Neal Weaver – LA Weekly Writer-director Odalys Nanin’s fictionalized bio-play zeroes in on Mercedes De Acosta, who in the 1930s was celebrated as a poet, playwright and novelist, though nowadays she’s remembered mostly for her lesbian affairs with famous actresses including Eva LeGallienne, Alla Nazimova and Tallulah Bankhead.In Nanin’s play, De Acosta (played by the … Read more
Pauline Adamek – LA Weekly Creating a raucous, rocked-out party atmosphere by blasting preshow music (think “Welcome to the Jungle” at ear-splitting volume), the hilarious spoof show Point Break Live! offers super-soaked excitement in a grungy Hollywood nightclub setting. What do we mean by “soaked”? Let’s just say you’d be wise to take them up … Read more
Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly Los Feliz’s Skylight Theatre has become the home for L.A. scribe Shem Bitterman, who’s had his plays staged in this city for decades. His latest, a real estate mystery named Open House, premiered last week. Before getting to Open House, it’s worth perusing Bitterman’s past writings, which reveal patterns … Read more
Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly Lalo (Miguel Santana), Paco (Henry Madrid) and Nacho (Roberto Garza) have been friends for 50 years. Former field workers, they escaped a life of hard labor by forming a trio and earning a living as singers of Mexican love songs. Now elderly and unemployed, they reflect back on the humiliations … Read more
Pauline Adamek – LA Weekly Now in its 10th year, Hurricane Season is a competition of short new plays. Block Two (reviewed here) continues over this weekend, with Block Three running Aug. 9-18. The audience favorites of the festival will receive awards in an Aug. 23 ceremony, and a jury will give monetary prizes to … Read more
Neal Weaver – LA Weekly This comic extravaganza, written by Ron House, Diz White, Alan Shearman and John Neville-Andrews and first produced in 1971, went on to become an international hit. Now the Ruskin Group brings it back, and to insure it retains its original comic glory, two of the original creators have returned: Shearman … Read more
Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly In her book Nickel and Dimed, Barbara Ehrenreich detailed her sojourn into the world of the working poor, illuminating (as no recounting of statistics ever could) the struggle, heartache and resilience of this often forgotten and/or disrespected class of Americans. Read more… Melinda Schupman – ArtsInLA Barbara Ehrenreich’s 2001 book, Nickel … Read more
Neal Weaver – LA Weekly In David Lindsay-Abaire’s dark comedy, Kimberly (Dorrie Braun) is a teenager who suffers from progeria, a disease that causes its victims to age more than four times faster than the normal rate. Read more… Now running through August 11.
Bob Verini – ArtsInLA If there’s a more sheerly interesting playwright in the United States these days than Bruce Norris, I don’t know who it is. In a continuing series of audacious, ambitious comedies, he has remained resolutely non-P.C. in questioning some of our culture’s most cherished assumptions on race (his Pulitzer winner Clybourne Park), … Read more
Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly …..Stephen Sachs‘ Heart Song, which just opened at the Fountain Theatre, also looks at the capacities of art to overcome the seeming finality of death. Act One is as literal — with explanations about the purpose of art that border on the tendentious — as A Fried Octopus is abstract. Act Two, however, … Read more