24.10.13

dressed for laughter - a review of don't dress for dinner (at TFPO)



The ICT in Long Beach previously served us a dish of deep thought with Red, a study of artist Mark Rothko and his work. With Don’t Dress for Dinner, the company caps off its 2013 season with the sort of play that deliciously frustrates the critical writer, a production whose lack of substance is absolutely irrelevant to its quality and capacity to delight.

Written by Marc Camoletti and adapted by Robin Hawdon, Don’t Dress for Dinner offers no psychological depth, no culture critique, no dramatic insight. Nor does it constitute a political protest, act of provocation, morality play, or topical analysis. In short, this is not the sort of play to...

Read the rest of my review at THE FRONT PAGE ONLINE



Don't Dress for Dinner, by Marc Camoletti. Adapted by Robin Hawdon. On stage at the International City Theatre in Long Beach from October 9th to November 3rd, 2014. Thursday - Saturday at 8p. Sunday at 2pm. Call 562-436-4610 (M-F 9am – 5pm) or visit www.ictlongbeach.org for tickets and information. 

17.10.13

tylerr pery is no jesus, but he’s still a superstar (at TFPO)


Do the performing arts have an equivalent to dive bars? If so, Santa Monica’s Promenade Playhouse – tucked in a Third Street crevice next to a soap shop – surely must fit the bill. Lest you think that a condemnation, consider that it’s precisely in such raw threadbare spaces that one finds the greatest potential for surprise. We expect sophisticated theatre from marquee theatres with refined architecture. With dive theatres, we leave ourselves deliciously vulnerable to the genuine risks and rewards of discovery.

Such was the case a few years ago with Small Office, a cozy little cubicle dramedy written by Jeremy Evans – a Second City Conservatory graduate whose credits include performance at major comedy, improvisation, and theatrical venues – that offered a smart, often hilarious portrait of personal office politics. It was ideally suited to the space, authentic and genuine, showcasing skilled performers enacting a script that demonstrates the writer’s craft that led Evans to the semi-finals in the Edward Burns Feature Script Contest.

Fitting, then, that I should return to the Playhouse for Evans’s latest piece, the hour-long musical comedy Tylerr Pery Superstar. This time we find Evans in a...

Read the rest of my review of Tylerr Pery Superstar at THE FRONT PAGE ONLINE.

And go support independent theatre.

8.10.13

win free sven clogs!


And how can you win? Read my review of a pair of clogs generously given to me by Sven Clogs for review purposes, and find out how you can get up to three chances to win.




El clogs del fuego