From an Aborted NYC Mikado to Bloomberg Foundation Largesse to the 20 Most Produced Playwrights of 2015-16. Paul Birchall – Stage Raw Also making news is the news that Brian Kite, producing artistic director of La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts, is stepping down to take over the Department Chair at the UCLA School … Read more
Myron Meisel – Stage Raw City Garage’s creative duo of Frédérique Michel and Charles A. Duncombe are long-established dab hands with Molière, so abundantly so that despite their reliable pedigree, I feared that Tartuffe by Moliere: A Reality Show would perhaps be too much yet again of the same thing. Yes, but no. Read more… Now running … Read more
Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw Playwright Miki Johnson’s discerning but uneven one act takes place in small-town America and calls to mind Thoreau’s phrase “lives of quiet desperation.” Read more… Now running through Oct. 11.
The Marsh, in San Francisco, is the Bay Area’s answer to Son of Semele’s Solo Creation Festival in L.A. The San Francisco venue, however, is a year-round breeding ground of solo performances. Echo Brown’s Black Virgins Are Not for Hipsters was supposed to run through August, and has been extended through October, understandably so given the blend … 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
Deborah Klugman – Stage Raw Sometimes staging Shakespeare in a period piece setting adds color and spark. Other times, this sort of stage dressing proves either a distraction and/or irrelevant to the production as a whole. Both is the case with director Ellen Geer’s current mounting of As You Like It, which is set in mid … Read more
Paul Birchall – Stage Raw So, nobody does it better. Makes me feel sad for the rest. Nobody does it better. Baby, baby, you’re the best. We are talking about James Bond, ruthless British secret agent 007, who, along with Doctor Who and the dear old Queen Liz, are some of the best things to … Read more
Pauline Adamek – Stage Raw Ellen Geer directs a large ensemble of actors and, together with the design team and crew, the Theatricum Botanicum company delivers an endearing stage version of one of the most beloved novels in American literature. Read more… Now running through Sept. 27.
From Paul Verdier to Dakin Matthews to A. Jeffrey Schoenberg to Stephen Sachs Paul Verdier (contributed by Steven Leigh Morris) Steven Leigh Morris – Stage Raw Yet another passing of another era was marked September 6, when actor-director-playwright-producer Paul Verdier died of complications from Parkinson’s Disease while under hospice care in West Hollywood. Read more… … Read more
Neal Weaver – Stage Raw Rick Segall’s epic solo-drama focuses on the last hours of Jesus’ disciple, Simon Peter, later canonized as St. Peter. Condemned to death for refusing to reject Jesus and accept the Roman emperor as a living god, he spends his last night sharing a cell with Marcus Attilius Regulus, a former … Read more