Neal Weaver – Stage Raw
Shirl Hendryx’s play is set in an inn on a small Mediterranean island off the coast of Greece, where a group of movie-makers have gathered to prepare for a location shoot. Socially conscious American movie star Branson (Richard Chassler), who’s scheduled to head the cast, has insisted on the hiring of Brit director Paul Deckard (Jonathan Salisbury), unaware that his wife once had an affair with Deckard. Read more…
Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly
An initial impulse upon discovering a new play about Hollywood types making a movie in an exotic location is to get down on your knees and pray, “Please Lord, not another play by and about dissolute filmmakers grappling with their purpose in life.”
After a few minutes watching writer-director Shirl Hendryx’s Games on a Bombed-Out Beach at West Hollywood’s Macha Theatre, however, you’ll realize that your prayer has been answered — at least in this case. This is not just another riff on David Mamet’s dissection of the movie biz, Speed-the-Plow, nor is it a variation on Douglas Carter Beane’s facile coming-out comedy about a movie star, The Little Dog Laughed. Rather, Hendryx’s play is a smart, complex and fascinating (albeit overwritten) character study of people who are privileged enough to make movies. Read more…
Now playing through June 22.