Les Spindle – Edge on the net In a world so enamored with the modern-day equivalent of Barnum and Bailey-namely the dazzling extravaganzas offered by Cirque de Soleil-Lorenzo Pisoni might be referred to as the little clown who could.Read more… Pauline Adamek – LA Weekly As the title indicates, Humor Abuse is no lighthearted evening … Read more
Bob Verini – ArtsInLA For R II, Jessica Kubzansky’s adaptation currently being performed at the Theater @ Boston Court, Shakespeare’s Richard II has lost not just six letters from its title but also about 25 percent of its text and upwards of 90 percent of the ensemble usually assembled to perform it. In R II, John Sloan portrays the … Read more
Pauline Adamek – ArtsBeatLA Almost immediately after the central protagonist Maggie (Jennifer Pollono) bustles onto the stage, pretty soon she’s letting fly a string of profanity. We are abruptly dropped into playwright John Pollono’s milieu, inhabited by working class New Hampshire types who are struggling to make ends meet.Read more… Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly … Read more
Neal Weaver – LA Weekly Breaking up is hard to do, particularly if you’re embedded in a 20-year marriage. That’s the not terribly surprising message of Paul Coates’ play, illustrated by three couples: one straight (Kelly Coffield Park and playwright Coates), one gay (David Youse and William Franklin Barker) and one lesbian (Ferrell Marshall and … Read more
Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly As a storyteller, Joyce Carol Oates frequently traverses aberrant corridors of the human psyche. That’s readily apparent in this 1990 (since updated to 2003) one-act, about a middle-aged couple, Frank and Emily Gulick (Alan Blumenfeld and Katherine James), whose son has been accused of the brutal rape and murder of … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA Max and Wynn have bought a beautiful house in the country. They’ve invited Roger and Abby for a weekend visit. The two women are best friends. Their husbands, however, gloomily predict it’s going to be a long weekend. As it turns out, in this Norm Foster play, the consequences … Read more
Bob Verini – ArtsInLA Time heals everything, so the song goes, and a quick overview of history reveals there’s no calamity so atrocious that the passage of time won’t soften its impact. Shed any tears over the massacre of the Huguenots lately? How about the victims of the Children’s Crusade? Fortunately, art often comes forward … Read more
Bob Verini – ArtsInLA The Burnt Part Boys, now at the Third Street Theater in a co-production with West Coast Ensemble Theater, is an energetic hoot-’n’-hollerin’ musical play that would benefit from a little less hoot-’n’-hollerin’ and a little more straight talk. Read more… David C. Nichols – LA Times If “Floyd Collins” and “Stand By … Read more
David C. Nichols – LA Times A star is reborn in “Funny Girl,” now marching its band out in Fullerton (and soon after, Redondo Beach). This solid 3D Theatricals revival of the classic 1964 musical generally engrosses, and triumphs in lead Nicole Parker. Shining in every detail, Parker’s nuanced, platinum-voiced Fanny Brice withstands the Streisand … Read more
Mayank Keshaviak – LA Weekly The theme of fathers and sons occupies well-trodden ground in the theater, but Joe Orrach’s exploration of his relationship with his Puerto Rican father is unique in its presentation. Having been a professional boxer and tap dancer, Mr. Orrach is hardly an average Joe, and he and co-writer Lizbeth Hasse … Read more