Brett Cullum

Jennifer Decker is a pro at deconstructing relationships, and it is no surprise that she handles this material very well. Also, she has a very talented cast at her beck and call, so THE WANDERERS here in Houston works exquisitely for the most part.

SEVEN ASSASSINS WALK INTO A BAR aims for the pop culture jugular and hits it quite well. Audiences are going to have a blast watching this collection of “badasses” compare notes on a misspent life. Dain Geist has an ear for dialogue and a knack for characters.

Playwright, director, and actress Candice D’Meza swings for the fences up in the sky with MISS LARAJ’S HOUSE OF DYSTOPIAN FUTURES, but this is hardly a surprise to anyone who has been following her work here in Houston.

One of Houston’s most fascinating productions opens this week. Mildred’s Umbrella is presenting THE WANDERERS at the Evelyn Rubenstein Jewish Community Center on South Braeswood.

Candice D’Meza is a being that never stops evolving; she is constantly being reborn. She is a multidisciplinary artist, writer, actor, activist, filmmaker, and mother. It's so hard to pin down Candice D’Meza because when you think you got her, she shifts again.

Denise Fennell is just a delight in this role, and she plays off the audience so well that you would swear Sister is a real person. I can’t praise her performance enough. She can handle anyone, anytime, and mine every audience for comedic gold.

Ariel Shani is part of the cast of MEAN GIRLS coming to the Houston Hobby Center from January 28th through February 9th. The show is a tour that Theatre Under the Stars is bringing in as part of their season. Ariel was raised in Israel and also Canada but ended up going to the Tisch School of the Arts in New York City.

The luminous Broadway star, Adrienne Warren, comes to the Hobby Center on February 1st. You may know Adrienne from her Tony Award-winning turn as Tina Turner in the West End and on Broadway productions of TINA: THE MUSICAL or her role opposite Audra Mcdonald in SHUFFLE ALONG. She will have a “one night only” cabaret show that is part of the Beyond Broadway series.

Sam and Dean are here to make you laugh, and they love what they are doing as well as each other. And at the end of the day, I would see this type of show over and over and love it for being what it is. The message of the entire show is that community theater can save the world! So, thank goodness to the folks at Theatre Suburbia for reminding us of their superpower.

It's a May-December relationship. But, unlike most May-December relationships that we see. The woman is older, and I wanted to explore that. HAROLD AND MAUDE is one of my favorite movies.

If you live under a rock or in a remote African village without Facebook, THE BOOK OF MORMON was developed by Matt Stone, Trey Parker, and Robert Lopez. Trey and Matt infamously created the SOUTH PARK animated series, and Robert Lopez helped conceive the puppet comedy AVENUE Q. They took eight years to develop this one (small workshops that progressively grew larger), which finally opened on Broadway in 2011, launching the careers of Andrew Rannells and Josh Gad.

Ben Chavez is a singer, actor, and dancer who currently lives here in Houston. He recently was in the THEATRE UNDER THE STARS production of NEWSIE. He's done a national Broadway tour with Disney’s ALADDIN. He's done New York performances on Broadway.

FROZEN is a fun family production that is perfect for the holiday season in many ways. The show brings the beloved Disney film to life for the stage and offers unique twists to make it all more theatrical and accessible for the Hobby Center. It’s a technically gorgeous production with a strong cast of singers and something that should dazzle kids and their parents easily.

There are so many people in the world who have to work on Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, or other holidays. I really wanted to tell a story that could speak to that experience. You know those who are working hard to keep the world running during our holiday season.

I feel like this company, at this point in time, is simply happy to be here doing this show, and I can say the feeling is infectious. It’s not your typical holiday offering, but you can never be wrong with the wit of Christopher Durang and the magic of invoking the spirit of Maggie Smith. I’m thankful this season for companies like 4th WALL, which produce plays that offer the joy of what theater is all about.

The author wrote this dark piece about a liberal couple whose mother invites a conservative stranger into their house on Christmas Eve to show how easily fascism marches in politely and with charm. It’s a tense and moody winter tale and warns of the ineffectiveness of the left when faced with the right’s ability to make folks nostalgic for times long gone. It’s perfect for this time of year and certainly pointed in our current political climate of 2024.

It is all about just telling stories through this little world that we create together, and many of us just bring in many of our personal experiences as actors or even just through our lives. And the show really invited that openness, for sure, because LOVE BOMB or just love in general is a topic that can go so many different ways.

I don't want to give too much away, but we are about corn, as you can see from all the marketing materials. But it's about a town called Cobb County that is somewhere sort of in the middle of the U.S.A. This town sort of runs on corn, but the corn starts dying, so a brave young woman has to leave the town, and accidentally enlists a con man to come back to the town with her, and hilarity ensues.

LOVE BOMB is a masterpiece of the absurd, but at the same time, it’s a viable Melanie jukebox musical that could command any stage in town. Yet I doubt that any company other than the Catastrophic Theatre will ever dare to do so because it asks much of its audience.

During an interview I did with Michelle Britton a few weeks ago, she mentioned she “didn’t want to become the Alley” and that her Lionwoman Productions is “about helping people understand each other better.” Certainly, PLAYHOUSE CREATURES is right up there in rivaling the quality of the Alley!