Nora by Ingmar Bergman. David C. Nichols – Backstage It’s seldom that a revision of a classic carries the riveting punch of Nora, now getting its overdue Los Angeles debut at Pacific Resident Theatre. This stark black-box take on Ingmar Bergman’s searing 1981 reduction of Henrik Ibsen’s immortal A Doll’s…
The Muesli Belt by Jimmy Murphy. Dany Margolies – ArtsInLA.com This U.S. premiere of an Irish import is a gentle little script that probably would speak to Dubliners of the late 1990s. But playwright Jimmy Murphy offers not much to Angelenos of the new…
Their Eyes Saw Rain by West Liang. Pauline Adamek – LA Weekly Playwright West Liang also stars in his astonishingly intense ensemble drama, set in a fictitious small country town. The specter of tragedy hangs over the townspeople of Castle, emblematized by an ever-present…
Finding Barb by Barbara Heller. Pauline Adamek – LA Weekly Barbara Heller has taken her personal quest for her spiritual path and turned it into an earnest and sweet musical. The show’s pretty songs – beautifully sung – are composed by Avi Avliav who performs…
Theatre in the Dark by various playwrights. Dany Margolies – ArtsInLA.com Some ideas don’t even sound good on paper. This one, however, turns out to be a thoroughly entertaining and relatively informative one. Ron Sossi’sbrainchild lets audiences sit in absolute pitch darkness, experiencing…
How to Write a New Book for the Bible by Bill Cain. Melinda Schupmann – ArtsInLA.com Narrator Bill (Tyler Pierce) enters with a notebook in hand and announces: “First rule of writing? Write what you know. If writers stuck to it, there…
Death of a Salesgirl by Patricia Scanlon. Dany Margolies – ArtsInLA.com First to strike the attentive audience member upon entering the theater here is John Zalewski’s sound design. It seems to consist of effervescent electronic dots and anchoring bass-note dashes. A haunting, initially disquieting,…
42nd Street by Mark Bramble, Michael Stewart, Harry Warren and Al Dubin. David C. Nicols – L.A. Times Audiences craving unbridled pizazz should race to 42nd Streetat the Carpenter Center in Long Beach. Musical Theatre West opens its 60th season with the indestructible backstager, and scores a toe-tapping triumph. Read…
KONG: A Goddamn Thirty-Foot Gorilla by Adam Hahn. Pauline Adamek – LA Weekly Adam Hahn’s spoofy homage to King Kong, the 1933 creature feature about a colossal gorilla that is captured and runs amok in New York City, is an ambitious undertaking. Just…
Orestes 3.0: Inferno by Charles Mee. Dany Margolies – ArtsInLA.com Apollo, god of healing and truth, pops onstage for a chat with the audience. He is clad in Bermuda shorts and sunglasses, a party boy. Does his makeover shake our core beliefs?…