Staff Blog Entries

Behind the Grand Drape

During the Restoration era, two of the reigning actresses, both named Elizabeth, couldn't hate each other enough. They played a scene in which one would wave a knife - a prop, the audience assumed. But ...

Nobody Loves You at the Old Globe

TV's most damning expression reigns when the jobless rate's rarely been higher. Viewers wait an hour to hear what's-his-hair shout "you're FIRED!" Itamar Moses and Gaby Alter's featherweight musical comedy freatures an expression even more ...

"The Funniest Man I Ever Saw"

In The Scottsboro Boys, Haywood Patterson is condemned to the electric chair for a crime he didn't commit. In the Old Globe production, Clifton Duncan plays Patterson and sings "Nothin'" two ways: he blasts out ...

Master Harold...and the Boys at Lyceum Theatre

For its inaugural production, Living Light Theatre performs Athol Fugard's autobiographical drama. The intermissionless piece talks about an unexpected twist in a short story - then delivers a shocking one on stage. The twist is ...

Arts Left Behind?

Nilaja Sun's No Child opens this Saturday at Mesa College's Apolliad Theatre. It's based on her experiences directing a play during No Child Left Behind. Kevin Six, former arts administrator and arts education advocate, offers ...

The Cast Looks at Brownie Points

On the surface, Janece Shaffer's comedy-drama sounds pleasant enough. Girl Scouts go camping in the Northern Georgia pines. Five mothers tag along: two are troop leaders, three want to watch their daughters earn Brownie points. ...

The Hound of the Baskervilles at North Coast Rep

I saw a preview of Phil Johnson and Cynthia Stokes' work-in-progress. Johnson, in fact, was performing before his first live audience. So this won't be a "review" in any formal sense. Just two heartfelt plugs. ...

Respect: A Musical Celebration of Women at the Lyceum

About half way into Dorothy Marcic's revue, a shiny black rotary phone sits on a chair center-stage. Kelsey Venter kneels before it transfixed. When it doesn't ring, she grows antsy and begins singing the Vikki ...

Lucille's Ashes

As he recalled his process for a recent blog about Cygnet Theatre's Parade, director Sean Murray added an anecdote that gives the musical another telling dimension. Leo Frank was accused of raping and murdering a ...

A Look Back

Cygnet Theatre's extraordinary Parade must close this weekend. The musical tells the story of Leo Frank, a Southern Jew wrongly accused of murder and lynched by vigilantes in 1913. It ran only 84 performances on ...

Deconstruction of a Drag Queen at Circle Circle dot dot

Shaun Tuazon's terrific performance shoots a sure arc through a production filled with highs and lows. He plays Michael, a super-bright student with a clearly-defined path: get top grades, go pre-med. at UCSD, then med. ...

Ripples from Walden Pond

I used to teach in humanities programs. We began one with Henry David Thoreau's Walden. Student read it, took its message of self-reliance to heart, and quit school, vowing to live an authentic life from ...

This at North Coast Repertory Theatre

Slouching towards 40-something. A year ago Jane and Roy had an ideal marriage, if seen from afar; Tom and Marrell were expecting their first child; and Alan's mnemonic ability made him a popular TV personality. ...

The Pride at Diversionary Theatre

For Alexi Kaye Campbell's difficult drama, Diversionary imported director Glenn Paris, from Ion Theatre, and three Craig Noel Award-winning actors: Francis Gercke, Jessica John, and Brian Mackey. In spite of its accolades, The Pride's uneven ...

A Man, His Wife, and His Hat at Moxie Theatre

Sir Isaac Newton was wrong. Gravity isn't the only law of the land. In Lauren Yee's 90-minute, surrealistic piece, love also grounds people. And the un-loved float away. Oliver Sacks wrote *The Man Who Mistook ...

Turn of the Screw at Intrepid Shakespeare Company

In Jeffrey Hatcher's adaptation, Henry James' spooky tale isn't a traditional ghost story. It's more like a demonic possession. Or seduction. A young governess on her first assignment can become "easily carried away." Like Jane ...

Stage Directions

Someone once said, "to write a mystery, you can't be mysterious. You must be precise." Sam Shepard's experiments with form and surreal atmospheres have always been ahead of their time. But in one sense he's ...

Holy Week

Want to watch a golfer get stupid right before your eyes? CBS TV shows a lane lined with magnolias. At the end is a vague yellow something or other on a grassy mound and a ...

Almost, Maine at Scripps Ranch Theatre

It's not a good sign when you're watching a play and it reminds you of another play, or playwright, more adept at similar material. John Cariani's Almost, Maine recalls Garrison Keillor's Lake Woebegon, the TV ...

Ghosts and the Brothers James

Next week, Intrepid Shakespeare Company will stage an adaptation of Henry James' novella The Turn of the Screw, hailed by many as one of the, if not the, greatest ghost stories of all time. Seemed ...

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