It is not often I go to a theatre in Los Angeles, where I see such joy as I saw from the Actors Workout Studio. 

From the moment I walked in, everyone was genuinely excited and glad to be part of part of this theater.  The co-directors were working the door and set the perfect tone for a lovely evening.

The show consisted of six short plays…scenes really.  The title of the compilation was “Taboo,” so I was expecting to have the limits of decency pushed.  I was disappointed a bit on that front, but was not disappointed by the level of talent involved in this production.

The first piece, “Offender,” was about a registered sex offender just trying to do his job and inform the neighbors of his presence.  The twists and turns create a funny scenario about a serious and taboo subject as he is the target of some crazy energies and has to squirm his way through it.  Miles Faber played the titular character and held his own against the “over-the-top” characters played by Joey Jupiter-Levin and Rachel Christianson.  Faber was a bit behind on the comic timing of the scene, but his mugging and dedication to the character made up for it.  Director Ian McClure guided the actors to the line of uncomfortability, made sure they never crossed it, and gave them permission to pour themselves into it.  I was very impressed with what he created.

The second piece, “What are you going to be?” was a bit more labored.  The piece revolved around parents dealing with a potentially racist Halloween costume choice by their daughter.  I did not get almost any familial chemistry between any of the actors.  The dialogue seemed to lag and cues seemed to be left on the stage for the crew to pick up.  It just seemed off and half-hearted.  Near the end of the piece, it picked up and it seemed like the actors got their groove.  However, I wish there was more chemistry between the actors, less pausing, and more of something to grab onto.

The third piece, “Don & Eva,” was very strange.  It involved two people going home together after meeting in a bar.  Fun setup, good commitment shown by both actors, Joey Jupiter-Levin and Siaka Massaquoi, but there was an escalation to the scene that seemed off.  The energy and pacing seemed to be suffering from a rare form of tourettes, sporadically shifting from quiet and calm to outbursts of noise and dialogue.  I actually enjoyed it overall and felt the actors dealt with the delicate issues of race and one night standsnwell, but I wish there was a more natural, organic flow to how the scene evolved.

The fourth piece, “I’m Chris Hansen,” was fantastic! 

Regan Talleh presented a monologue about her obsession with Chris Hansen.  It was so captivating and enjoyable, I found myself wanting to google Chris Hansen and fall in love myself.  There was an odd direction given, where she was speaking to one person, in the upper left hand corner of the audience, which made me feel like I was missing something behind me, but once I got used to it, I gave in fully to her diatribe.  Talleh sold the piece with her whole self, body and speech.  Major kudos Stacy Ann Raposa for directing such a great piece.  A monologue in a show full of fully cast scenes is not easy, but these two managed to work it out and show us something great.

The fifth piece, “When Babies Fly,” was the perfect piece for its two actors.  Miles Faber and Saige Ryan were funny, engaging, and committed.  The comedic timing was on point and let me see what these two actors could do far beyond the first scenes they were in that night.  They walked a line with how awful people can be while still being relatable and charming…and they did it perfectly.  There was an energy dip at the end of the scene, almost like they were getting tired, but overall a great piece.  The director, Raposa, knew how to steer these two to realize their potential.

The last piece of the evening, “Shake My Hand,” was another stab at race in America.  The actors seemed competent and committed to the characters, but I felt that they were not directed fully.  The personalities may have been too much to handle.  The actors seemed lost in an odd mixture of ego and reticence.  The scene and its players needed to be reined in and led to the heart and core of the scene.  Sadly, they were not nor were they able to discover it for themselves.

Overall, I would highly recommend this show.  It has its high points and its lows, but it made me laugh, made me think, and I enjoyed the evening.  Director Stacy Ann Raposa is a pro and handled her scenes with a deft hand.  Director Ian McClure is very talented and I look forward to watching him grow and evolve as a director and hope he continues making great art.

Actors Workout Studio
4735 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood, CA 91602

TICKETS>>

Dragon Bait Productions presents “Wolf Cub” written and directed by Che Walker.

Running September 21st to October 13, Friday & Saturday at 8pm.

McCadden Place Theatre, 1157 North McCadden Place, Hollywood, CA 90038

“Wolf Cub,” written by prolific English playwright and director Che Walker, makes its Los Angeles debut…and what a debut it is. 

The play is performed as a one-woman show and documents the strange and poetic life of Maxine, a woman raised almost feral by an abusive, violent father in the wilds of the American south.  During a pivotal moment in her fear-riddled life she watches a wolf give birth to a cub in the woods and creates a deep connection to it, her burgeoning personality aligning permanently with the cub in a kind of creation story to her own mythology.  Whether this encounter is dream or reality matters not, Maxine choses her familiar and the power of that kindred creature drives her life choices from then on.

Maxine’s journey through the world as she grows is littered with men making bad decisions on her behalf, but to her fear-thickened skin, the repercussion of those epic fails bounce off her like rain.  Relocated to Los Angeles,her father works on drilling rigs and she attends high school.  But her instincts are too wild to be contained and she soon takes up with a local drug dealer and enters the explosive world of the drug gangs in 80s L.A.

Her boyfriend steals from the wrong guy and takes off, leaving her to face his crimes.  It is at this point that Maxine truly takes control of her life, embraces her psychosis, kills her father, becomes a legend in the terrifying underworld of drugs, Iran-Contra and the evolving crack industry.

 Devin Ketko 

The stage is totally bare.  Maxine paces and writhes and mesmerizes with her sinewy lycanthropic body.  Devin Ketko manages to imbue her character with a vivid fearless grace as she recounts her life like an ancient storyteller reenacting a tragic fable, or a tribal explanation of how the world began.  It’s an awful lot to be responsible for, this allegory, but Devin is a powerful and striking actress and seems to revel in it.

This is not an easy play to explain.  It’s part myth, part heartbreaking parable, part wild ride.  It’s the story of a women told in her own language directly from her own damaged mind, aching heart and her deepest darkest instincts.  The more she speaks to us the more I believed she was speaking to the wolf cub.  Longing for a life she could have had, if her mother hadn’t left, if her father wasn’t a violent drunk, if she had stayed in the woods with the wolf.  Even when she does take control it’s in a world that could never really be hers and for a time that was always destined to end, quickly and violently and utterly.  But it is the careening inevitability of all of that which ultimately saves her, which sets her free.

All this is so beautifully told by one woman on a bare and dimly lit stage with the help of a few pieces of music, her sheer raw nerve and an obvious and deep connection to the story.  “Wolf Cub” is weird and wonderful, deeply moving and oddly uplifting.  It is a poem inside a punch inside a crack in the world and I think it’s absolutely brilliant.

The run is very short and I urge you to sit in the dark with Maxine, you won’t regret it.

Running September 21st to October 13, Friday & Saturday at 8pm.

McCadden Place Theatre, 1157 North McCadden Place, Hollywood, CA 90038

https://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/3568155

STARRING: Devin Ketko as “Maxine”

PRODUCTION TEAM:

Production by playwright Che Walker

Produced by Dragon Bait Productions 

Executive Producer Montana Roesch

Director Che Walker

Publicity by Sandra Kuker PR

The Road Theatre Company presents “The Rescued,” written by Julie Marie Myatt and directed by Marya Mazor. 

I love dogs.  I have four, or “four too many” as my husband says.  I also have five cats and I love them too, but cats are different, independent and aloof, apart from the one that basically sleeps on my head every night.

But If you had to define me you would say I was a dog person.  I bask in their love, their absolute adoration of me. I love how they always try to maintain eye contact with me as I walk around the house or the garden.  How their heartbroken little faces mourn me when I leave and how they hover near the door, jostling for position when I return.  I know how each of them needs to be touched and where and at the end of the day we all stack up together on the couch, each in our own special place.  Yes, I am definitely a dog person.

Leandro Cano, J.D. Hall and Meeghan Holaway PHOTO CREDIT: Brian M. Cole

“The Rescued” is a play about dogs.  A group of rescued dogs living in a house with a family expected back by the end of the day. 

The human actors who play the dogs don’t sully their characters with cheap doggy imitations, no, they honor the souls of these beleaguered beasts with nuanced and complex performances as if the dogs were human, upright, fragile and flawed.  There is also one cat, in a pink dress, who is as complicated as any of them.

The premise of the play is a day in their life.  Two older dogs are sitting in their recliners or their beds, playing cards and discussing their lives.  There are a couple of new arrivals, one a bit mean and defensive, another scared and hiding in a closet.  There is also one very overexcited dog who keeps lists of everything he finds in the garden and is thrilled to finally have a home.  And then there’s the cat, who once lead a life of privilege and struts about proudly, although she is just as broken as the rest of them.

How different are any of us from the damaged and forlorn animals abandoned and tortured and forgotten?  When we see another person who is angry or aggressive or belligerent, how often do we ask ourselves what made them that way?  A dog is made to fight, he is beaten into it.  Isn’t it just as likely that a person is too?

This is a play about dogs, yes, but what makes it so profound is that with all their pain, their psychosis and their struggles to be happy we see in their eyes their humanity.  They believe in each other, even when they disagree, they hold on to each other and reach out through the fear and the bad memories.  They reflect what is best about us by being so much better than us. 

Meeghan Holaway and Patrick Rieger  PHOTO CREDIT: Brian M. Cole

The playwright, Julie Marie Myatt, has created a beautiful, heart-wrenchingly funny and inspiring glimpse into the world of these few precious beings. 

She has fleshed out the characters with heart and light, they are real and wonderfully quirky and they also, rather charmingly, sing songs, familiar and brilliantly chosen, which reminds me so much of when my own lovely beasts ‘sing’ along with the firetrucks as they wiz by.  These “Rescued” dogs do actually sing though, which works far better for the stage than a howl. The songs are surreal and magical moments throughout the play and I loved them.

Patrick Rieger and Rahul Rai  PHOTO CREDIT: Brian M. Cole

I cannot encourage you enough to see “The Rescued” at The Road. 

This warm and extraordinary play performed with bold brilliance and grace by each and every one of these excellent actors will astonish you.  Don’t we learn more about ourselves and our lives by the creatures we surround ourselves with, both human and not? Bravo!

TICKETS>>

Running September 21st through November 11th

The Road on Magnolia, 10747 W Magnolia Blvd, North Hollywood, CA 91601

Cast:

Jason – Patrick Joseph Reiger

Harold – J.D. Hall

Buster – Leandro Cano

Candice – Meeghan Holaway

Darrell – Rahul Rai

Lola – Kacie Rogers

Production Staff

Katie Witkowski – Producer

Amy Stoch – Producer

Maurie Gonzalez – Producer & Stage Manager

Susie Lever Asst Director/Asst Stage Manager

David Elzer – PR

Michelle Gillette – Music Director

Sarah B. Brown – Scenic Designer

Derrick McDaniel – Lighting Designer

Mary Jane Miller – Costume Designer

David B. Darling – Sound Designer

Megan Morn – Property Master

Bjorn Johnson – Fight Director

Book and music by James Chiao and lyrics by James Chiao and Lily Chiao.

Directed by James Chiao

Choreography by Becky Castells

Conducted by Charles Fernandez

September 22nd -26th at 8pm, El Portal Theatre, North Hollywood,CA

There is something very magical about watching dreams come to life.  In this case, the journey from the dream to the stage is wondrously profound, to say the least.

The creator of “Mannequin Man by Day Tenor by Night,” James Chiao, was born in China many years ago.  His life there was hard and a far cry from the life his parents planned for him. His father was the famous and much celebrated Chinese composer Fei Chiao and his mother an accomplished soprano, but the Chinese revolution changed everything for them and James was sent away to become a farmer and a fisherman in a tiny village where he met his beautiful wife Lily.

Lauren Han and Kevin Gino. Photo by Ed Krieger.

Their hard work brought them to America where they eventually set up their own business making mannequins, but it was James’ dreams that drove him to study music and singing and the rest has now become musical history and the foundation for James’ first musical.

This charming work is based on James and Lily’s life here in America, with a little bit of extra theatrical magic mixed it.  The character of James is a hardworking owner of a mannequin factory who has dreams of becoming a professional singer.  His family has grown a little tired of hearing him rehearsing endlessly at home and his wife, upset that James insists on practicing continuously, even on their anniversary, forbids him to sing in the house ever again.  One evening Lily and James are paid a visit by their new neighbor, a magician, who offers James a solution to his lack of support at home.  The magician tells James to meet him at his factory late at night where he casts a spell giving life to James’ mannequins who can now provide him with the adoring audience he has always sought.  The only problem is James can never leave, or they will revert to their original state.  Unbeknownst to James, the magician is secretly in love with Lily, and with James out of the way he plans of working his magic on her.

Alexandra Mitchell, Stefan Alexander Mille and Kevin Gino. Photo by Ed Krieger.

This is a really fun show. 

The musicality is absolutely beautiful and the cast are all truly exceptional singers.  They give life to this delightful story and fill these lovely characters with the passion they deserve.  The cast is also full of brilliant dancers and the chorus is fantastic.  There are some terrific numbers with the mannequins and the staging is truly unique and full of color and magic.  It’s an unusual and enigmatic story, there are so many hilarious moments and also quite poignant and moving turns to the story.  My absolute favorite number involved dancing suitcases at the airport in a frantic race to save Lily. You’ll just have to see it to believe it!

Musicals are notoriously difficult to produce and starting off with something this ambitious is startling and audacious. But he pulls it off!  For James Chiao “Mannequin Man by Day Tenor by Night” is clearly his life’s work and why mess around with anything less important than that, I ask you?  James is absolutely triumphant in this play.  The story is strange, fantastical and deeply compelling, and the fact that it is based in his own life brings a remarkably sweet truth to it.  I loved this show.  It’s bold and funny and musically delightful. The actors own the stage, using every ounce of their talent and energy to make us all believe that dreams do come true…bravo!

The orchestra is also wonderful, making it feel as if this production floats on musical air.  They give such splendid support to the performers and the story and don’t stop playing for a second throughout the entire show. Amazing!

I thoroughly enjoyed “Mannequin Man by Day Tenor by Night.” 

It is only on for a couple more nights at the El Portal, but they are touring, so please look them up if you can’t make these shows.  We should all give our support to beautiful dreamers like James and Lily Chiao.

TICKETS>>

Cast:

Kevin Gino, Stefan Alexander Miller, Alice Ko, Lauren Han, Allison Aoun, Tash Casberg, Caitlyn Faucher, Mark Curtis Ferrando, Timothy Hearl, Gavin Juckette, Thurzday Lyons, Alexandra Mitchell, Benjamin Perez, Taleen Shrikan, Andrea Somera, Chad Takeda, Patrick Tsoi-A-Sue, Karlton “K.Starr” Wallace, Junru Wang, Mary Au

Production:

Amy Chiao – Producer, Scenic Projection, Props & Manmequin Costume Design, Casting

Coleen Chan – Costume Design

Cricket Myers – Sound Design

Chara Abvabi – Lighting Design

Klint Flowers – Hair & Makeup Design

Assistant Props Design – Christine Choi

Jeanine Pool – Artistic Advisor

Mary Au – Vocal Coach

Jordan Jones – Stage Manager

Lydia Runge – Assistant Stage Manager

Stacy Hennon Stone – Production Manager & Technical Director

Brian Chiao – General Manager

Lily Chiao – Producer

Benjamin Perez – Assistant Director

Becky Castella – Choreographer

Charles Fernandez – Music Director, Orchestrator & Arranger

Crown City Theatre Company presents “The Mousetrap” written by Agatha Christie.

What better way to spend a Sunday afternoon that in the company of one of England’s most beloved of authors! 

Agatha Christie is an icon, if sometimes a little dated.  But at Crown City Theatre her vintage is charming rather than old hat and “The Mousetrap” is absolutely one of her most enigmatic and celebrated works.

Written originally as a play for radio and then adapted into a short story, Christie asked that the story never be published in England while the play ran in the West End, which it has done continuously since 1952 – by far the longest-running play in the world.  She also forbad a film version, until after the play closed.  The famous twist ending has to be the best kept and yet the most widely known secret in the world by now!

This production is wonderfully loyal to the original.  It’s set in 1952 in an old English country house in the dead of winter.  The young owners of the house have turned it into a guest house and this is the inaugural weekend of their new business.  A group of seemingly disparate people arrive one by one, fighting their way through the rapidly falling snow.  Once all the expected guests have arrived, along with one unexpected guest whose car is buried in a snow drift nearby, the snowfall becomes more intense and they are all soon officially trapped. Snowed in…

Fortunately, there are plenty of supplies and wood for the fires so the guests settled in to the kind of routine only the English can create out of necessity.  Of course, there is a murder and once the police are called the phone lines are then cut to add further mystery to the madness.  A lone policeman manages to reach the house on his cross-country skis and the investigation begins.

It’s a brilliant piece of classic Christie, all “Oh I say’s” and “I’d rather not, thank you’s.”  I felt quite at home!  Agatha Christie can be a bit of a struggle to do well.  It seems simple enough but there’s a fine line between farce and fiction and this play is definitely not intended to be a farce.

It’s actually based around a true account of two young boys who were badly abused by their foster parents, one of them died and Christie created the story around the people who she imagined were most deeply affected by the crime.  The myriad of characters, people you would never imagine to be in the same room together, are all related to that sad case.  But that is all I will tell you.  The secrets that were written over 60  years ago will stay secret, at least that is until you buy your ticket and see this brilliant and charming adaptation for yourselves.

The performances are funny, sweet, poignant and memorable.  The accents are really pretty good too, which was a relief.  All these actors are exceedingly well suited to their roles and clearly having a ball playing them.  Crown City can always be relied upon to give everything they do great heart and tremendous passion and “The Mousetrap” is no exception.  It has a lovely vintage feel, the setting, the wardrobe, the attention to detail in hair and makeup.  It’s all beautifully thoughtful.  I must admit to having never seen the play before and so I was thoroughly surprised by the twist.  It seems bizarre that a secret can be kept so well for so long.  It’s one of those unspoken rules of the theatre…never reveal the ending of “The Mousetrap” and I can tell you that all that effort has been worth it!

I highly recommend “The Mousetrap” at Crown City Theatre.  Bravo!  I think they should have a dress up night where everyone goes as their favorite Agatha Christie characters!  There would be acres of glorious Hercule Poirots and Miss Marples I’m sure.  This is not a long run unfortunately so don’t hang about…get your tickets now!!

https://www.crowncitytheatre.com

Extends through December 30!

Friday & Saturday at 8pm, Sunday at 3pm

Crown City Theatre, 11031 Camarillo St., North Hollywood, 91602

Cast:

Mollie Ralston – Nathalie Rudolph/Laura Hartley

Giles Ralston – Bobby Slaski/Neil Unger

Christopher Wren – Peter Mastne/Michael Marchak

Mrs. Boyle – Mouchette van Helsdingen/Heidi Mendez

Major Metcalf – Glenn Ratcliffe

Miss Casewell – Riegan Sage/Olivia Saccomanno

Mr. Paravicini- Michael Mullen/Martin Sottile

Detective Sergeant Trotter- Hans Obma/Blake Adams

“The Beauty Queen of Leenane” – written by Martin McDonagh. and directed by Mark Kemble at Studio Stage.

Set in dreary Galway, western Ireland, “The Beauty Queen of Leenane” is the first of Martin McDonagh’s trilogy of plays about his birthplace. 

Since its first production in Ireland in 1996 it has toured extensively, played in the West End twice and on Broadway, where three of the four roles won Tonys for its cast as well as Best Director.  So you know going in that this is something special.

This excellent production at Studio Stage feels as if you have stepped through a portal and been transported into a damp, cramped cottage in the backside of nowhere.  The play is set in the Folan’s family parlor.  The daughter, Maureen, is caretaker to her mother Mag and their relationship is not built on love.  Mag is manipulative, sour and vindictive.  Maureen miserable, resentful and mean, taking her meagre victories where she can. This is her mother’s house and Mag plans to live as long as possible so escape for Maureen seems sadly out of the question.

Angela Nicholas, Tim Hildebrand

The story truly begins when a neighbor’s son, Ray, drops round to invite them to a party.  Maureen is out and Mag tries to dispose of the invitation knowing she couldn’t possibly attend given her illnesses, but Maureen finds out anyway.  The night of the party Maureen meets up with a long lost love, Pato, a sweet house painter who lives in London. She brings him home and this infuriates Mag of course, especially when Pato stumbles into the kitchen in the morning.  This all sets in motion a series of heartbreaking and gorgeously macabre events rather beautifully played out.

The character of Ray is the unwitting and a rather gormless antagonist, the blithe destroyer and gives some wonderful comic relief.  In the end, his is the only blameless character, with his childlike acceptance of his own grim world.  The rest are all to blame.  All equally guilty of the mess they make, even sweet Pato.

Curtis Belz, Casey Kramer 

It’s a stirring and brilliant play, full of clever Irish whit, chilly pathos and the kind of really deep self-deceit of which we are all capable from time to time.  In a small, cramped world where nothing ever happens, where days turn on the space between menial tasks and bad food and there seems to be no end in sight or break in the never-ending rain, it’s hardly surprising that depths are sunk to and foulness hangs in the air, accompanied by the horrible stench of Mag’s much denied morning potty dump into their kitchen sink.

This is a very tricky play to get right.  It’s dark and sad and all too real to be fiction.  The characters are spiteful, wounded and barely alive in some ways.  Yet the lyrical language and the riveting and often humorous sadness makes it compelling and strangely wonderful. 

Only truly excellent actors could do this darkness well and these four are very, very fine indeed.

The mother and daughter circle each other like vultures picking at a carcass.  The men are sweeter and far more affable, but the women are the stars.  McDonagh writes women so bloody well.  They glisten in their mutual loathing and we can only admire them for it.  Everyone is totally believable, the set is perfection, real tea is made and porridge too…thankfully we are spared the stench of the pee, although it certainly looked real enough!  As did everything in fact. So much of these magnificent words need their accompanying actions in this play that it is essential to really feel as if we are stuck in this cottage in the soggy countryside…I really truly felt as if I was.

This is not a play for the faint of heart. These are lives with real struggles and bitterness that deserve our attention and to some extent even our compassion. 

Wonderfully written and superbly acted, I highly recommend spending an hour or two in Leenane with these truly unforgettable creatures.

Running from September 15 through October 21. Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, Sundays at 7pm.

Tickets>>

Studio Stage, 520 N. Western, Los Angeles, CA 90004

Cast:

Casey Kramer, Angela Nicholas, Curtis Belz, Tim Hildebrand

Production Crew:

Stage Manager – Erin Moore

Light & Sound Design – Greg Crafts

Sound Design/Photography – Thai Long Ly

Set Design – Angela Nicholas

Set Paint – Capricorn Eleven Productions

Costumes – Angela Nicholas

Publicity – Nora Feldman