Don Shirley – Angeles Stage ‘Animal Farm’. ‘Sanctuary City’. ‘Everybody.’ ‘Oedipus.’ ‘Jagged Little Pill.’ ‘Oklahoma!’ How ya gonna keep ‘em down on the ‘Farm’, after they’ve seen…Pasadena? Yes, I’m paraphrasing the lyrics of an ancient pop song to make the point that Pasadena and nearby neighborhoods constitute the hottest cluster of locally-produced theater right now. … Read more
Jonas Schwartz-Owen – Broadway World During the opening number, the Troubadour Theatre Company, affectionately known to all as the Troubies, comment how thrilled the troupe, and the audience by extension, is to have returned to live theatre. The audience responded with glorious applause, and both the occasion and the Troubies deserve that adulation. Read more… Terry … Read more
Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw Everyone is wounded — that’s the overarching theme of The Heal, writer/director Aaron Posner’s ironical, imaginative play about living with pain and choosing to do the right thing even if you’re unclear just what that thing might be. Those three words reprise over and over in composer/performer Cliff Eberhardt’s opening song, … Read more
Dany Margolies – The Daily News Each year for the past decade, the Getty Villa in Pacific Palisades has commissioned a Los Angeles theater company to adapt an Ancient Greek play for the Getty’s outdoor amphitheater. This year, the Pasadena-based Theatre @ Boston Court sets the Euripides tragedy “Medea” in modern-day Boyle Heights. Enter “Mojada: … Read more
Dany Margolies – Arts In LA The weighty ideas expressed in this piece have retained their potency from nearly 2,500 years ago. The skills and vibrancy of the actors here are flawless. Had the two elements meshed, this would be a perfect production. Read more… Bob Verini – Stage Raw Reviewing the 2011 Getty Villa production … Read more
Bob Verini – ArtsInLA As Greek tragedies go, Prometheus Bound poses something of a staging nightmare. There’s no betrayed wife out to murder her own children and her rival, no king brought to understand the truth about the older woman he married. Instead, it’s a solemn religioso pageant in which the god who created mortal … Read more
Euripides’ Helen, by adapted by Nick Salamone. Dany Margolies, ArtsInLA Nick Salamone is most gracious in crediting Euripides as the writer here, merely listing himself as adaptor. He has riffed on the Greek tragicomedy original, working with historical plot and characters but blending in elements of Hollywood movie musicals and characters from Hollywood’s Golden Age. Read more… Pauline Adamek – LA … Read more