We Will Rock You Queen (Music & Lyrics); Ben Elon (Book) San Jose Stage Company Three hundred years in the future in a land once known as Earth and now known as iPlanet, life is lived online; all music is computer-generated; pop stars are avatars; and owning a musical instrument is illegal. Yet in such a dystopian landscape, a few rebels have a cause and are … [Read more...] about We Will Rock You
The Toxic Avenger
The Toxic Avenger Joe DiPietro (Book & Lyrics); David Bryan (Music & Lyrics) Los Altos Stage Company Slapstick, camp, and parody abound as an audience's constant laughter peppers the air in the Bus Barn Theater of Los Altos Stage Company. Topics like global warming, corporate greed, corrupt political leaders, and toxic pollution are generally not that … [Read more...] about The Toxic Avenger
The Wizard of Oz
The Wizard of Oz L. Frank Baum (Book); Harold Arlen & E.Y. Harburg (Music & Lyrics); Herbert Stothart (Background Music) Mountain Play From the opening notes of the Overture, bits of familiar tunes brighten more than three thousand faces as toes tap and heart beats quicken. Young and old alike have made once again their way up Mount Tamalpais in yellow … [Read more...] about The Wizard of Oz
Continuity
Continuity Bess Wohl Shotgun Players A movie about climate change that is supposed to be taking place on an iceberg in the Arctic is in the midst of shooting time and again one scene on a styrofoam berg in the heat of a New Mexico desert -- a location decision made by a studio drawn there by tax incentives. The script, already rewritten many times with much of the … [Read more...] about Continuity
Becoming a Man
Becoming a Man P. Carl Z Space Polly spent the first fifty years of her life as a girl/woman who came out as queer and eventually married her girlfriend of twenty years, Lynette. On March 16, 2017, at the Hotel Chandler in New York, this same person was called "sir" at the front desk, in the elevator, and at breakfast. As bearded Carl proudly tells us, "I became … [Read more...] about Becoming a Man
Doubt
Doubt Douglas J. Cuomo (Composer); John Patrick Shanley (Libretto) Opera Parallèle A rigidly traditional nun's vague but deeply-felt suspicions about a modern-leaning, charismatic priest's inappropriate conduct with the first black student in a 1964 Bronx Catholic school is the subject of John Patrick Shanley's much-acclaimed Doubt: A Parable, winner of both the … [Read more...] about Doubt
anthropology
anthropology Lauren Gunderson City Lights Theater Company In the heart of Silicon Valley where currently AI is all the buzz and the source of seemingly countless new start-ups and mounting wealth, how appropriate and timely for City Lights Theater Company to open the West Coast premiere of Lauren Gunderson's anthropology, her 2023 play about a distraught AI expert … [Read more...] about anthropology
The Lunchbox
The Lunchbox Ritesh Batra (Book & Co-Lyrics); The Lazours (Music & Co-Lyrics) Berkeley Repertory Theatre Repeatedly in publicity materials, program, and even the pre-show announcement, "heart, humor, and hope" are the three words used to describe The Lunchbox, a musical now in world premiere at Berkeley Repertory Theatre. And admittedly, there may be no … [Read more...] about The Lunchbox
Tosca
Tosca Giacomo Puccini Libretto by Luigi Illica & Giuseppe Giacosa West Bay Opera With music that flows with abundant passion and fury, with performances directed and acted with creative insight and fervor, and with a setting made grand and glorious by massive and majestic projections, West Bay Opera once again proves with its current production of Giacomo … [Read more...] about Tosca
Oliver Twist
Oliver Twist Adapted by Neil Bartlett from Charles Dickens Foothill Music Theatre Upfront, a chorus of the entire cast sings a warning of what is to follow: "To be sure, it is a work of fiction, An impossibility, an anomaly, an apparent contradiction; For it finds hope where all hope was past." After all, it is 1837 in an England where the usual fate of young … [Read more...] about Oliver Twist
La Cage Aux Folles
La Cage Aux Folles Harvey Fierstein (Book); Jerry Herman (Music & Lyrics) Theatre Rhinoceros Anyone preparing for Pride and searching shops around the Castro for a yard or two of chiffon, silk organza, netting, voile, or gauze much less any spangles, sequins, boas, or feathers might as well give up. Bonita Rose has probably emptied most shelves as she acquired … [Read more...] about La Cage Aux Folles
Dracula: A Feminist Revenge Fantasy, Really
Dracula: A Feminist Revenge Fantasy, Really Kate Hamill San Francisco Playhouse Since the 1897 publication of Bram Stoker's gothic horror novel Dracula, hundreds upon hundreds of adaptations in cartoons, films, plays, and musicals from amateur to Hollywood and Broadway have spread the tale of the iconic vampire, Count Dracula, who moves from Transylvania to England … [Read more...] about Dracula: A Feminist Revenge Fantasy, Really
In the Heights
In the Heights Lin-Manuel Miranda (Music & Lyrics) Quiara Alegría Hudes (Book) South Bay Musical Theatre As our country born of immigrants seeking a better life is only weeks away from celebrating its 250th anniversary, recent immigrant citizens and non-citizens alike feel their lives and livelihood here threatened by a current administration and its cohorts … [Read more...] about In the Heights
Shakespeare Over My Shoulder
Shakespeare Over My Shoulder Ted Lange African-American Shakespeare Company For acclaimed, award-winning playwright, director, actor, and educator, Ted Lange, it began almost sixty years ago while researching a possible role in Romeo and Juliet; it happened again in 1984 while at the Royal Academy for Dramatic Arts in London; and it continued occurring every few … [Read more...] about Shakespeare Over My Shoulder
Pictures from Home
Pictures from Home Sharr White Marin Theatre There is that box in your closet that you know is there but have not opened in years -- a box crammed with family photos and a history of beach, holiday, dress-up, and back-yard poses. What memories lie there ready to reveal stories you have forgotten or relationships you have not resolved? How much reality is actually … [Read more...] about Pictures from Home
