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Evan Henerson - Page 5

Evan Henerson

Evan Henerson is a longtime arts and features writer who lives in Southern California. He is the former theater critic for the Los Angeles Daily News and has written for such publications as American Theatre, Playbill Online, Stage Directions and Backstage.






Review: AMPED UP POETRY IN MOTION - FREESTYLE LOVE REIGNS SUPREME at Pasadena Playhouse
Review: AMPED UP POETRY IN MOTION - FREESTYLE LOVE REIGNS SUPREME at Pasadena Playhouse
July 24, 2022

The work is smart, kinetic, occasionally a bit raunchy and a blast. Basically, this is part of the evolution of improvised comedy, only with better music. The Groundlings should be so cool.

Review: GROCERS GONE WILD IN KNIGHT OF THE BURNING PESTLE at Independent Shakespeare Company In Griffith Park
Review: GROCERS GONE WILD IN KNIGHT OF THE BURNING PESTLE at Independent Shakespeare Company In Griffith Park
July 15, 2022

ISC’s unique brand of Shakespeare in the park has long been a summertime favorite for Angelenos of all ages. PESTLE is a work of Francis Beaumont, not the Bard, but as adapted and staged by director Melissa Chalsma, this loopy bit of play-within-a-play meta is every bit a comic winner.

Review: DEAR EVAN HANSEN Is Still Waving, Searching and Yanking on Heartstrings
Review: DEAR EVAN HANSEN Is Still Waving, Searching and Yanking on Heartstrings
July 12, 2022

With 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 evening
Review: A WICKED SOUL makes for a killer evening
July 3, 2022

Director 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 PEOPLE
Review: Boys will be Monsters in THE BEAUTIFUL PEOPLE
July 2, 2022

The 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 Playhouse
BWW Review: KING OF THE YEES at Sierra Madre Playhouse
June 4, 2022

As 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: KING LEAR at Wallis Annenberg Center For The Arts
BWW Review: KING LEAR at Wallis Annenberg Center For The Arts
May 23, 2022

Despite some instances of inventive staging and plenty of technical blares and flashes, John Gould Rubin’s production is as wrongheaded as it is irritating to sit through. Read our BWW critic's review.

BWW Review: VENUS IN FURS at Atwater Village Theater
BWW Review: VENUS IN FURS at Atwater Village Theater
May 15, 2022

The 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 Theatre
BWW Review: HADESTOWN at Ahmanson Theatre
May 5, 2022

Read 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 Theater
BWW Review: A DEATH DEFYING ESCAPE at Hudson Guild Theater
April 26, 2022

Prestidigitation 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: HOODED OR BEING BLACK FOR DUMMIES at Echo Theater Company At Atwater Village Theatre
BWW Review: HOODED OR BEING BLACK FOR DUMMIES at Echo Theater Company At Atwater Village Theatre
April 11, 2022

Ahmed Best's production expertly blends fantasy, pop cultural references and the keen observation of a sharp script. HOODED is an instruction manual for lovers of good drama.  

BWW Review:  BARBS APLENTY IN SATIRE THE PLAY THAT YOU WANT at Road Theatre
BWW Review: BARBS APLENTY IN SATIRE THE PLAY THAT YOU WANT at Road Theatre
March 25, 2022

The satirical juices flow through Michael John Garces’ production of THE PLAY YOU WANT. Set in the present day, the play offers a bunch of well-known, real-life figures who are sent up and ultimately knocked down to make Cubria’s point.

BWW Review: Stop the Music! Misguided Musicalized Movies light up THE REVUE, at Colony Theatre
BWW Review: Stop the Music! Misguided Musicalized Movies light up THE REVUE, at Colony Theatre
March 23, 2022

Suppose you took a really good movie – or a crowd-pleaser - and you loaded it down with bad music. Or maybe not with atrocious music, but wrong-headed ditties. Or maybe you assigned the wrong composer for this particular cinematic genre.

BWW Review: ASSASSINS Shoots to Thrill
BWW Review: ASSASSINS Shoots to Thrill
March 5, 2022

Los 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 Playhouse
BWW Review: POWER OF SAIL at Geffen Playhouse
February 26, 2022

POWER 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 Within
BWW Review: ALL'S WELL THAT ENDS WELL at A Noise Within
February 21, 2022

ALL’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 Probes
BWW Review: SLAVE PLAY Considers and Probes
February 21, 2022

Unquestionably, 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 Theatre
BWW Review: SOMETHING ROTTEN! at Kavli Theatre
February 6, 2022

If 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 Season
BWW Review: Touring CHRISTMAS CAROL Lights up the Season
December 11, 2021

Directed 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 north
BWW Review: WINTERTIME is a romantic hot toddy up north
December 5, 2021

Charles 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.



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