Rob Stevens – Haines His Way During this long, seemingly endless Heat Wave that has been plaguing Los Angeles for nearly a month, if you did not have central air or a heavy-duty air conditioner, you might have considered a day at the beach. The sun would still be unbearable, but you could cool off … Read more
Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw George Orwell began writing Animal Farm in the waning months of 1943. The book was conceived in response to the evils of Stalinist Russia and the disturbing tendency of many left-leaning British intellectuals to excuse the regime’s murderous excesses and cruelties. Never an officially declared socialist or communist, Orwell had been a … Read more
Dana Martin – Stage Raw International City Theatre’s latest production of South African playwright Athol Fugard’s Valley Song is a welcomed beacon of light. First produced in 1995, Valley Song is Fugard’s first work post-apartheid. He searches for hope through the messiness and confusion of a rapidly shifting world and finds it in a younger generation ready to step … Read more
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way Way back in the mid 1970s, when I was just a few years into my theatre-going and theatre-reviewing career, I made the acquaintance of the lovely Viola Heigi-Swisher, who at the time was the Los Angeles theatre reviewer for the glossy, artsy New York-based monthly magazine After Dark. She … Read more
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way Yusuf Yildiz’s Not That Illegal started life as a 15-minute work at the 2019 Strawberry One-Act Festival in New York City where it received a Best Play nomination. Now he has expanded it to a 90-minute one-act at the Hollywood Fringe Festival. It’s about 60 minutes too long in its present … Read more
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way Writer/director/choreographer/percussionist John Wuchte and had a big success at the 2019 Hollywood Fringe Festival with Scarlett Fever, a physical movement piece that looked behind the scenes at the search for an actress to play Scarlett O’Hara in the classic film Gone With the Wind. They are back this year with a look at … Read more
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way If you are seeing a new musical at the Hollywood Fringe Festival that starts off with a character known as Cockman who wakes up the sleepy town every morning singing about choking his chicken, you would think you were in for a wild and fun time. Unfortunately, those first … Read more
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way Can an Elvis Impersonator reinvent himself as a drag queen? More to the point–can an impoverished married straight man with a child on the way become a successful star drag act? This is the thin premise that playwright Matthew Lopez has used to create his hilariously outrageous ode to … Read more
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way Nineteen century American novelist Henry James did not think much of his novel, Washington Square, about a plain, naïve, sheltered heiress and the strikingly handsome young man who suddenly begins to court her. The work has had a life far beyond what James could ever have imagined. Read more… Now through June … Read more
Rob Stevens – Haines His Way A friend recently returned from his first trip to Paris. Among the many sites he visited was the grave of Oscar Wilde. I need to ask him if the gravesite looked very disturbed. I would think it would be nearly uprooted with all the spinning in his grave Mr. … Read more