Tamara Summers, Dakin Matthews, Jefferson Mays, and Michael McKean
Photo by Michael Lamont
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA
Before you hear this production described as “sitcomish,” know it was written by Antony Jay and Jonathan Lynn, the writers of the 1980s British television series Yes Minister and then Yes, Prime Minister. And if the humor of those series was good enough to keep the Brits giggling, it’s good enough for this reviewer.
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Bob Verini – ArtsInLA
The first extended run of the tuner A Man of No Importance is a matter of some importance, as it inaugurates—in this era of folding companies and theaters in transit—a new enterprise: the Good People Theater Company, under the direction of the gifted veteran stager-choreographer Janet Miller. Taking on the countervailing winds (money drying up, expenses mounting, uninterest in live performance growing) is a brave and noble thing, and one wishes Miller and company well.
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Les Spindle – Frontiers L.A.
The intimate 2002 musical, A Man of No Importance—an Outer Critics Circle Award winner and Lucille Lortel nominee—proves to be an astute choice for the debut offering of the Good People Theatre Company. The new organization’s Producing Artistic Director Janet Miller produces, directs, and provides musical staging for a memorable production of this subtly profound musical.
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Sharon Perlmutter - Talkin’ Broadway
To tell you the honest truth, I’ve always loved A Man of No Importance, and wished this chamber musical had more success than it did. The tale of Alfie Byrne, a bus conductor in 1964 Dublin, desperately hiding his homosexual feelings from everyone and filling the void in his lfie with an amateur theatrical company at his local church, is a sweet and deeply moving one. Read more
Pauline Adamek – ArtsBeatLA
It’s not every day you get to be heavyweight champion of the world—for a professional sportsman it’s a once in a lifetime event, at least the first time is… In 1964, at the tender age of 22, boxing legend Cassius Clay (soon thereafter known as Muhammad Ali) ascended to the pinnacle of his chosen sport.
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Photo by John Flynn
David C. Nichols – LA Times
The pull of history and considerable topicality sells “One Night in Miami…” at Rogue Machine. Although this well appointed dramedy about what might have gone down in the Hampton House hotel the night that Cassius Clay became world heavyweight champion slightly overdoes the 20/20 hindsight, that doesn’t stop it from grabbing our imaginations.
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Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly
Although rooted in a historic event, Kemp Powers’ period piece about the meeting of Sam Cooke, Jim Brown, Malcolm X and Cassius Clay is less about these gentlemen per se than it is about the struggle of African-American men in general to deal with the ubiquitous racism that continually challenges their manhood.
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Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly
Kemp Powers’ One Night in Miami takes a semi-biographical, satirical look at idealists and the toll taken by their ideals when they enter the body politic. Here, that body is represented by a Miami motel room in 1964, after upstart 22-year-old boxer Cassius Clay (Matt Jones) has just won the heavyweight title from Sonny Liston.
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Les Spindle – Frontiers L.A.
A hotel room meeting among world-heavyweight boxing champ Cassius Clay, the late Islamic civil rights leader Malcolm X, football superstar Jim Brown and the late rock singer-songwriter-producer Sam Cooke sounds like it might have been a cataclysmic clash of titans—or at least a hell of an evening.
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Now running through September 15.
Shirle Gottlieb for the Gazette Newspapers
Unless you’ve been lost in the desert for the last five decades, you’ve undoubtedly heard of “Little Shop of Horrors.” Originally produced circa 1960 by the infamous Roger Corman, this black-and-white film has become a cult classic that is still going strong.
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Photo by Jonathan Lewis
Melinda Schupman – ArtsInLA
Sarah Ruhl’s slightly daffy but contemplative play takes a shot at our cell phone culture while examining human connections and the nature of love. Jean (Alina Phelan) is sitting in a cafe, ostensibly working on something, when a cell phone at the next table rings over and over, interrupting her concentration. Finally, she rises to encourage the man at the table to answer it. The problem is, he’s dead, and, in Ruhl’s world, a phone demands to be answered.
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Photo by Suzanne Mapes
Shirle Gottlieb – Gazette Newspapers
International City Theatre opened “Dead Man’s Cell Phone” last Friday, and it’s a winner across the board. Written by Sarah Ruhl in 2007, it walked away with the Helen Hayes Award for the Best New Play, and with Richard Isreal’s astute direction, it’s easy to see why.
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Mayank Keshaviak – LA Weekly
Bottom is the tops in New American Theatre’s take on the classic tale of love and mischief, here set in 1930s Greece. Director and company founder Jack Stehlin brings energy and cheeky wit to the character of Nick Bottom by fully exploring the hills and valleys of Shakespeare’s linguistic landscape.
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Robert Cicchini and Vanessa Waters. Photo by Jeannine Wisnosky Stehlin
Chaz Photographics
Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly
Writer-performer Jozanne Marie’s intense solo show encompasses the wrongs done to three generations of women — her grandmother, her mother and herself — but its primary motif is her struggle for a relationship with her sexually abusive father, whose approval she sought despite his pernicious assaults. Read more…
Photo by Ed Krieger
Les Spindle – LA Stage Times
Dámaso Rodriguez, who has served as co-founding artistic director for LA’s ever-adventurous Furious Theatre Company since its origin in 2002, is helming his last LA production before he relocates to Portland, Oregon. He recently began his new job as artistic director for that city’s distinguished professional group, Artists Repertory Theatre.
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SLEEPLESS IN SEATTLE – Music by Ben Toth, lyrics by Sam Forman.
Hoyt Hilsman – Huffington Post
After a long journey from the screen to the musical stage – which included numerous comings-and-goings of composer/lyricist teams – the Sleepless in Seattle musical has arrived at the Pasadena Playhouse. It is a huge challenge to adapt an iconic film that was so closely identified with its two stars – Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan. But this version has largely succeeded by dint of the talented musical team of composer Ben Toth and lyricist Sam Forman, as well as a gifted trio of lead actors – Tim Martin Gleason, Chandra Lee Schwartz and Joe West.
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Dany Margolies – ArtsInLA
If you’ve ever had nothing else to think about and thus spent a second or two wondering if the 1993 film Sleepless in Seattle depended on Tom Hanks and Meg Ryan for its charm, this world premiere musicalized version of it provides your answer. Yes, it needed them for its success. Even that pair, however, couldn’t save this stage rendition.
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THE SCOTTSBORO BOYS – music and lyrics by John Kander and Fred Ebb, book by David Thompson
Les Spindle – Edge Los Angeles
The 2010 musical “The Scottsboro Boys” now in its L.A. premiere, is among the most innovative and thrilling shows to have graced Broadway in recent years, justifiably earning 12 Tony nominations. Yet it lost all of those Tony bids in a year when “The Book of Mormon” proved to be an undefeatable juggernaut.
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Photo by Craig Schwartz
Dany Margolies – ArtsInLA
This production opens with a woman sitting on a bus bench, holding a pastry box. The aroma from the box seems to give her a Proustian memory. Suddenly, a troupe charges through Ahmanson Theatre, heads for the stage, and begins to tell the tale of the Scottsboro boys. The story of the real-life pretense at justice for nine Southern black teens in the 1930s unfolds, but not in documentary form.
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