Evita Andrew Lloyd Webber (Music); Tim Rice (Lyrics) San Francisco Playhouse With music that ranges from solemn classical, hip-swishing Latin, and grinding rock to soaring ballads and anthems, Andrew Lloyd Webber’s Evita leaves any audience member with enough memorable earworms for a full night’s worth of dreams. The endurance of Webber’s music coupled with lyrics by … [Read more...] about Evita
4.5 E
Chaplin and Keaton on the Set of Limelight
Chaplin and Keaton on the Set of Limelight Greg Lam The Pear Theatre One was known worldwide for his bamboo cane, derby hat, toothbrush mustache, too-small black jacket, and a walk more like a penguin than a man. The other’s big screen image familiar to all was a clean-shaven face smothered in thick, white makeup; a deadpan expression with smile totally absent; baggy … [Read more...] about Chaplin and Keaton on the Set of Limelight
Torch Song
Torch Song Harvey Fierstein Marin Theatre With strut and style, Virginia Ham strolls into the spotlight in full drag glory to lip sing with wonderfully exaggerated aplomb a queen’s torch anthem. By the time she has wowed us with mimicked words escaping her Mammoth-Cave-sized mouth; with eyes ready any moment to pop out of their sockets; and with hands that flit, flip, … [Read more...] about Torch Song
The Taming of the Shrew
The Taming of the Shrew William Shakespeare Modern Verse Translation by Amy Freed and Play On Shakespeare African-American Shakespeare Company Like his Merchant of Venice with its many antisemitic references, William Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew – even for all its underlying silliness – is often viewed as a difficult work to swallow by modern audiences, given what … [Read more...] about The Taming of the Shrew
Blue Door
Blue Door Tanya Barfield Aurora Theatre Company Like Charles Dickens’ Ebenezer Scrooge, Lewis heads to bed, soon to toss and turn and to spend a night confronted by the ghosts of his life – in his case, direct-line ancestors stretching over a hundred years. As one ghost announces, “This is a summoning” for this distinguished, Black, mathematics professor who before … [Read more...] about Blue Door
Florencia en el Amazonas
Florencia en el Amazonas (Florence in the Amazon) Daniel Catân (Music); Marcela Fuentes-Berain (Libretto) Based on the Writings of Gabriel Garcia Márquez) Opera San José The romantic drama of multiple loves lost, denied, and finally found intertwine with the Amazon’s alluring myths and fantasy in Opera San José’s magnificent dip into the waters of Daniel Catán’s … [Read more...] about Florencia en el Amazonas
Tiger Style!
Tiger Style! Mike Lew TheatreWorks Silicon Valley The thirty-something Chen siblings’ lives are a mess, and they are looking for someone to blame. Sure, MD/PhD Jennifer is a successful oncologist and also a classical pianist who has played Carnegie Hall; but her do-nothing boyfriend of three years is walking out on her because she is too dominant and no fun. … [Read more...] about Tiger Style!
Hangmen
Hangmen Martin McDonagh San Jose Stage Company Take your seat; fasten your seatbelt; and prepare for another dark comedy, rollercoaster ride on the Martin McDonagh Express, once again available for a sinister, laugh-filled ride as terrifically and terrifyingly staged by San Jose Stage Company where audiences have howled and cringed in equal measures five times in the … [Read more...] about Hangmen
Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord
Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord Kristina Wong American Conservatory Theatre With the hard rock and blues beats of J Roddy Watson and the Business blasting out, “I’ve been pulling threads, doing all kinds of evil,” a woman sits at her sewing machine and quickly whirls a piece of cloth through the machine’s needles, pulling out a mask – the kind we were all desperately … [Read more...] about Kristina Wong, Sweatshop Overlord
Boss McGreedy
Boss McGreedy Gary Graves Central Works In his silk dressing robe, the “Boss” pours himself another whiskey as he listens to Dudley – his lawyer and friend since childhood – tell him there is a real possibility for a “remand,” if he will “just tell the truth.” The man who proudly boasts he built New York in his years as Commissioner of Public Works is also the … [Read more...] about Boss McGreedy
A Little Night Music
A Little Night Music Stephen Sondheim (Music & Lyrics); Hugh Wheeler (Book) South Bay Musical Theatre In a rich, reverberating blend of harmonies, an elaborately attired quintet sings snippets of fuller songs soon to come of the on-again, off-again love affairs and marriages we are about to witness: “Unpack the luggage, la-la-la; pack the luggage, la-la-la.” ... … [Read more...] about A Little Night Music
Heroes of the Fourth Turning
Heroes of the Fourth Turning Will Arbery Los Altos Stage Company Four recent graduates of Transfiguration College of Wyoming – a Catholic school so conservative that students turn in their cell phones during their four years – have returned to witness their favorite professor’s ascension to be the institute’s first woman president. Two days before a full eclipse of … [Read more...] about Heroes of the Fourth Turning
Babes in Ho-lland
Babes in Ho-lland Deneen Reynolds-Knott Shotgun Players In a college dorm room whose walls are laden with ‘90s girl-band posters and whose floor is bedecked with plastic baskets flowing with laundry still to be done, a rockin,’ dancin,’ jumpin’ late teen gyrates irradicably to Courtney Love’s “Violet.” Just as she hits a climax in her spins, her roommate walks in, … [Read more...] about Babes in Ho-lland
Orpheus in the Underworld
Orpheus in the Underworld Jacques Offenbach (Music) Hector Crémieux & Ludovic Halévy (Original French Libretto) Donald Pippin (English Adaptation) The plights of Orpheus and Eurydice have fascinated audiences from the times of ancient Greeks through the works of Ovid and Virgil up until today’s multiple versions of their ill-fated journey into Hades as told in … [Read more...] about Orpheus in the Underworld
The Road to Mecca
The Road to Mecca Athol Fugard Weathervane Productions at Z Below Light vs. Darkness. Love vs. Trust. White vs. Black. Old vs. Young. Friendship vs. Loneliness. Acceptance vs. Prejudice. Apartheid vs. Freedom. Christian Values vs. Eastern Values. Opposites continuously intercede, sometimes blend, and often explosively collide in Athol Fugard’s thought-provoking … [Read more...] about The Road to Mecca
