JoBeth Williams equates making her LA intimate theater debut in Joel Drake Johnson’s The Fall to Earth at the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble to climbing Mount Everest. Director Robin Larsen helmed the playwright’s Four Places at Rogue Machine Theatre to critical acclaim in 2010. The two discuss diving into the drama’s complex emotional cauldron of parent vs. adult child relationships. READ MORE
Kathleen Turner and Molly Ivins Dance the Two-Step
by Deborah Behrens | January 11, 2012
Kathleen Turner discusses how portraying the late iconic Texas columnist, in the West Coast premiere of Red Hot Patriot: The Kiss-Ass Wisdom of Molly Ivins opening tonight at the Geffen, fits perfectly into the Tony nominee’s successful string of alcohol-fueled, “M”-monikered stage divas — Maggie the Cat, Mrs. Robinson and Martha. And why at 57, she doesn’t have to prove herself anymore. READ MORE
Sheryl Kaller Explores Faith vs. Family in Next Fall
by Deborah Behrens | November 2, 2011
Director Sheryl Kaller discusses her long bi-coastal journey with Geoffrey Nauffts’ Next Fall from first reading to Off-Broadway sensation to Broadway Tony Award nominee. She gleaned new insights exploring its theme of faith versus family with a new Geffen Playhouse cast featuring playwright Nauffts. And she tells why she’s grateful for what the experience taught her. READ MORE
Anne Archer in the Court of Public Opinion
by Deborah Behrens | October 5, 2011
Anne Archer discusses her return to the stage as Jane Fonda in Terry Jastrow’s Jane Fonda in the Court of Public Opinion at Edgemar Center for the Arts, what playing Mrs. Robinson in The Graduate at 53 did for her sense of self and why human rights is a major issue in her life. READ MORE
Anne Bogart Keeps Walking With Trojan Women
by Deborah Behrens | September 7, 2011
Director Anne Bogart discusses SITI Company’s production of Trojan Women (After Euripides) at the Getty Villa, her new criteria for projects at 60 and why ‘just keep walking’ is a mantra she shares with Hecuba. READ MORE
Hal Linden and Christina Pickles Summer
On Golden Pond
by Deborah Behrens | July 27, 2011
Hal Linden and Christina Pickles have circled each other’s orbit since both became Broadway regulars in the early ’60s, then network television stars on Barney Miller and St. Elsewhere — but it took the call of some iconic Maine loons to finally bring them together. READ MORE
Ann Closs-Farley: Always Bold, Never Beige
by Deborah Behrens | June 8, 2011
No one could accuse Ann Closs-Farley of being beige. The multiple award-winning costume designer best known for her eye-popping creations in Ken Roht’s 99¢ Only holiday extravaganzas to The Pee Wee Herman Show likes to explode color palette boundaries both on stage and off. READ MORE
Mitzi Gaynor: Still Razzle Dazzling
by Deborah Behrens | May 11, 2011
Going to Mitzi Gaynor’s home is like being invited over for a play date with your soon-to-be new best friend and her gal pals. Not only do Nellie Forbush and Ethel Merman make cameos but Lindsay Lohan and Grace Kelly likewise show up – sans BFF status. The 70-something triple threat entertainer is enjoying a career resurgence clad in new Bob Mackie couture created for her one-woman show, Razzle Dazzle: My Life Behind the Sequins, playing a double-header at La Mirada Theatre for the Performing Arts on May 14. READ MORE
Taking a Stand With Gay Marriage Plays
by Deborah Behrens | April 22, 2011
All politics are personal. None more so perhaps than the fight over gay marriage, currently playing itself out in California courts and on stage in Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays. which opens a new five-week run on May 9 at the L.A. Gay & Lesbian Center’s Renberg Theatre. Co-producer Stuart Ross and frequent Standing on Ceremony actress Peri Gilpin see the popular evening of celebrity-performed short plays by well-known playwrights as both galvanizing and accessible. READ MORE
Jane Anderson: Sex and Class in The Escort
by Deborah Behrens | April 5, 2011
Tis the theatrical season for high-end call girls. First a 16th century Venetian courtesan named Veronica in Dangerous Beauty and now Manhattan-based Charlotte in the premiere of Jane Anderson’s The Escort on April 6 at the Geffen Playhouse. Anderson says she somewhat facetiously subtitled her erotically charged show, “An Explicit Play for Discriminating People,” so audience members who prefer to identify with “high-end naughty things” would take a look. READ MORE
Annie Potts:
Empty Nester Returns to Her Theatrical Roots
by Deborah Behrens | March 2, 2011
Annie Potts is an actress film and television audiences have come to trust. From Janine Melnitz (Ghostbusters) to Mary Jo Shively (Designing Women) to Mary Elizabeth “M.E.” Sims (Any Day Now), the Golden Globe and Emmy Award nominee has repeatedly proven herself both a gifted comedienne and respected navigator of emotionally complex dramatic terrain. In AfterMath, Elliot Shoenman’s new semi-autobiographical play about a family cast adrift by a father’s suicide at Odyssey Theatre Ensemble, she deftly juggles both. READ MORE
The Dangerous Beauty Diaries
Part III: Change & Commitment
by Deborah Behrens | February 9, 2011
Dangerous Beauty Director Sheryl Kaller has a favorite mantra she likes to impart after making adjustments or giving notes: That is a change and change is good. The phrase could easily be a de facto motto for the musical’s 10-year journey from first note to its February 13 Pasadena Playhouse premiere. READ MORE
