All Entries Tagged With: "eric marchese"
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 [...]
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 [...]
SMOKEFALL (SOUTH COAST REP): 54% – BITTERSWEET
BITTER Those with a penchant for homespun elegy playfully whipped up may enjoy “Smokefall,” but the work is really a collection of derivative themes in search of a fleshed-out drama. Charles McNulty – LA Times BITTER Director Anne Kauffman and her talented design team contribute polish and visual wit but finally cannot disguise the fact [...]
THE WHALE (SOUTH COAST REP): 72% – BITTERSWEET
SWEET Director Martin Benson championed “The Whale” since he first encountered it, and his enthusiasm shows in every aspect of this production. Thomas Buderwitz’s cluttered set and Michael Roth’s thoughtful and subtle sound design are wonderfully effective. Each performance is filled with life and urgency, and we realize from the first moment that the stakes [...]
CATCH ME IF YOU CAN (PANTAGES/SEGERSTROM CENTER): 67% – BITTERSWEET
BITTER Unfortunately, there’s nothing about “Catch Me If You Can” that inspires a repeat visit. While the cast is working hard, the material they’re working with is too flawed to make the show an enjoyable experience. Katie Buenneke – Neon Tommy BITTERSWEET These tireless touring actors nearly con us into thinking we’re seeing a show [...]
OKLAHOMA! (CARPENTER CENTER): 95% – SWEET
SWEET But as someone raised on the Kansas/Oklahoma border with the show ingrained in his brainpan, this reviewer can safely state that when the full-throated ensemble sends the title number soaring over the orchestra pit, audiences may find it hard to avoid joining in. Yeeow! David C. Nichols – LA Times SWEET Drop what you’re [...]
CHINGLISH (SOUTH COAST REP): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Directed by Leigh Silverman, who staged the work on Broadway, “Chinglish” gleams with witty intelligence about the dizzying divide that separates the world’s two economic superpowers. Charles McNulty – LA Times SWEET Hwang brilliantly blends character, dialogue, and the idea that even when bilingual interpreters are present, translations are fraught with errors and misconceptions, [...]
TRIASSIC PARQ: THE MUSICAL: 80% – SWEET
SWEET The show’s many charms include playful costumes (by Anthony Tran), vigorous choreography (by Kelly Todd) and the lithe, fearless cast. Margaret Gray – LA Times SWEET It is well worth seeing, wherever you live in Southern California. Daniel Faigin – Observations Along the Road BITTERSWEET The show and its staging are pleasingly wacky and [...]
AROUND THE WORLD IN EIGHTY DAYS (ICT): 100% – SWEET
SWEET For the moment, Mark Brown’s crackerjack adventure comedy under Allison Bibicoff’s inspired baton opens ICT Season 28 with quite enough theatrical fireworks to light up the Long Beach sky for weeks to come. Steven Stanley – StageSceneLA SWEET The production, which requires a cast of five to play dozens of roles in constantly shifting [...]
BOEING-BOEING (LA MIRADA THEATRE): 76% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET Despite director Jeff Maynard’s spirited direction and the production’s high degree of craftsmanship, accepting the goings-on requires considerable suspension of disbelief. Eric Marchese – Backstage BITTERSWEET On the other hand, these same developments also make the play considerably less hilarious than expected — I’ve laughed a lot harder at a number of other farces. [...]
CHAPTER TWO (LAGUNA PLAYHOUSE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Despite a bit of overwriting, director Andrew Barnicle finds his way through to the heart of the matter with an outstanding cast, headed by Caroline Kinsolving as a young divorcee and Geoffrey Lower as the novelist who stands in for Simon. Tom Provenzano – LA Weekly SWEET Courtesy of Andrew Barnicle’s deft direction and [...]
THE MOTHERFUCKER WITH THE HAT (SOUTH COAST REP): 94% – SWEET
SWEET If it’s possible to write a play about addiction and attempted recovery that’s both darkly earnest and ruthlessly funny, then Stephen Adly Guirgis has done exactly that. His incisive 2011 Broadway hit “The Motherfucker With the Hat,” about drugs and drinking, love and infidelity, pulls no punches in depicting characters who are messed up [...]
FOOTE NOTES (OPEN FIST): 90% – SWEET
SWEET Both plays are populated with characters quirky and eccentric yet wholly lacking in artifice; each is steeped in genuine regional flavor and awash in Foote’s accurate ear for colloquial speech. Open Fist Theatre Company’s production takes to them with ease and grace, reminding us why the theater arts are so compelling. Eric Marchese – [...]
A SNOW WHITE CHRISTMAS (PASADENA PLAYHOUSE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Still, if “A Snow White Christmas” is closer to countless theme-park shows than traditional panto, it will certainly enchant its targeted demographic while giving their parents a respite from the umpteenth “Nutcracker” and “Christmas Carol” on tap. David C. Nichols – LA Times SWEET The Lythgoes’ Americanization of the panto’s concepts yields a sui [...]
HUGHIE (OPEN FIST): 87% – SWEET
SWEET In Open Fist’s hands, the strengths and the weaknesses of translating O’Neill’s specificity from the page to the stage is bravely handled. Leigh Kennicott – Stagehappenings SWEET Demson and Schlessinger ensure that we experience Erie’s arc, from cheerful, gravel-voiced chatterbox to lost soul desperate for validation. His need is for someone to worship at [...]
42ND STREET (MUSICAL THEATRE WEST): 92% – SWEET
SWEET Audiences craving unbridled pizazz should race to “42nd Street” at the Carpenter Center in Long Beach. Musical Theatre West opens its 60th season with the indestructible backstager, and scores a toe-tapping triumph. David C. Nichols – LA Times BITTER The show’s nostalgia and old-fashioned nature serve as a double-edged sword. It can be cutting [...]
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 [...]
OVERLOOKED: 100% – SWEET
SWEET Despite the sleek, chic look of visual elements, it’s Mazor’s quintet of actors, and what she does with them, that get this darkly cynical comedy flying high. Eric Marchese – Backstage SWEET Far more compelling—and satisfying—is the world premiere of Brian Nelson’s “Overlooked” at Chance Theater in Anaheim Hills. Whether the world of contemporary [...]
EURYDICE (SOUTH COAST REP): 75% – BITTERSWEET
BITTERSWEET The acting isn’t quite as accomplished as the mise en scène. Alex Knox’s Orpheus and Carmela Corbett’s Eurydice make an attractive pair, though their characterizations sometimes seem stilted in a way that isn’t very compellingly individualized. Charles McNulty – LA Times BITTERSWEET At the production’s best moments, the strong, simple truths of relationships are [...]
ABSURD PERSON SINGULAR (SOUTH COAST REP): 88% – SWEET
BITTER Because we don’t get a palpable feel for these couples, the ironic reversals that befall them don’t land with much impact. We’re left hanging from punch line to punch line, with the sense that the cast too has somehow been stranded. Charlotte Stoudt – LA Times SWEET If the first act is a delightful [...]
THE CHANGELING (LONG BEACH PLAYHOUSE): 82% – SWEET
BITTERSWEET With Middleton and Rowley’s Jacobean tragedy, Dave Barton, who handles both, does a serviceable job in terms of comprehensibility, but the effect is at best uneven and at times languorous in terms of dramatic impact. Mayank Keshaviah – LA Weekly BITTERSWEET If you consider a play a piece of military strategy, in that actors [...]
I LOVE A PIANO (3-D THEATRICALS): 100% – SWEET
SWEET It’s a thread of a story, to be sure, but enough to make this evening more than just a walk down memory lane. Each section – from Tin Pan Alley to The Great Depression to the Stage Door Canteen and Post World War II – is a winner. Ellen Dostal – Musicals in LA [...]
GHOST-WRITER (ICT): 95% – SWEET
SWEET Director caryn desai’s compelling staging is both placid and forceful, her troika of outstanding actors moving as if in a dream. Hollinger spins prose dialogue into lovely poetry replete with haunted imagery. The spirits of death and longing saturate the story, which analyzes the literary process’ intense solitude and long bouts of inactivity punctuated [...]
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (SHAKESPEARE OC): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Some odd quirks and remnants of wit adorn “Much Ado About Nothing,” which closes Shakespeare Orange County’s 21st season in beautifully appointed, crowd-pleasing, curiously off-kilter fashion. David C. Nichols – LA Times SWEET Shakespeare Orange County’s placement of “Much Ado About Nothing” during the Roaring ’20s never threatens to dwarf or trivialize the material [...]
ELMINA’S KITCHEN: 83% – SWEET
BITTER Kwei-Armah crams his play with colorful, sometimes amusing supporting characters, but his scattered tale lacks drive and originality, meandering along an all-too-predictable trajectory. Pauline Adamek – LA Weekly SWEET Kwei-Armah’s genuine portrait of this culture and its universal themes engages, as does Terrell as he leads a superb cast under the skilled direction of [...]
THE TRAGEDY OF RICHARD III (SHAKESPEARE ORANGE COUNTY): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Yet when all is said and done, this is Walcutt’s show. His Richard is cheerfully, gleefully corrupt, yet also suitably choleric, the fire of hatred burning openly in his face. He brims with energy so boundless, it drives this fascinating and always entertaining historical tale. Eric Marchese – OC Register SWEET For this 2012 [...]
WEST SIDE STORY (CHANCE THEATRE): 100% – SWEET
SWEET Less a revival than a whole-scale reinvention, this stunning chamber version of the landmark 1957 musical by Leonard Bernstein, Stephen Sondheim and Arthur Laurents yields breathtaking, deeply moving results. David C. Nichols – LA Times SWEET By using more modern movements, director Oanh Nguyen and choreographer Kelly Todd have deconstructed the classic musical in [...]
LA CAGE AUX FOLLES (PANTAGES & SEGERSTROM): 76% – SWEET
SWEET Equally undeniable is that Herman’s inspiration pales in Act 2, Hamilton’s musical theater abilities are sorely limited, and the Pantages is three sizes too big a venue. Given the rapturous reception at the reviewed performance, such caveats are immaterial. Die-hard fans, reserve immediately. David C. Nichols – LA Times BITTERSWEET I saw this version [...]
JENNIFER ANISTON STOLE MY LIFE (BEST OF FRINGE): 83% – SWEET
SWEET The situation’s faux good cheer was distressingly well-observed under Deborah Geffner’s staging. Steven Leigh Morris – LA Weekly SWEET The play was well-written by Jon Courie, expertly directed and well cast. It was happy, sad, reflective and thought-provoking. All in all, it was the kind of stupendous art that I have grown to expect [...]
WAR HORSE (AHMANSON THEATRE): 88% – SWEET
SWEET If you can only see one play this year, make it “War Horse.” Jean Lowerison – SDGLN SWEET Yes, it’s sentimental. Yes, there are scenes that might have given even as inveterate a melodramatist as Charles Dickens pause. But this 2011 best play Tony winner, which launched its national tour at the Ahmanson Theatre [...]
