Dany Margolies – Arts In LA This play is more about storytelling than story. It is about the way we make theater and observe theater. It is about words and how they are enhanced by a theatrical production. And yet, as the title character tells us in a surprisingly emotion-stirring moment at the play’s end, … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA This Matthew Lopez play would have made a fascinating two-hander. But the playwright added a third character and ratcheted up the intrigue, conflict, and shaping, making it an even more fascinating play. Like a fine puppeteer, director Howard Teichman pulls strings to alter the balance among the characters, adding … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA Let’s say the police are after you, but you’re innocent, and they’re actually not police but enemy spies, and your only means of escape is to jump out of a window. But you’re actually an actor, and your window is a picture frame, and your show is filled with … Read more
Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly A quartet of Big Idea plays has opened over the past two weeks, exploring the intersections of art, psychology and history. Sarah Ruhl’s Passion Play, co-presented by the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble and Evidence Room, has been around since at least 2005, with productions at Arena Stage in Washington, Chicago’s … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA At its start, this Octavio Solis play is not easy to watch. The couple at its center is a mess: drugged, abused, irresponsible. The storytelling is unhelpful, as the characters seem not to know who they are. Then, too, the production, directed by Robert Castro, taxes the eyes if … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA For those who like protracted-lie farces, British playwright Ray Cooney is a master, and this one is a classic. In it, an average Joe weaves a tangled web, which gets unwound some two hours later, minus the intermission. The action is set in 1982 London, where Henry Perkins (Tom … Read more
Deborah Klugman – ArtsBeatLA What do Thomas Jefferson, Charles Dickens and Leo Tolstoy have in common? In Scott Carter’s intellectually upscale comedy, all three are smug anthropomorphic spirits, trapped in a single chamber purgatory and forced to communicate despite their disdain for any view contradicting their own. Read more… Dany Margolies – Arts In LA History’s … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA The audience plays an active part in Becky’s New Car, and Becky is very much the hostess of this evening of theater. She greets us immediately, hospitably offers a beverage, and shows us around her world. She also asks for our help, but if her ethics are not our … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA Stagecraft and education combine here, as two performers from Scotland’s Visible Fictions theater company reenact the myth of the orphaned ancient Greek prince and the brave sailors who went with him to the ends of the Earth, looking to bring their nation peace, justice, freedom, and, Jason hopes, fun. … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA Dawn King’s play is set in Britain, in the near future. As with all good literature, it’s meant to represent the here and now. So when an inspector arrives at a struggling farm, interrogating the farmers too inappropriately and searching the home too thoroughly, a certain Notorious Safety Administration … Read more