Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw
In Bernardo Cubría’s The Play You Want, directed by Michael John Garcés, Bernardo (Peter Pasco), the central character, is a Mexican-American playwright who writes experimental plays about clowns, whom he views as universal symbols of humanity. Little would please Bernardo more than to be acclaimed as the new Latino Samuel Beckett. But there’s a problem… Read more…
Now running through April 17
(Photo by Brian M. Cole)
Neal Weaver – Stage Raw
Sarah (Paris Perrault) and her boyfriend Sam (Philip Orazio) are enjoying a quiet Christmas Eve at home when they are interrupted by an imperious knocking at the door. The visitor is Nate (Josh Zuckerman), Sarah’s friend since childhood and perhaps her former lover.
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way
The Road Theatre Company is currently presenting the West Coast Premiere of playwright Anna Ziegler’s A Delicate Ship at their space on Magnolia Blvd. in North Hollywood. It’s a delicate memory play with three thirty-something characters who constantly break the fourth wall….
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Now running through March 11
Photo by Brian Cole
Terry Morgan - Stage Raw
To paraphrase a theater maxim of Edmund Kean’s, “Tragedy is easy; comedy is hard.” It’s an assertion that’s proved true time and again. Harder still, perhaps, is successfully combining these two genres into one play, as the disappointing Big Night at the Douglas proved a couple of weeks back.
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Rob Stevens – Haines His Way
Playwright Sharr White and actress Taylor Gilbert proved to be a winning pair in The Road Theatre Company’s 2015 production of The Other Place. They have joined together again for The Road’s current World Premiere of the playwright’s Stupid Kid. Gilbert’s Gigi in the current play is worlds apart from the dementia plagued Juliana of Cape Cod in the previous play. Read more…
Now running through November 11
Photo by Michele Young)
Terry Morgan - Stage Raw
With its plot involving the fate of a foreign refugee seeking a new life in America, Jeff Augustin’s Little Children Dream of God couldn’t be timelier. It gets a solid production from the Road Theatre Company in this West Coast premiere and is full of strong performances, but something curiously flat in the main storyline keeps it from attaining its full potential. Read more…
Now running through April 15
Photo by Ed Krieger
Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw
In the opening scene of Will Arbery’s dark, roundabout dramedy, a family lounges in the living room of their grungy Dallas domicile, munching food and watching TV. The clan consists of Cole, the dad (Dirk Etchison), and his three teenaged kids. Kay Bailey (Arielle Fodor), the serious-minded middle sibling (and, we learn, the only family member in firm touch with an external reality) inquires if they’ll be going to church. After a brief discussion, the consensus emerges as no. Read more…
Now running through April 17
Les Spindle – Frontiers L.A.
In its West Coast debut, Steven Simoncic’s 2013 portrait of urban gentrification, set in contemporary Chicago, offers intriguing ruminations on the human ramifications of the phenomenon. Read more…
Now running through April 3
Courtesy Road Theatre Company
Bob Verini - Stage Raw
Lisa Loomer writes Issue Plays. She may not set out to do so quite so baldly, but there it is. Her works tend to be identifiable, and tend to last in the memory, as copiously researched treatments of specific ongoing problems in contemporary American life. And, by the way, she tends to be the only dramatist taking up those issues, which is to her everlasting credit.Read more…
Now running through November 7.
Photo by Michelle Young
Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw
Like many plays that deal with our mortality, those about dementia can be extraordinarily affecting. They speak to a loss of self nearly as complete and devastating as our physical demise. Read more…
David C. Nichols – LA Times
The first glimmer of it comes on a Friday. They’ve flown me to St. Thomas, some private golf resort, I pretend I’m giving a lecture but really it’s another sales pitch, I used to be enthralled by my new life, but the blush has come off the rose.”
Now running through April 11.