Troilus and Cressida, Shakespeare’s take on the Trojan War, should be seen a lot more often in LA. The Porters of Hellsgate are doing their part in Charles Pasternak’s inventive staging in NoHo. Meanwhile, the Segerstrom Center for the Arts brings Car Plays to the OC as part of its Off Center Festival — right next door to South Coast Rep’s Topdog/Underdog. READ MORE
Making Eye Contact With City Garage’s Filthy Talk
by Don Shirley | January 9, 2012
City Garage is finally connecting the theatrical and the visual arts at Bergamot Station, re-setting Neil LaBute’s early performance art piece, Filthy Talk for Troubled Times, within an art gallery. Might the City Garage artists be commenting on MOCA’s recent gala, which featured spectacles directed by performance art sensation Marina Abramović? A Noise Within’s revival of Noises Off is another example of a company fully inhabiting its new and larger space. READ MORE
LAT on LAT — The Limits of McNulty’s 2011 List
by Don Shirley | January 3, 2012
In 2011, LA Times theater critic Charles McNulty devoted much of his space to only four of LA’s theater companies and too much of his time to theater in New York and London. Many of the “99%-ers” who work in other LA companies, even at the Pasadena Playhouse, must feel neglected — not to mention those readers who might like his viewpoint on what’s playing in their own neighborhoods. READ MORE
Highlights of 2011 in LA Theater
by Don Shirley | December 19, 2011
A look at some of the highlights of LA theater in 2011 embraces LA plays, LA writers, CTG’s smallest shows, the return of Pasadena Playhouse, A Noise Within’s last Glendale season, two shows set about 50 years ago, two shows set in World War II, two shows from the June festivals, two surreal musicals about doomed men, two plays about pharmaceutical company workers and Iris. READ MORE
Three Holiday Parties — and Baby Doll
by Don Shirley | December 13, 2011
Among the more unusual holiday shows, the Troubies’ A Christmas Westside Story is riotously entertaining. Atomic Holiday Free Fall! at the Actors’ Gang and A Chanukah Carol at Theatre 68 aren’t quite as shiny. Plus a few thoughts on Joel Daavid’s interpretation of Baby Doll for Elephant Theatre. READ MORE
Donate Your Theater Programs to the LA Public Library
by Don Shirley | December 9, 2011
Tired of wondering what to do with all your old theater programs? The Los Angeles Public Library already has collected more than 30,000 of them, dating back to the 19th century. Your contribution could help strengthen this valuable resource and, by reminding us of our roots, help build a greater sense of community. READ MORE
Short Eyes. And Two Comedies About Being Jewish in America.
by Don Shirley | November 28, 2011
A revival of Miguel Pinero’s Short Eyes ricochets through LATC’s Theatre 4. And two plays offer comic takes on Jewish identity in America — Laurel Ollstein’s Esther’s Moustache and James Sherman’s The God of Isaac. READ MORE
CTG’s LA Grade Rises to C+ with A+ Night Watcher, Pasadena Playhouse Bounces Back with Blues
by Don Shirley | November 21, 2011
Charlayne Woodard’s CTG solo The Night Watcher, at the Kirk Douglas, raises CTG’s overall grade on LA talent and content to a C+. Is Bring It On actually set in California, too? Pasadena Playhouse’s Blues for an Alabama Sky is an entrancing return to fine form for the playhouse, but Pasadena’s second theater, A Noise Within, offers a Desire Under the Elms that feels too stolid. READ MORE
The Cates Years at the Geffen — A Hard Act to Follow
by Don Shirley | November 7, 2011
The Geffen Playhouse has been closely identified with its founder and producing Gil Cates. Let’s take a quick tour through the Cates years and then ask the inevitable question — what now? With Cates gone, will the Geffen create a new identity? Plus a few thoughts on the current Geffen production Next Fall. READ MORE
Cuban Fantasies from 50 Years Ago at A Noise Within and LATC
by Don Shirley | October 31, 2011
A Noise Within opens its new Pasadena home with a Twelfth Night set in pre-revolutionary Cuba. And Latino Theater Company moves to LATC’s largest venue with Evelina Fernandez’s Hope, set a few years later as the Cuban missile crisis was terrifying everyone, including a Mexican American family in Phoenix. Expect lots of snappy costumes in Twelfth Night and soulful singing in Hope. Also, Art Manke comments on A Noise Within’s big moment. READ MORE
Tales From the WWII Home Front: Peace, Sons, Robber, Plus 9 Circles
by Don Shirley | October 24, 2011
Two revivals of plays from 1947, both of them about how civilians behaved on the home front during World War II, offer distinctive twists. Antaeus’ revival of Noel Coward’s Peace in Our Time adds songs and deletes characters, while the Matrix version of Arthur Miller’s All My Sons is cast multiculturally. Meanwhile, The Robber Bridegroom has a ’40s connection too, while 9 Circles is about a different kind of war — and Dante. READ MORE
Dakin Adams and Jane Fonda in the Santa Monica Commons
by Don Shirley | October 17, 2011
Stephen Metcalfe’s The Tragedy of the Commons isn’t quite a tragedy, but it an uncommonly penetrating portrait of an aging blogger who’s in a modern California story reminiscent of The Cherry Orchard, with a bountiful performance by Brian Kerwin. Anne Archer is a much cooler character, up against much angrier adversaries, as Jane Fonda in the Court of Public Opinion, also in Santa Monica. READ MORE
