INCOGNITO at Son of Semele Ensemble

Rob Stevens – Haines His Way When Albert Einstein died of a brain aneurysm at Princeton Hospital in 1955, the pathologist who performed the autopsy ended up stealing Einstein’s brain. The physicist had left specific instructions for his remains to be cremated, and they were, except for his eyes and his brain. Dr. Thomas Harvey eventually … Read more

BLACK SUPER HERO MAGIC MAMA at the Geffen Playhouse

Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw It’s hard to imagine a more painful life event than the death of a child — especially when that child is shot by police and the perpetrator goes free. That almost unbearable grief that a mother must feel is creatively addressed in Black Super Hero Magic Mama, Inda Craig-Galván’s latest play….Read more… … Read more

HAMLET at the New American Theatre

Lovell Estell III — Stage Raw Shakespeare’s best plays are a rich source of complex, conflicted characters and readily lend themselves to creative, critical exploration or inspired adaptations. Of course, there are always risks when treading the path of the unconventional, but there are also creative successes. Director Matthew Leavitt’s updated take on the Bard’s … Read more

THE WOLVES – ECHO THEATER COMPANY at Atwater Village Theatre

Erin Conley – On Stage & Screen “We are the Wolves. We are the Wolves,” a group of teenage girls chants, each repetition of the phrase growing in both volume and urgency. The Wolves are a high school indoor soccer team, and the subject of Sarah DeLappe’s play of the same name currently in its … Read more

LACKAWANNA BLUES at the Mark Taper Forum

Erin Conley – On Stage & Screen Lackawanna Blues, Ruben Santiago-Hudson’s autobiographical solo show, has been on quite a journey since it first premiered at the Public Theater in New York in 2001. After that first production, which won a special citation Obie Award, it played at multiple regional theaters across the United States before being … Read more

THE GLASS MENAGERIE at A Noise Within

Dany Margolies – The Daily News If you had a perfectly happy childhood with ideal parents, good for you. Tennessee Williams did not, and this led to some of literature’s most-affecting, most-enduring plays. Many in his audiences didn’t, either, and that’s why we keep coming back to his classics, particularly “The Glass Menagerie.” Indeed, its … Read more

PURE NATIVE at the Autry Museum of the American West

Terry Morgan  –  Stage Raw  Theatrically, Los Angeles is blessed in many ways, and one of them is the presence of Native Voices at the Autry, the only Equity theatre company devoted exclusively to developing and producing new works from Native American, Alaska Native and First Nations playwrights. Their shows are often specific and insightful … Read more

TUESDAYS WITH MORRIE at the Sierra Madre Playhouse

Frances Baum Nicholson –The Stage Struck Review In Mitch Albom’s memoir “Tuesdays with Morrie: an old man, a young man, and life’s greatest lesson,” Albom details his mid-life reconnection with a favorite Brandeis sociology professor, Morrie Schwartz. Now running through March 31