MODERN DRAMA: 67% – BITTERSWEET
LemonMeter | Jun 27, 2012 | Comments 7 |
The cast of “Modern Drama” at studio/stage. Credit: Company.
SWEET
Sterritt directs his excellent cast to deliver broad, comedic performances that suit his high-flown and hilarious text, yet these characters are slightly distant and bloodless… Yet there’s a wonderful scene in this archly witty play where Hillary relates the back-story of their marriage’s early departure into infidelity.
Pauline Adamek – ArtsBeatLA
SWEET
The small, yet technically capable cast and simple, yet effective staging make this One-Act comedy a must-see for some hearty summertime laughs.
Anjeli Jana – LASplash
SWEET
This Modern Drama is white, wealthy, drunk and funny.
Fayeruz – Fayeruz Blogspot
SWEET
Extremely recommended.
M. Jarett Christensen – Tolucan Times
BITTER
There are some very interesting ideas at the bottom of Mr.Sterritt’s comedy, but he needs a few more drafts for those ideas to fully blossom.
Andrew Moore – MadTheatrics
BITTER
Unfortunately, guts aside, the production doesn’t come close to meeting that high standard.
Geoff Hoff – LA Theatre Review
MODERN DRAMA
SPQR Stage Company
AT studio/stage
520 N. Western Ave.
Hollywood, CA 90004
REMOUNTED AUGUST 3-26, 2012; Fridays and Saturdays, 8 p.m., Sundays, 5 p.m.
Tickets: $10; (323) 463-3900
Running time: 90 minutes, no intermission
Filed Under: Featured • LemonMeter
About the Author: We don’t “review” shows here at the Lemon, rather we "review" reviews by gathering them from a variety of local review sites around the internet, judging them to be positive or negative, then forming an aggregate score that we call a LEMONMETER RATING, showing how well that show has been reviewed in total. For more detail on how the LemonMeter works visit here.
Not to dispute the LemonMeter, but my take was decidedly bitter.
Apparently today was argue with the LemonMeter ratings day, Andrew, because you’re the third person to contact me about a review, each on a separate issue and on a separate show. Frankly, I’m too tired to argue so I’m fine changing it.
But just so everybody knows, THIS day is an exception and I will be returning to my normal perfunctory grouchiness.
Let me leave you all – including you, Andrew – with this; if you want people to know what your opinion is on a show then work a little harder on clarifying and communicating your opinion on that show. Your review was not “decidedly bitter”, Andrew, it was decidedly ambiguous, bordering on academic non-commital. If you don’t like a production, please say that. Somewhere. Anywhere. I have no horse in the race either way, except perhaps clarity of communication.
That is all. Back to our regular programming…
Your perfunctory grouchiness doesn’t seem to be lacking. Thanks for the advice.
Unsolicited, I admit, but thank you for taking it in the vein it was intended.
Saw your response to my critique of your critique, Andrew (http://madtheatrics.blogspot.com/2012/06/perhaps-snark-is-public-service.html)
I’m always amused how people confuse clarity of communication with snark. You do realize that our original tag line on this site was “Critique the Critics” yes?
Or did you think we provide this free service to the LA Theater Community because we are just such kind souls and simply want to be loved and admired by all?
How’s about this for snark, I could just not include your review in the mix at all?
Not that big a deal really, I admit, no big shakes to be on the Lemon, but more and more often as I slog through these reviews in LA (especially when I’m trying to catch up as I am now because of the Fringe), I often wonder why I’m even including some of the reviews that are out there. Yours is usually not one of them, but there are a dozen or so out there who are consistently paraphrasers, summarizers, pom-pom shakers and intellectual contortionists that barely merit attention.
Up til now I’ve been including them because of the dearth of raw data and to help smaller shows get a LemonMeter rating for marketing purposes and to also continue this experiment on the democratization of theater criticism, but it appears the time is coming very near when a distinction will need to be made between “top critic” and “all critics” similar to Rotten Tomatoes.
Many readers are already making that distinction on their own – they simply bypass and ignore those writers they’ve found to be pretty much inane – but it may be time to draw the distinction ourselves.
But then again that might be too snarky for some.
MODERN DRAMA took a hit to the solar plexus this morning..and how did we respond? A healthy house that laughed until they cried – we are not only bullet proof – WE’RE HOFF PROOF!!!!
Boom.