Once Enda Walsh (Book); Glen Hansard & Markéta Irglov (Music & Lyrics) (Based on the Movie by John Carney) Hillbarn Theatre & Conservatory For over fifty-five years of its eighty-three-year history, Hillbarn Theatre has performed in its highly versatile and intimate black box setting, transforming its close-at-hand audiences to locations wonderful, wild, … [Read more...] about Once
Musical
Ruddygorre Or, The Bruja’s Curse
Ruddygore Or, The Bruja’s Curse W.S. Gilbert (Libretto) & Arthur Sullivan (Score) Adapted by David Euresti Lamplighters Musical Theatre The Company that for seventy-one years has entertained Bay Area audiences with its Gilbert and Sullivan fare has taken one of the pair’s Victorian parodies of the English, nineteenth-century melodrama, Ruddygore, and married it … [Read more...] about Ruddygorre Or, The Bruja’s Curse
Rent
Rent Jonathan Larson (Book, Music & Lyrics) Hillbarn Theatre & Conservatory In January 1996, onto a Broadway stage burst a sexy, soaring musical daring to bestow unforgettable faces and personalities to seven artists struggling to survive not only their 1989, East Village poverty, but also the plague of AIDS/HIV that appeared ready to wipe out an entire … [Read more...] about Rent
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
Falsettos
Falsettos William Finn (Music & Lyrics); William Finn & James Lapine (Book) The Pear Theatre For me as an avid theatregoer and a critic, nothing is more upsetting than to see the applaudable efforts of a talented cast squandered by the choices and/or oversights by those who direct the production, both stage and musical. Unfortunately, such was the case in … [Read more...] about Falsettos
A Chorus Line
A Chorus Line James Kirkwood and Nicolas Dante (Book): Marvin Hamlisch (Music); Edward Kleban (Lyrics) Originally Conceived by Michael Bennett San Francisco Playhouse What is immediately striking as the twenty-four dancing hopefuls both sprint and shuffle onto the stage is the wide variety of shapes, sizes, races, and ages among them. At first glance, many of them is … [Read more...] about A Chorus Line
Sunday in the Park with George
Sunday in the Park with George Stephen Sondheim (Music & Lyrics); James Lapine (Book) Los Altos Stage Company “Order.” “Design.” “Tension.” “Composition.” “Balance.” “Light.” As each word is announced by the artist whose science of painting is guided by these exacting principles, the members of his most famous composition move into place, aided by his … [Read more...] about Sunday in the Park with George
She Loves Me
She Loves Me Jerry Bock (Music); Sheldon Harnick (Lyrics); Joe Masteroff (Book) Based on a Play by Miklós Lázló 42nd Street Moon At 42nd Street Moon, it is Christmas in June; and an old favorite is under this year’s tree, She Loves Me. The multi-Tony-nominated 1963 musical by Jerry Bock (music), Sheldon Harnick (lyrics), and Joe Masteroff (book) started as a 1937 play … [Read more...] about She Loves Me
Into the Woods
Into the Woods Stephen Sondheim (Music & Lyrics); James Lapine (Book) The Mountain Play What better way to get in the mood to enjoy an afternoon of Into the Woods than to walk on a path through a forest of mighty trees after traveling by bus, car, or even foot halfway up a mighty mountain? Now far away from the Bay and a City that can be seen through a gap in the … [Read more...] about Into the Woods
1776
1776 Sherman Edwards (Music & Lyrics); Peter Stone (Book) Broadway San Jose How familiar does this sound? A Congress that seems to get nothing done. A Congress that is divided into two factions that can barely tolerate each other. Committees upon committees where members of Congress meet to debate ad nauseum and decide little. Members of Congress debating who … [Read more...] about 1776
Singin’ in the Rain
Singin’ in the Rain Betty Comden & Adolph Green (Book); Arthur Freed (Lyrics); Nacio Herb Brown (Music) South Bay Musical Theatre I am a sucker for tap-dancing, especially when a stage is packed to the gill with smiling, arm-swinging tappers that uniformly are toe-heel clicking up a storm and singing at the same time in full, fine voice. For that reason alone, I … [Read more...] about Singin’ in the Rain
The Scottsboro Boys
The Scottsboro Boys John Kander & Fred Ebb (Music & Lyrics); David Thompson (Book) 42nd Street Moon Eleven Black men walk onto the stage with spirited steps carrying wooden boxes that become their seats. In the middle of their quarter-moon arc enters a tall, white man in white suit and with white hair and beard. After first announcing, “Gentleman, be seated,” … [Read more...] about The Scottsboro Boys
The SpongeBob Musical
The SpongeBob Musical Kyle Jarrow (Book) Based on the Series by Stephen Hillenburg Original Songs by Yolanda Adams, Steven Tyler & Joe Perry of Aerosmith, Sara Bareilles, Jonathan Coulton, Alex Ebert of Edward Shape & The Magnetic Zeros, The Flaming Lips, Lady A, Cyndi Lauper, John Legend, Panic! At the Disco, Plain Whites T’s, They Might Be Giants, T.I., David … [Read more...] about The SpongeBob Musical
The Producers
The Producers Mel Brooks (Book, Music & Lyrics) Hillbarn Theatre and Conservatory Perspective #1: Raunchy, crass, insulting, insensitive. Horrible stereotypes that in 2023 seem particularly out of place in light of Me-Too, Don’t Say Gay, dramatic increase in antisemitism, and attacks in state after state aimed at transgender people. Perspective #2: Riotous, … [Read more...] about The Producers
Merrily We Roll Along
Merrily We Roll Along Stephen Sondheim (Music & Lyrics); George Furth (Book) Based on the Original Play by George S. Kaufman & Moss Hart 42nd Street Moon 6 a.m., October 1957, on a rooftop of a New York apartment building, two friends look to the sky, searching for the world’s first orbiting satellite. Frank has just been released from the Army and is about … [Read more...] about Merrily We Roll Along
