Otello
It is no surprise that Giuseppe Verdi revered Shakespeare; one master dramatist recognizing that genius in another. The young Verdi had written an operatic adaptation of MACBETH but stayed away […]
Photo Credit Cory Weaver/LA Opera
Mason, Rorrer, Lam, Wright, Boek, Edemodi, Lane, Ferri. Photo by Jenny Graham.
The Pilot Who Crashed the Party
Paul Sand’s new play, THE PILOT WHO CRASHED THE PARTY, boasts an intriguing title. And the description, which hints at an homage/satire of drawing room dramas, conjures images of well-dressed […]
Zambito, Greaves. Photo by OddDog Pictures.
The Thin Place
Lucas Hnath is a playwright who resists easy categorization. His plays are so different in story, style, tone, and technique that one would assume several quite different writers authored them. […]
Grimes, Shald. Photo by David Sprague.
Heavenly Country
On Broadway, a new country-flavored musical called SHUCKED is currently in previews. Closer to home, the world premiere of HEAVENLY COUNTRY, a jukebox country-western musical, is running at the Two […]
Mancasola, Liverman. Photo by Craig T. Matthew
Pelleas et Melisande
It is remarkable that Claude Debussy’s PELLEAS ET MELISANDE remains sui generis 121 years after the opera’s premiere. Despite aggressively modern works by Schoenberg, Tippett, Berio, and Glass, it remains, in its […]
Miller, Rodriguez. Photo by Ashley Erikson.
Calvin Berger
Audiences have long had a love affair with the dashing hero of Edmond Rostand’s CYRANO DE BERGERAC. Theatre creators also succumbed to the charms of the man with the generous […]
Meachem, Colclough. Photo by Cory Weaver.
Le Nozze Di Figaro
A show curtain for the current LA Opera production of Mozart’s comic masterpiece, LE NOZZE DI FIGARO (The Marriage of Figaro) prominently features Commedia del Arte characters. Was this an indication that […]
Photo by Martha Benedict
Ercole Su’l Termondonte
The always ambitious Pacific Opera Project (POP) is presenting the American premiere of Antonio Vivaldi’s ERCOLE SU’L TERMONDONTE (Hercules on the Thermodon) along with an interactive theatrical history lesson. The […]
Grant, O'Hara, Brophy. Photo by Jeff Lorch.
Little Theatre
For those of us who came of artistic age in Los Angeles during the 1980’s and 90’s, the CAST Theatre was a vibrant home to a wide range of plays […]
Housewife ’52
John Wuchte’s 2019 Hollywood Fringe show Scarlett Fever, a physical theatre exploration of the legendary search for Scarlett O’Hara in “Gone with the Wind,” was certainly the highlight of that last pre-pandemic Fringe […]