked-on story twist. Never mind that the [...]
MARY POPPINS: 100% Sweet
SWEET Eyre’s direction is spot-on and he has managed to hold onto some of the stories grit. The dances by Bourne are brilliant. The magical set and set pieces (statues that come to life and dance), a kitchen disaster that is all put back together in a flash, are just two of the many wonderful [...]
EQUIVOCATION: 100% Sweet
BITTERSWEET Bottom Line: An original and often witty play that says less than it wants to say in more words than it needs to use. Jay Reiner – Hollywood Reporter BITTERSWEET Cain should be congratulated for the breathtaking boldness of his endeavor here. But rather than equivocate myself, let me say that more playwriting discipline [...]
“Come Back, Little Horny”: 100% Bittersweet
SWEET Director Martha Demson’s character-driven production artfully emphasizes the subtext underlying the family’s brittle relationship. Not a line is spoken that doesn’t seep with layers of corrosive back story. Although the pacing occasionally falters — and the piece frankly could use some cutting, particularly during the final third — the writing is smartly full of [...]
“Dirty Dancing”: 67% Sweet
BITTERSWEET We’re all here to see Baby come into her own, but it sure takes a while. The producers could easily cut 20 minutes off the evening without losing the heart of the story. As is, the endless parade of camp activities and general stage busyness takes the air out of a storyline ultimately intimate [...]
“Courting Vampires”: 50% Bittersweet – UPDATE
BITTERSWEET Unfortunately, the whole doesn’t end up equaling the sum of its parts, leaving the audience with numerous great moments that don’t fuse into a powerful or coherent story. Mayank Keshaviah – LA Weekly BITTERSWEET Laura Schellhardt’s play works best when it pursues a comic vein. Nina’s attempts to teach Rill the art of seduction [...]