Review: DEAR EVAN HANSEN Is Still Waving, Searching and Yanking on HeartstringsJuly 12, 2022With its award-winning book by Steven Levenson and score by Benj Pasek and Justin Paul, the touring version of DEAR EVAN HANSEN offers the same gut punches along with assurances that life for the Hansens, the Murphys and the millions of nameless, faceless lonely souls out there on the internet may yet be OK.
Review: A WICKED SOUL makes for a killer eveningJuly 3, 2022Director Mike Donahue’s production on the Geffen’s Cates stage is so intelligent, well-crafted and downright fun that A WICKED SOUL IN CHERRY HILL seems destined to have a future beyond Westwood.
Review: Boys will be Monsters in THE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLEJuly 2, 2022The work of director Guillermo Cienfuegos, Alex Neher and Justin Preston is brave, honest and frequently stomach-churning, the kind of character study that should frighten the hell out of anybody (particularly parents).
BWW Review: KING OF THE YEES at Sierra Madre PlayhouseJune 4, 2022As directed by Tim Dang for the Sierra Madre Playhouse, KING OF THE YEES is a comedy and a quest, a Caroll-ian plunge through Chinatown led by a sure-handed guide who is seeking some penetrating answers. The author of the hit play CAMBODIAN ROCK BAND is a rock star and this gem from 2017, staged with all kinds of finesse at SMP, is a winner.
BWW Review: VENUS IN FURS at Atwater Village TheaterMay 15, 2022The lady is four-alarm hot; the man, her plaything. The script is literate and cruelly funny, a simultaneous homage to its salacious source and to the craft and vagaries of live theater. Got your stole? Very good. So who out there is game for some kick-ass kink?
BWW Review: HADESTOWN at Ahmanson TheatreMay 5, 2022Read our critic's review. HADESTOWN, the too-hot musical by Anais Mitchell directed by Rachel Chavkin, is a scorcher. Masterfully sung, elegantly staged and with a sensibility so romantic it could physically knock you over, the national tour of the 2019 Tony Award-winning musical parks at the Ahmanson through the end of May.
BWW Review: A DEATH DEFYING ESCAPE at Hudson Guild TheaterApril 26, 2022Prestidigitation factors heavily into ESCAPE, but it’s by no means the performance’s only draw. Directed by Lee Costello from a script by Carter, the 90-minute three-hander showcases Judy Carter as a talented performer and a deeply conflicted person who has navigated some bumpy terrain in her life.
BWW Review: ASSASSINS Shoots to ThrillMarch 5, 2022Los Angeles’s East West Players has a long and vibrant history with the musicals of Stephen Sondheim, making it hardly a news flash that the company would both take a – er – shot at the composer’s controversial 1990 work, ASSASSINS, and end up bringing it off so splendidly.
BWW Review: POWER OF SAIL at Geffen PlayhouseFebruary 26, 2022POWER OF SAIL is a smart firecracker of a play getting a blistering production at the Geffen Playhouse directed by Weyni Mengesha. Presenting itself initially as a debate masquerading as dramatic fiction, SAIL quickly pivots and deepens, morphing into a tale that is part character study, part thriller.
BWW Review: ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL at A Noise WithinFebruary 21, 2022ALL’S WELL THAT ENDS WELL undeniably has at its center, a butterfly-in-waiting and a marvelous performer waiting to take her on. From leading lady Erika Soto to company stalwart Deborah Strang, Nike Doukas’s solidly entertaining production of ALL’S WELL boasts a particularly strong core of women who anchor this effort with great skill.
BWW Review: SLAVE PLAY Considers and ProbesFebruary 21, 2022Unquestionably, we all should listen...and talk...and occasionally laugh, and sometimes we should even be screaming until our lungs are on the brink of explosion. And we can be doing some of this to a Rihanna soundtrack.
BWW Review: SOMETHING ROTTEN! at Kavli TheatreFebruary 6, 2022If a playgoer knows anything about Shakespeare and/or musicals, then for sheer inventiveness, sweetness and curtain-to-curtain smiles, SOMETHING ROTTEN! has you covered.
BWW Review: Touring CHRISTMAS CAROL Lights up the SeasonDecember 11, 2021Directed by Thomas Caruso from the original production helmed by Matthew Warchus, the L.A. production of A CHRISTMAS CAROL is delightful if not magical, certainly enough to scratch anybody’s holiday itch and maybe a little bit more.
BWW Review: WINTERTIME is a romantic hot toddy up northDecember 5, 2021Charles L. Mee’s rumination on the foibles of love and the love of foibles is enjoying a gloriously self-indulgent revival at the Berkeley Repertory Theatre’s Roda Theatre through December 19. The Les Waters-directed production is every inch an old home week occasion at Berkeley Rep, featuring longtime company members James Carpenter, Sharon Lockwood and Lori Holt.