Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania Lynn Nottage’s Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Sweat, now playing at the Mark Taper Forum, exposes the collapse of the American working class in the new millennium. When backed up against the wall and left with neither income nor hope, people sink into racism almost by reflex. The ramifications of humanity’s anger hangs over … Read more
Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly Our Very Own Carlin McCullough is about a mother and a daughter and the tennis coach who comes into their lives and transforms them.Read more… Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania Parenting is a daunting task, one that comes with no rule book. Even when a parent, particularly a single one, desires the … Read more
Erin Conley – On Stage & Screen Despite an impressive pedigree, there is little that’s flashy about The Humans, the 2016 Tony Award winner for Best Play that opened this week at Center Theatre Group’s Ahmanson Theatre. Written by Stephen Karam with the entire original Broadway cast reprising their roles, the one-act play unfolds over the … Read more
Deborah Klugman – LA Weekly Tom Hanks as Falstaff, Joe Morton as King Henry IV and a solid supporting ensemble add up to half a dozen good reasons to see director Dan Sullivan’s staging of Henry IV,….Read more… Ellen Dostal – BroadwayWorld Director Daniel Sullivan‘s adaptation of HENRY IV, Parts 1 & 2 may only be playing in … Read more
Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania Twenty years ago, Culture Clash presented Bordertown Now, which took a look at the percolating tension between the US government and undocumented Mexican immigrants crossing the border. Read more… Now running through June 24
Ellen Dostal – Musicals in LA It takes an incredible amount of work to create a new musical, and to dream up one that is different from any other musical already written is an even more complicated developmental process. The blood, sweat, tears, and years that go into it are not for the faint of … Read more
Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania Farce is a science, a series of actions and reactions. People slam and swing open doors, they race up and down stairs, they misplace their clothing. If farce is a science, Noises Off deserves a Nobel Prize for physics.Read more… Rob Stevens – Haines His Way What has eight doors and … Read more
Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania The overture fades in with the woodwinds as the strings wistfully play the motif of “Bali Ha’i,” the lush music that transports audiences to the magical islands of South Pacific. Just beyond the breeze and the luster of the sand, the entire world has clashed violently, and fascism has drawn most of mankind … Read more
Terry Morgan – Talkin’ Broadway Labeling a work of art as being one particular thing can often be problematic, creating expectations that the piece doesn’t fulfill. Amy Herzog’s play Belleville is being promoted as a Hitchcockian thriller, which it is not. It’s only a thriller in the sense that Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf? is a thriller, in that … Read more
Jonas Schwartz – TheaterMania Joshua Harmon’s Significant Other, now playing at the Geffen Playhouse, explores friendship as a buffer, a support system, and a crutch when navigating the precarious world of love. Often funny, the comedy will remind audiences of their own singlehood, past or present. Unfortunately….Read more… Dany Margolies – The Daily Breeze What … Read more