L.A. Stage Insider
Celebrating the Best in Live Theater and Cabaret in the Greater Los Angeles Area
Written by Julio Martinez
August 23, 2023
NEWS
Richard Bekins, Bella Heathcote, Bryan Lee Huynh, Wendie Malick
Geffen Playhouse has announced the full ensemble for its West Coast premiere of The Engagement Party. A young couple is celebrating their engagement with an intimate gathering of family and friends. When a glass of wine is spilled, the night takes an unexpected turn. Written by Samuel Baum and directed by Tony Award winner Darko Tresnjak, the cast includes Richard Bekins, Bella Heathcote, Brian Lee Huynh, Mark Jacobson, Wendie Malick, Brian Patrick Murphy, Jonah Platt and Lauren Worsham. Original music & sound design by Jane Shaw. Previews begin Oct 4 in the Gil Cates Theater at Geffen Playhouse. Opening night is Oct 12. Gil Cates Theater at Geffen Playhouse, 10886 Le Conte Avenue, Westwood 90024. Tickets and more information available by phone at 310.208.2028; or go here.
Le Egoista
A Place Called Home (APCH), the youth development and community center serving South Central Los Angeles, currently celebrating their 30th anniversary, announces the return of its 3rd annual El Centro Del Sur Latinx Theater Festival: Tu Hogar (plus FREE Community Block Party in honor of Latinx Heritage Month), taking place Sep 14-17. This live theater festival includes four encore productions: “La Egoista” (Skylight Theater Company); “(Un)Documents,” written and performed by Jesús I. Valles; “L.A. Real” (About…Productions); and “The Diary of Anne Frank (LatinX)” (Pop-Up Playhouse, Burbank Human Relations Commission). Programming will also include an exclusive APCH premiere production of “Mariposa” (Company of Angels); a workshop staging of “Bodalands: A Comedy in Four Weddings” (ACT@APCH); and a staged reading of “Spread” (The Sideway Society with Alumni Members of APCH). All plays presented feature all Latinx casts, writers, directors, designers, and crew. The festival is produced in part by the teen members of APCH Theater Program’s Advanced Classes in Theater (ACT@APCH). A Place Called Home’s Bridge Theater (www.apch.org) is located at 2830 S. Central Ave. Los Angeles 90011. For more information and tickets, visit: www.apch.org/elcentrodelsur.
PREMIERES
India Kotis & Carlyle King
The Road Theatre Company announces the first show of its 2023-2024 season, the premiere of “Bisexual Sadness,” focusing on that specific loneliness of being a bisexual woman in love with a man, staring down the barrel of a lifetime of feeling that way, written by India Kotis and directed by Carlyle King. The production is double cast. The ‘Edna St. Vincent Millay’ cast (Tiffany Wolff, Alaska Jackson, Brian Graves, Karrie King, Gloria Ines and Andrea Flowers) opens Sep 28 (8pm) and the ‘Roxane Gay’ cast (Liz Fenning, Bex Taylor-Klaus, Philip Smithey, Amy Tolsky, Naomi Rubin and Samira Beija) opens Sep 30 (8pm). Performances are Thu-Sat (8pm); Sun (2pm), through Nov 5. The Road’s 2023-24 Season continues with the West Coast premiere of “Mercury,” written by Steve Yockey, directed by Ann Hearn Tobolowsky. Closing the season will be two plays in repertory, the world premieres of “High Maintenance” by Peter Ritt & “Singularities Or The Computers Of Venus,” written and directed by Laura Stribling. All performances will at the Road Theatre, located in The NoHo Senior Arts Colony, 10747 Magnolia Blvd. in North Hollywood.dFor tickets and to view a complete schedule and more information, please call 818-761-8838 or visit www.RoadTheatre.org.
Seated: Kathi Barnes. Rear: Cecil Jennings, Mary Elisabeth Somers, Hogan Mason, Liv Denevi Photo by Garry Michael Kluger
Theatre West is presenting the premiere of “Walking in Space.” Inspired by true events, this fictionalized, autobiographical tragicomedy is an affectionate portrait of four siblings who arm themselves with fierce tenacity, good humor, and their love for one another to save their prescription drug addicted mother...and themselves. Written by Garry Michael Kluger, the cast includes Kathie Barnes, Andrew Cereghino, Liv Denevi, Cecil Jennings, Hogan Mason, David Mingrino and Mary Elisabeth Somers, directed by Arden Teresa Lewis. Opens Sep 8, continuing through Oct 8 (performs Fri & Sat, 8pm, Sun, 2pm. Theatre West is located at 3333 Cahuenga Blvd. West
Los Angeles, 90068. For tickets and more information, go here.
AROUND TOWN
Courtney Johnson (ROSALIND), Ryan Hollon (TOUCHSTONE), Ben Trotter (ORLANDO Michael Hardy Photography
Long Beach Playhouse is presenting William Shakespeare’s “As You Like It, written in 1599, taking place in the Forest of Arden. Director Michael Hernandez-Phillips has adapted the play, moving the forest to Central Park in the 1950s, “reimagining the Bard’s characters as street vendors and beatniks.” Instead of a royal court, Rosalind, Orlando, and a band of love-struck, eccentric characters flee the rigidness and paranoia of the 5th Avenue elite. The 12-member cast includes Courtney Johnson, Ben Trotter, Skylar Alexis, Ryan Hollon, Andy Justus, Zion Aguilar, Jared Gaxiola, Jacob Gerard Caldwell, Taylar Ann, Marco Estrada, David Clark Hutchison, and Jessica Plotkin. Opening Night is Sep 2, running through Sep 30. Long Beach Playhouse is located at 5021 E. Anaheim St., Long Beach, CA, 908. Tickets are available at www.lbplayhouse.org, or by calling 562-494-1014, option 1.
Akilah A. Walker Photo by Daniel Reichert
A Noise Within in Pasadena is presenting “The Bluest Eye.” “Three young Black girls in 1940s Ohio strive to make sense of love, sisterhood, abuse and hate,” adapted by Lydia R. Diamond from the novel by Toni Morrison. Stars Kamal Bolden, Julanne Chidi Hill, Crystal Jackson, Mildred Marie Langford, Alex Metz, Alex Morris, Kacie Rogers and Akilah A. Walker, directed by Andi Chapman. Opens Sep 2 (8pm) and Sep 3 (2pm). Performances continue Thu (7:30pm), Fri (8pm), Sat (2 & 8pm), Sun (2pm), through Sep 24. A Noise Within is located at 3352 E Foothill Blvd., Pasadena, 91107. For tickets and more information, go here.
SOLO MOJO AT HITF
Penny Peyser
Combined Artform’s The Hollywood Independent Theater Festival (HITF)is extending The 6th Act’s “Sonnets From Suburbia,” a one woman show with music, conceived and written by Penny Peyser, reflecting on modern life through her wry Elizabethan sonnets, as “she wrestles with her past demons, and refuses to emerge from her comfortable quarantine,” directed by Co-Artistic Directors Matthew Leavitt and Liza Seneca. Performances are Sep 6 (7pm) & Sep 20 (8:30pm) at Stephanie Feury Theatre (Main Space), 5636 Melrose Avenue, 90038. For tickets, go here.
Rainee Blake
HITF is also showcasing “Joni Mitchell: Take Me As I Am,” written and Performed by Rainee Blake, Sep 6 (8:30pm) at Stephanie Feury Studio. For tickets, go here.
Arts in Review, hosted by arts journalist Julio Martinez, celebrating the best in theater and cabaret in the Greater Los Angeles area, airs on KPFK90.7fm on Fridays (2-2:30pm), streamed live around the world in real time over KPFK.org.