Jonas Schwartz – Arts In LA Experiencing theater—or any form of entertainment—is similar to the sensation of a blind date. Apprehension, as past disasters or boring evenings flood the mind, mix with exhilaration of a history of joyous surprises. In the opening moments, one can sense confidence in the conversation or a desperation to be … Read more
Melinda Schupmann – Showmag.com Garnering numerous awards at the New York Musical Theatre Festival in 2011, it has been re-worked as a full-scale production and is McCoy Rigby Entertainment’s first world-premiere musical. Fresh and imaginative, it takes the finest features of Jane Austen’s classic novel and musically highlights the love stories of its principal characters. Read … Read more
David C. Nichols – LA Times Never underestimate the power of stagecraft. Case in point: ”Carrie: The Musical,” now receiving a mind-blowing immersive production at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts. Read more… Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania Few musicals are as infamous as the 1988 Broadway bomb Carrie. That notoriety was enhanced by the bootlegged CDs … Read more
Myron Meisel – Stage Raw During the notoriously doomed 1984 coal miners’ strike against Maggie Thatcher’s determination to destroy the union and its jobs, motherless 11-year old Billy Elliot (Mitchell Tobin) ditches his 50-pence afterschool boxing classes for ballet lessons, unbeknownst to his picketing father (David Atkinson) and firebrand older brother Tony (Stephen Weston). Read more… … Read more
David C. Nichols – LA Times The dilemmas facing the life-battered protagonist of “Good People” are perhaps strategically manipulated, but that doesn’t make them any less relevant, humorous or dramatically engrossing. Read more… Now running through Oct. 12.
Pauline Adamek – Stage Raw In 1981, a musical adaptation by Andrew Lloyd Webber of British poet T. S. Eliot’s collection Old Possum’s Book of Practical Cats took London’s West End by storm. Cats was immediately transferred Stateside, where the Tony Award-winning musical still holds the record for being the second longest-running show in Broadway history. Read more… Jonas Schwartz … Read more
Bob Verini – Arts in LA One of the most ambitious art musicals of recent years, Floyd Collins by Adam Guettel (music and lyrics) and Tina Landau (book and additional lyrics) is receiving an outstanding mounting from helmer Richard Israel and the management of the La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts. The producers, who regularly bring … Read more