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THE LONELY FEW at Geffen Playhouse

Lauren Patten. Photo by Jeff Lorch.
March 18, 2023Patrick Chavis – LA Theatre Bites World Premiere: The Lonely Few @ Geffen Playhouse – 8 out of 10 – Good Show! LA Theatre Bites Recommended! More…  

LA EGOISTA at Skylight Theatre

Lys Perez and Chanel Castañeda. Photo by Jenny Graham.
March 17, 2023Patrick Chavis – LA Theatre Bites West Coast Premiere: La Egoista @ Skylight Theatre – 8.2 out of 10 – Good Show! LA Theatre Bites Recommended! More…  

HAROLD AND MAUDE at Group Repertory Theatre

Clara Rodriguez and Landon Beatty. Photo by Doug Engalla.
March 17, 2023Rob Stevens – Haines His Way. GRT’s production uses projections on the back wall and on smaller screens that come and go from the wings in an attempt to open up the action. Unfortunately, they don’t add much to the show and Larry Eisenberg’s lackadaisical direction lets the production drag on. Most scenes just meander
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SNOWHITE at Santa Monica Playhouse

Photo courtesy of Santa Monica Playhouse
March 15, 2023Lara J. Altunian – Stage Raw When it comes to classic fairy tales, there’s always room for updated adaptations — particularly when it comes to introducing one with antiquated values to a new generation of audiences. Santa Monica Playhouse’s rendition of the Brothers Grimm’s Snow White spins the narrative of a helpless young girl into
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MEAN GIRLS at Segerstrom Center for the Arts

Photo by Jenny Anderson
March 13, 2023Dana Martin – Stage Raw …Mean Girls is updated from the movie in order to reflect an era of smartphones and selfies but still manages to feel dated. Even the most feared book in school, the almighty Burn Book, loses a bit of its sting. Yet — Mean Girls doesn’t talk down to its audience
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LOVE AND INFORMATION at Antaeus Theatre Company

Photo by Jenny Graham
March 9, 2023Katie Buenneke – Theatre Digest Through some unlucky combination of script, direction, cast, set design, and video design, this felt more like sitting through a scene study class than a professional play. Somehow, I hadn’t seen a play by Caryl Churchill before, but I’m in no rush to see another. Read more… Patrick Chavis –
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HAPPY BIRTHDAY MCKENNA at the Hudson Backstage Theatre

Photo by Steven Silverman
March 7, 2023Martίn Hernández – Stage Raw Playwright-director Steven Silverman’s dark yet amiable comedy offers up a multi-ethnic family whose members, despite living or being raised in racially turbulent Chicago, have no apparent animus over each other’s skin colors. No, these folks are dealing with more explosive issues common to many a kith and kin, regardless of
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Archive for March 2017

HARLEQUINO: ON TO FREEDOM at the Actors’ Gang

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Thursday, March 30th, 2017
Photo by Ashley Randall

Photo by Ashley Randall

Deborah Klugman – Capital & Main

Writer/director Tim Robbins’ Harlequino: On to Freedom at the Actors’ Gang is a messy, boisterous show that runs nearly two and a half hours before the message it wants to deliver about personal freedom and self-determination comes through simply and clearly. Along the way, however, it features first-class talent, colorful spectacle and enough historical detail about commedia dell’ arte to keep audiences entertained and involved. Read more…

Now running through May 6

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ABSINTHE at Spiegelworld

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Thursday, March 30th, 2017
(© Erik Kabik)

(© Erik Kabik)

Jonas Schwartz -  Arts In LA

Vegas’ dirty little secret has crashed into Los Angeles at L.A. Live. Absinthe, an X-rated burlesque show produced by Cirque du Soleil, defies logic as the human body proves that anything’s possible. The feats performed feel more raw and dangerous than what’s typically seen in polished Cirque shows. Read more…

Now running through May 28

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CAT’S PAW at Actors’ Co-op

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Thursday, March 30th, 2017
Photo by Lindsay Schnebley

Photo by Lindsay Schnebley

Neal Weaver  – Stage Raw

An obscure warehouse in Washington, D.C. is the headquarters of a shadowy organization that claims to be devoted to the preservation of the planet. The leader and mastermind of the group is the flamboyant and self-dramatizing Victor (Sean McHugh). Read more…

Rob Stevens – Haines His Way

Playwright William Mastrosimone is best known for his 1982 off-Broadway play Extremities about a rape victim and her vendetta of revenge against her rapist. Read more…

 

Now running through April 30

 

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CAT ON A HOT TIN ROOF at Antaeus Theatre Company

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Thursday, March 30th, 2017
Steven C. Kemp

Steven C. Kemp

Paul Birchall  – Stage Raw

Antaeus Theatre Company inaugurates their lovely new Glendale performance space with this tremendously stylish production of Tennessee Williams’ family drama. The play tells the story of a desperate woman named Maggie (the “cat” of the title) her depressed alcoholic husband Brick, and the battle for the estate of Brick’s father, the intimidating Big Daddy. Read more…

Erin Conley – On Stage & Screen

“What is the victory of a cat on a hot tin roof?” While the cat’s case is less clear, there are many victories to be found in Antaeus Theatre Company’s take on the Pulitzer Prize-winning Tennessee Williams classic Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, which marks the inaugural production at their beautiful new home….Read more…

Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly

Tennessee Williams’ 1955 potboiler Cat on a Hot Tin Roof has more than one story to tell, and in the premiere performance I saw last week, directed by Cameron Watson at Antaeus Theatre Company’s new digs in Glendale, it was Big Daddy’s story that captivated my attention.   Read more…

Rob Stevens – Haines His Way

Arthur Miller, Eugene O’Neill and Tennessee Williams are considered by most to be the three foremost American playwrights of the 20th Century. Of that trio, Mr. Williams has always been my particular favorite. Read more…

Dany Margolies – The Daily Breeze

Like an abandoned lover, the double bed at the center of Brick and Maggie’s bedroom seems to writhe and cry out in loneliness, in Antaeus Theatre Company’s production of “Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.” Read more…

Pauline Adamek – ArtsBeatLA

The Antaeus Theatre Company production of Tennessee Williams’ Pulitzer Prize-winning masterpiece Cat on a Hot Tin Roof is a handsome production and extremely well acted (this review is of The Buttered Biscuits cast), but unfortunately the play itself feels extremely dated. The characters are often one-note in their misery and the dialogue is tediously repetitive. Read more…

 

 

Now running through May 7

 

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RULES OF SECONDS at L.A.T.C.

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Thursday, March 30th, 2017
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(© Grettel Cortes Photography)

Jonas Schwartz -  TheaterMania

The words “human,” “gentlemen,” and “rules” are peppered throughout John Pollono’s Rules of Seconds, an exploration of the brutality of duels in the 19th century. There may be many rules in dueling, but there’s nothing human or gentlemanly involved in shooting each other because of a tiff.  Read more…

Erin Conley – On Stage & Screen

In this new age of Hamilton, it seems duels are on the brain. Rules of Seconds, a world premiere play written by John Pollono and presented by the Latino Theater Company and The Temblors, transports us back to the 19th century, when people literally lived and died by the rules of duels, relying on this barbaric code to settle even the most minor of disputes. Read more…

Now running through April 15

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THE CRIPPLE OF INISHMAAN at Torrance Theatre

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Thursday, March 30th, 2017
CRIPPLE

Photo by Lucy McDonald

Dany Margolies – The Daily News

Sticks and stones can break our bones, but words hurt more, in Martin McDonagh’s dark comedy “The Cripple of Inishmaan.” The sticks and stones are wielded by these all-too-human characters… Read more…

Now running through April 23

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REMOTE L.A. – Don Shirley, L.A. Observed

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Thursday, March 30th, 2017
Photo by Craig Schwartz

Photo by Craig Schwartz

Don Shirley – LA Observed

…..there should be an eager audience for “Remote L.A.,” Center Theatre Group’s engrossing headset-guided walk through parts of LA’s primary urban hub, in the vicinity of CTG’s own downtown headquarters.Read more…

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Categories : Feature article

2016 Award Show Photos

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Wednesday, March 29th, 2017

LADCC 2016 AWARD SHOW PHOTOS

The 48th Annual Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle award show was held on March 20, 2017 at the Colony Theatre in Burbank. Congratulations to all the award recipients and nominees! Here is a selection of photos from the event. Thanks very much to our photographer, Jayne Calucag! The full array of photos is available at her website, JayneCalPhotography.com, and a link to the specific page for this show is here: https://www.smugmug.com/gallery/n-cztvTQ/

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  Cast and production members from the Antaeus Theatre Company’s production of Cloud 9, the recipient of the most awards at this year’s show.

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Will North and Lewis Wilkenfeld from Cabrillo Music Theatre, the recipient of this year’s Joel Hirschhorn award for outstanding achievement in musical theatre. Jonas Schwartz, vice-president of the LADCC, stands in the middle.

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Jared A. Sayeg, recipient of this year’s Kinetic Lighting award for outstanding achievement in theatrical design.


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Bill Brochtrup and Casey Stangl, representing the Antaeus Theatre Company, a recipient of the McCulloh award for Best Revival for Cloud 9.

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The cast of Center Theatre Group’s Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom, a recipient of the McCulloh award for Best Revival.

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Deborah Puette, recipient of Best Solo Performance for Rogue Machine Theatre’s Captain of the Bible Quiz Team.

p7 Michael A. Shepperd, a recipient of Best Direction for Celebration Theatre’s The Boy From Oz.

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John Sloan, Kitty Swink, Ana Rose O’Halloran and Bill Brochtrup, representing Antaeus Theatre Company, recipient of the Margaret Harford award for sustained excellence in theatre.

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Ginna Carter, a recipient of Best Lead Performance award for Pacific Resident Theatre’s Eccentricities of a Nightingale.

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Ensemble and production members of Celebration Theatre’s The Boy from Oz, a recipient of Best Production.

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Categories : Reviews

KING LEAR at A Noise Within

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Tuesday, March 28th, 2017

South-Pasadena-Review-02-23-2017-A-Poignant-King-Lear-Stage-A-Noise-Within-003

Frances Baum Nicholson – The Daily News

It is an interesting new spin on Shakespeare’s “King Lear” to look at the downfall of this unwise ruler from the lens of Alzheimer’s disease. That is what director Julia Rodriguez-Elliott does in the production now in repertory at A Noise Within. Read more…

Now running through May 6

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AN AMERICAN IN PARIS at the Pantages Theatre

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Sunday, March 26th, 2017

aaip_tour-1130

Erin Conley – On Stage & Screen

“When you think of Paris, what comes to mind?” This question, posed somewhat oddly to the audience, sets the tone for An American in Paris, the musical adaptation of the 1951 film of the same name now playing at the Pantages Theatre in Hollywood.   Read more…

Jonas Schwartz -  Arts In LA

Most musicals either grab the audience or do not. It’s a risk to leave the audience a bit unsettled by intermission since there’s the chance people may walk out. An American in Paris takes that gamble, never giving audiences the assurance that the dangling story lines will ever gel, but by Act Two, it’s clear that the adaptation of the Oscar-winning 1951 musical is in very assured hands and quite a marvel. Read more…

Now running through April

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BURNERS at Atwater Village Theatre

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Saturday, March 25th, 2017
Photo by Mae Koo

Photo by Mae Koo

Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw

Terence Anthony’s Burners is a two-hander set in the dystopian future. The plot revolves around two people pitted against each other in a precarious war-torn world where a rebellious faction is attempting to overthrow an authoritarian state. Read more…

Now running through April 2

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THE CRUISE – Latin Theater Company at Los Angeles Theater Center

By LADCC critics · Comments (0)
Saturday, March 25th, 2017
Photo by Grettel Cortes

Photo by Grettel Cortes

Paul Birchall  – Stage Raw

A cruise ship is a metaphor for the world in microcosm.  All classes and strata of society live together within the boundaries of the little tin ship, which is surrounded by the nothingness of the great sea. Read more…

Now running through April 19

 

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