All Entries in the "Top Rated" Category
THE FANTASTICK (SOUTH COAST REP): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Purists may howl — I noted scattered walkouts at intermission — but that’s their loss, because ultimately this ingenious revival is enchanting. David C. Nichols – LA Times SWEET Tricks and illusions give ‘Fantasticks’ magical new life. Paul Hodgins – OC Register SWEET It’s easy to see why The Fantasticks is the longest running [...]
DYING CITY: 100% – SWEET
SWEET Directed by Michael Peretzian and starring Laurie Okin and Burt Grinstead, the production serves Shinn’s drama admirably. The acting is as meticulously observed as it is emotionally tense. And though confined to a cramped room, the staging fluidly handles the shifts of time and situation. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET The ambiguities that [...]
OPENING NIGHT (THEATRE 40): 100% – SWEET
SWEET The entire fiasco offers an evening of laughter throughout, and all of the actors prove their comedic talent. Former Canadian actor Bruce Gray directs. Carol Kaufman Segal – Reviewplays SWEET The show beamed with brilliance… from the direction, acting, and writing. Even the set decorators were deserving of applause, proving yet again, what Theatre [...]
THE CRUCIBLE (ANTAEUS): 93% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET As for the differing styles of delivery, it’s a brave theatrical device, but it was used for one of the few plays I know that doesn’t need deconstructionist staging. It’s like chipping away at some of the marble on Michelangelo’s David to display it in a smaller museum. Yes, there were moments that I [...]
CHESS (EAST WEST PLAYERS): 75% – BITTERSWEET
SWEET There’s much more to say about this vivid production, but its best left to experience yourself. There are things here and there that were different from previous productions of the show (“Someone Else’s Story” and “Pity the Child” are both moved to the first act, albeit fairly effectively) and the love story needed a [...]
THE SIZE OF PIKE (MOVING ARTS): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Boys will be boys and men will be men, though the distinction between the two is more likely one of personal income rather than emotional maturity. Or so it is with the three middle-aged children (Dennis Delsing, Jon Amirkhan and Gregg Christie) who explore their frayed adult bonds in this engaging revival of playwright [...]
THE WOMEN (THEATRE WEST): 100% – SWEET
SWEET The women created by Clare Boothe Luce may have been born a century or more ago, but her comedy classic remains as sharply-clawed and freshly-mascaraed as if it had been written just last week. Those requiring proof positive of the above need only check out the entertaining revival confectioned by The Women Of Theatre [...]
THE MATCHMAKER (ACTORS CO-OP): 100% – SWEET
SWEET With a whopping cast of 14 nutty actors darting on and off the stage, there are many belly laughs, and countless twists n’ turns to follow. Pat Taylor – Tolucan Times SWEET In a season that has included a brilliantly reconceived The World Goes Round and superbly acted revivals of Agatha Christie’s And Then [...]
MY MOTHER’S KEEPER: 100% – SWEET
SWEET The writer, Jane Press, brings this remarkable cast of women to life in a real, funny, touching way. Tommy Lightfoot Garrett – Highlight Hollywood SWEET It is a moving, though sometimes very disturbing – yet ultimately healing – piece of work. Shari Barrett – BroadwayWorld SWEET The dialogue is engaging, amusing and at times [...]
PARADE (3-D THEATRICALS): 100% – SWEET
SWEET The company 3-D Theatricals attains a rarefied level of artistry with this arresting, beautifully appointed take on Jason Robert Brown and Alfred Uhry’s Tony-winning 1998 account of the notorious Leo Frank trial in 1913 Atlanta. David C. Nichols – LA Times SWEET At any rate, T. J. Dawson’s staging of Parade overcomes the boxy [...]
CRUMBLE (LAY ME DOWN JUSTIN TIMBERLAKE) (THEATRE 68): 92% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET ‘Twas a shame such a marvelous canvas wasn’t utilized by stronger performances. G.S. Morales – LA Theater Critic SWEET Strip the play of all its craziness and universal struggles emerges that everyone deals with: death and discovering what it means to love. At the end of the day, Crumble is a coming-of-age story about [...]
STEEL MAGNOLIAS (LAGUNA PLAYHOUSE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET The cast absolutely radiates a core of true “giving” & “forgiving” beneath a delightfully teasing and tough-skinned script. Joseph Sirota – Laguna Beach Patch SWEET At the Laguna Playhouse, a solid cast distinguished by a couple of talented veterans delivers a well-crafted version of Robert Harling’s 1987 play, which was made famous two years [...]
REAL MEN SING SHOW TUNES…AND PLAY WITH PUPPETS: 100% – SWEET
SWEET Like Avenue Q before it, Real Men Sing Show Tunes…and play with puppets proves that you can get away with just about everything (and keep even your oldest and most conservative matinee subscriber rolling in the aisles) if you do it with puppets. Looks like co-creators Louis and Santa Maria have a franchise on [...]
ONE WHITE CROW: 100% – SWEET
SWEET That being said, this is a great script and it’s a decent enough production that I am comfortable recommending it. Rose Desena – The Los Angeles Post SWEET Now onstage at the Edgemar Center for the Arts, One White Crow, labeled a work in progress, is intelligent, stimulating theatre with superb direction form Deborah [...]
JOE TURNER’S COME AND GONE (MARK TAPER): 95% – SWEET
SWEET This powerfully acted production of “Joe Turner’s Come and Gone,” which opened Wednesday at the Mark Taper Forum under the direction of Phylicia Rashad, is a gift for audiences hungering for theatrical nourishment after being fed a steady diet of snacks. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET Thesps Keith David, Glynn Turman and John [...]
HOT CAT (THEATRE OF NOTE): 90% – SWEET
SWEET Yet Hot Cat is as ironic as The Royale is earnest — until the finale, a moving pas de deux between the estranged Maggie and Brick, set to the laconic sounds of a piano, in which the entire lunatic tragedy settles into a poignant tenderness. Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly SWEET The performers [...]
TIMON OF ATHENS (PORTERS OF HELLSGATE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET At its worst, their production is good. At its best, it is absolutely stunning. Kat Michels – Culver City News SWEET The Porters of Hellsgate always do a splendid job of interpreting the text and addressing it into a modern context. Although not one of Shakespeare’s better-known works, Timon of Athens is still potent [...]
HEMOPHELIA’S HOUSE OF HORRORS: 100% – SWEET
SWEET Cleverly conceived and directed by Dan Spurgeon, with the manic sketches and darkly whacky songs written by Matt DeNoto … this is an eerily entertaining production. Pat Taylor – Tolucan Times SWEET The Visceral Company presents a frightfully fun excursion into laugh-out-loud funny horror; an eclectic collection of sketches that range from macabre jokes [...]
THE LARAMIE PROJECT & THE LARAMIE PROJECT: 10 YEARS LATER (CHANCE THEATRE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET By presenting both stagings in alternating performance slots as, essentially, two halves of one show, director Oanh Nguyen and company have created a nearly five-hour epic. The results are sobering and painful in their candor, but the sum total – the act of experiencing of both plays – is also richly rewarding. Eric Marchese [...]
KILL ME: 100% – SWEET
SWEET Dark, provocative, unmistakably a creation of theater, Kill Me leaves the audience thinking and feeling. Richard Becker – Creepy LA SWEET I enjoy seeing a performance that makes me think. Even more so when days after I am still having trouble putting my finger on just every thought evoked. My cerebral enjoyment aside this [...]
I’M NOT RAPPAPORT (WEST COAST JEWISH THEATRE): 90% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET The play, like its central characters, was showing its age. Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly SWEET In a tribute both to Herb Gardner’s brilliant play which, through his comically sharp dialogue, explores a myriad of social issues, especially the challenge of aging and dodging adult children who think they have your best interests [...]
BRECHT ON BRECHT (ATWATER PLAYHOUSE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET On the small, basically barren stage, featuring five mismatched chairs and one door frame attendees must walk through to enter, the sense of being in for a real treat is palpable—and this welcome new mounting of the 1961 Off-Broadway classic does not disappoint. Travis Michael Holder – ArtsInLA SWEET Directed with a keen vision [...]
HURACLOWN: 100% – SWEET
SWEET It isn’t all smiles: There are a couple of interludes where a dark melancholy sets in, and this otherwise cheerful clown turns pitifully sad. But for the most part it’s old-school clowning without techno frills, and with plenty of laughs for all ages. Lovell Estell III – LA Weekly SWEET A philosopher once observed [...]
FALLING FOR MAKE BELIEVE: 92% – SWEET
SWEET Director Jim Fall and Musical Director Keith Harrison bring unexpected magic to the already magical—a neat trick. Samuel Bernstein – Stage and Cinema SWEET Falling for Make Believe rejects “falling for” the usual “make believe” that has permeated such previous dramatizations of the life of lyricist Hart as the 1948 Hollywood movie Words and [...]
RAISE ME UP (SANTA MONICA PLAYHOUSE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Raise Me Up is directed by Chris DeCarlo. A cast of extremely fine actors bring so much life into the characters. Dialects are absolutely perfect. Costumes by Ashley Hayes are wonderful as they always are in all productions at the Santa Monica Playhouse. Visca has written a wonderful tribute to her parents, and the [...]
PETER PAN: THE BOY WHO HATED MOTHERS: 97% – SWEET
SWEET Most of the seven actors play multiple roles. They are all gifted with physical agility, grace, and easily switch between different realities and characters. As important is their ability to communicate wonder and joy believably — particularly as adults playing children — and the cast at the Blank Theatre is more than up to [...]
PROOF (WHITMORE-ECLECTIC): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Aliah Whitmore imbues Claire with just the right blend of sisterly concern and frustration with the ever-pendulant, combative Catherine. Whitmore also doubles as director, directing her two leads to perform their lengthy speeches with high intensity and volume. Gil Kaan – Culture Spot LA SWEET This is an excellent all-around effort, serving author David [...]
SOMEONE WHO’LL WATCH OVER ME (GROUP REP): 93% – SWEET
SWEET Director Gregg T. Daniel brilliantly conveys the energy and black humor that keeps the men alive, and Gary Lee Reed (Set); Kim Smith (Lighting); Steve Shaw (Sound) and Elizabeth Nankin (costumes) capture the desolation. Morna Murphy Martell – Theatre Spoken Here SWEET A must see for all L.A. theater enthusiasts! This spellbinding and intensely [...]
ANNAPURNA: 94% – SWEET
SWEET From White’s poignant script to Bart DeLorenzo’s faultless direction to Megan Mullally and Nick Offerman’s beautifully centered performances, “Annapurna” is a lovely theatrical construct from the ground up. F. Kathleen Foley – LA Times SWEET Under the sturdy, austere direction of DeLorenzo and featuring two actors capable of such astonishing commitment to their art, [...]
GRIMM NIGHTS VOL. 1: HOLLYWOOD (ZJU): 100% – SWEET
SWEET “Grimm Nights Vol1: Hollywood” is Zombie Joe’s newest production and I believe even Wilhelm and Jacob Grimm themselves would find this comedy macabre such a delight to watch. Lorenzo Marchessi – NoHoArtsDistrict SWEET Known for its avant-garde selection of plays, Zombie Joe’s does not disappoint; it delivers with spectacular performances from Beth Ricketson as [...]
