The number of living legends from the world of film and theater is shrinking. Shirley MacLaine qualifies as both. From her rise to fame as Carol Haney’s understudy in 1954’s The Pajama Game (which led to a contract with...
A theatrical production with nudity, coarse language, explicit sexuality, and strong political themes might not be among the shows most venues would consider booking. At the family-friendly Hollywood Bowl, it’s even more surprising. This weekend the 1967 musical Hair...
It’s a banner year for one-person shows in Los Angeles: Denis O’Hare in An Iliad, Christopher Plummer in A Word or Two, Daniel Beaty in The Tallest Tree in the Forest, Barry McGovern in I’ll Go On, Annette Bening...
Larry Kramer’s play The Normal Heart is finally a movie—and it only took 29 years. Directed by Glee and American Horror Story creator Ryan Murphy (he also did Eat, Pray, Love) the film began airing on HBO this past...
“Keeping laughs fresh is easy because you have a new audience every night. Them hearing the joke for the first time makes you feel like you are telling it for the first time.”
Filmgoers know actor Alfred Molina as Doc Ock in Spiderman 2 and Diego Rivera in Frida, but local audiences may also know Molina from his appearances on stage in such productions as The Cherry Orchard and Red (both at...
When 89-year-old Elaine Stritch recently dropped an “F-bomb” on The Today Show, she knew exactly what she was doing. Suddenly, the video of her appearance was all over the internet. What a perfect way to get publicity for the...
If you’re up on your Chekhov, you know that Vanya is the title character from Uncle Vanya. You’ll know that that Sonya works with him in the same play. You’ll probably remember that Masha is the middle child in...
The 2012 movie Ruby Sparks told the story of a writer who begins a story about a girl when she suddenly appears in flesh and blood. In the new play Trudy and Max in Love, the story revolves around...
“That book is too big to have just one theme. It is too massive to draw one conclusion or reaction. In terms of humility, we are only focusing on a few themes and therefore cannot call it 'The Iliad' but just 'An Iliad.'”