All Entries Tagged With: "bob verini"
MISS JULIE (GEFFEN PLAYHOUSE): 67% – BITTERSWEET
BITTERSWEET A few minutes into this “Miss Julie,” you might think that the Geffen Playhouse started out with a traditionally cast “The Heiress” and then switched plays after losing a few key supporting players. Julie’s fall at the hands of this John isn’t so devastating. But the injustice of her money and his lack of [...]
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 [...]
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 [...]
Critique of the Week
This is something new for Bob Verini. I’ve always thought of Bob as a master of the shorter form review, along with Bill Raden of LA Weekly. They are able to say a lot about a show in a very short time. But now that Bob is writing more and more for ArtsInLA, he is [...]
The Saturday Saying(s)
“The ancient Greeks, with their complicated notion of catharsis, thought theater could speak to these questions. Great plays, like Medea or MacBeth, have taken us into unspeakable acts and if not made sense of them – at least honestly plumbed their depths. The folks at Boston Court couldn’t have imagined how their choice of plays [...]
AMERICAN MISFIT: 63% – BITTERSWEET
SWEET Via songs by Mr. Dietz and Phillip Owen, painstaking and inventive direction by Michael Michetti, and the enthusiastic participation of a four-man rockabilly band and a cast of eight (some overlap there), this show shouts encouragement to those who would participate in a collective political and spiritual evolution. If the show were a person, [...]
THE BEAUX’ STRATAGEM (A NOISE WITHIN): 84% – SWEET
SWEET For educational value alone, it’s wonderful to see the play produced professionally, but under Julia Rodriguez-Elliot’s direction, A Noise Within’s production makes it clear why the play was so popular back in its day. “The Beaux’ Stratagem” is immensely funny, and it’s quite entertaining to watch such a well-crafted play. Katie Buenneke – Neon [...]
AMERICAN BUFFALO (GEFFEN): 80% – SWEET
SWEET David Mamet’s “American Buffalo” is set in a junk shop, but there are jewels to be found in the play and they are thrillingly laid out for us in the Geffen Playhouse’s dynamically acted production directed by Randall Arney. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET Nevertheless, Mamet’s world, despite its grounding in acute social [...]
BILLY & RAY: 97% – SWEET
SWEET Still, the most fascinating aspect of “Billy & Ray” is Bencivenga’s smart, knowing script, which captures an important era in filmmaking fueled by two great minds who rose above their shared belief that “if there’s one thing Hollywood hates, it’s originality.” Travis Michael Holder – Backstage SWEET Mike Bencivenga’s World Premiere play Billy & [...]
TENDER NAPALM: 100% – SWEET
SWEET Tender Napalm is produced by Joe Morra, Lena Georgas, Edwards, Hamilton, and Paige, a labor of love that has paid off in a production which might not normally be this reviewer’s cup of tea, but in whose talented, committed hands, Ridley’s two-actor one-act becomes a theatrical adventure I am very glad I took. Steven [...]
TRIBES: 89% – SWEET
SWEET With actors this emotionally connected, words are secondary. More to the point of Raine’s play, hearing is shown to depend more on an open heart than fully functioning ears. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET The conversation Tribes inspires about communication and community in the deaf world more than justifies this production. It’s unfortunate [...]
Behold the Bitter Lemons Academy of Arts Criticism (BLAAC)
Pronounced “blaaach,” kinda like “blech” but with more “aaa”. But yes indeedy you heard right: The Bitter Lemons Academy of Arts Criticism. BLAAC. What the hell is it? Right now it is most definitely in its embryonic stage, but eventually it will become a full-fledged Academy with professors and semesters and tuition and diplomas and cigars [...]
CASSIOPEIA: 71% – BITTERSWEET
SWEET If you’re in a mood to give yourself over to rich imagery richly (sometimes too richly) conveyed, you’ll encounter something rare and beautiful. Bob Verini – Variety SWEET Part dream drama, part choreo-poem, the 75-minute three-character work, directed by Emilie Beck, charms both the brain and the senses. Evan Henerson – Backstage SWEET Still, [...]
HAPPY FACE SAD FACE: 56% – BITTERSWEET
BITTER It all sounds very intriguing, but Colleary and director Kathleen Rubin, who has helmed two of Colleary’s previous plays, have this time collaborated on a well-meaning experiment gone awry. F. Kathleen Foley – LA Times SWEET Director Kathleen Rubin has truly met the tremendous challenge of balance in the piece. While the text is [...]
FREUD’S LAST SESSION (BROAD STAGE): 76% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET For “Freud’s Last Session” to be a deeper play it would have to take a freer hand with the characters, exploring the textures of their inner lives rather than simply surveying their intellectual positions. St. Germain playfully illuminates some of the contradictions in their characters, but the piece sticks mostly to the surface, satisfying [...]
RUDOLPH THE RED-NOSED REINDOORS (TROUBADORS): 100% – SWEET
SWEET No offense to the original cartoon’s sound track, but it’s the Doors songs that provide the theatrical oomph that allows this mild-mannered TV show to explode all over a stage, especially when performed by Eric Heinly’s hot live band. Don Shirley – LA Stage Times SWEET Well, my guests were certainly stuffed after this [...]
OTHER DESERT CITIES (MARK TAPER): 76% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET What should be a perfect storm, alas, isn’t. Working with watchable and often affecting material, Egan and his cast of five feel like they’re trying to wrestle two or three disparate plays into a shapable entity. Despite a career-stretching performance by JoBeth Williams and strong work by the consistently reliable Robert Foxworth, “Other Desert [...]
The Saturday Sayings
“I don’t know whose idea it was to set the entire show in a dingy office and have the actors play workers who are sliding in and out of Gatsby roles as they go about their work day, but I think this concept adds nothing to the production. Far better that they’d just done Gatsby [...]
A CHRISTMAS CAROL: TWIST YOUR DICKENS: 67% – BITTERSWEET
BITTER What upsets me more is that the idea for Twist Your Dickens is phenomenal, but it ends up being a poor excuse for perplexing and annoying attempts at hilarity. Tony Frankel – Stage and Cinema SWEET This version of Dickens’ classic won’t live on nearly as long as the original. But it doesn’t really [...]
CONEY ISLAND CHRISTMAS: 79% – SWEET
SWEET As with many gifts, the wrapping isn’t much to speak of, in this case a weak framing narrative taken from a Grace Paley short story. But what’s inside – not one but two kid pageants superbly staged by Bart DeLorenzo, and a pan-denominational message – is a jewel to be cherished. Bob Verini – [...]
NOTHING TO HIDE: 93% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET If Penn and Teller were post-modern, these inevitably self-aware practitioners are post-Penn and Teller. They candidly eschew any hint of the phony, a historical hazard for magicians and a shibboleth of the contemporary sensibility. Yet their purposefully affectless manner gradually edges them toward the bland, so that by the end even their most spectacular [...]
GATZ (REDCAT): 91% – SWEET
SWEET Theatre like this arrives once in a blue moon, and you don’t want to miss a word-for-word of it. Tony Frankel – Stage and Cinema SWEET In its simultaneous devotion to Fitzgerald’s text and ingenious expansion upon it, “Gatz” looks forward to an entirely new American theatrical form. It is quite simply not to [...]
INTIMATE APPAREL (PASADENA PLAYHOUSE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Her fate is the subject of Lynn Nottage’s beautifully poignant play, “Intimate Apparel,” now receiving a sensitive production at Pasadena Playhouse under the direction of artistic director Sheldon Epps. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET The series of events that leads to Esther’s resolution, if somewhat predictable, was enough to get an engaged audience [...]
HOW TO WRITE A NEW BOOK FOR THE BIBLE: 77% – SWEET
SWEET Ultimately, Cain’s unique blend of theater and theology satisfies both disciplines. His faithfulness to the story is justified. The universal will emerge from the singular. As Cain the character says for Cain the writer-priest, “If you want to see God – says the Book – look at your family story.” Cristofer Gross – TheaterTimes [...]
BUILD: 62% – BITTERSWEET
BITTERSWEET Sadoski, who can always be counted on for textured individuality, humanizes Kip, making him a prisoner of his own fixated brilliance. If only the character had more to do than metabolize his guilt while removing the networking bugs in his video game design. By the time Kip’s bathrobe is discarded for a set of [...]
IN THE RED AND BROWN WATER: 100% – SWEET
SWEET Beyond the fact that it is sensational, the Fountain Theatre’s production of “In the Red and Brown Water” by Tarell Alvin McCraney is important for two reasons: It introduces Los Angeles audiences to a dramatic poet in the process of discovering his singular voice and it shows how magnificently one of L.A.’s better small [...]
SEMINAR: 70% – BITTERSWEET
SWEET Theresa Rebeck’s “Seminar” is a sturdy example of a genre that once ruled Broadway but is now more or less defunct: the intellectual light comedy. With its literary lion (Jeff Goldblum) roaring and sniffing out red meat among his writing group’s eager acolytes, “Seminar” is fueled more by plot mechanics than by the thrum [...]
Critique of the Week
There were a lot of excellent reviews on this production this week, but I continue to greatly admire how Bob is able to say so much, so well, in such a short amount of time. KRAPP’S LAST TAPE Bob Verini – Variety If there’s a bleak truth to be unearthed about the human condition, you [...]
FRATERNITY (EBONY REP): 100% – SWEET
SWEET The characters are much more dimensional than those in November, although the veteran Lincoln is more deeply drawn than the challenger. The actors, directed by Henry Miller, are superb. Don Shirley – LA Stage Times SWEET Jeff Stetson’s sprawling, sometimes awkward, always provocative work tackles the great subject of generational neglect. Bob Verini – [...]
NOVEMBER (MARK TAPER): 67% – BITTERSWEET
BITTERSWEET “November,” though adept and amusing, is hardly hilarious and essentially harmless. The last is what’s most wrong with it. David C. Nichols – Backstage BITTER Given the hard, cramped Mark Taper Forum seats, I for one was very glad the show ran faster than its promised 80 extremely glib minutes. Jason Rohrer – Stage [...]
