The Theatre - Play Reviews

Rollin’ On The T.O.B.A.
by Archie Rothman
El Portal goes back to its theatrical roots with Rollin’ on the T.O.B.A. It’s very likely that the El Portal was formerly a 1920s-1930s vaudeville house that booked Negro talent via the T.O.B.A. short for Theatre Owners Booking Association. So it seems logical that El Portal would present, as its second mainstage attraction, this unique evocation of black vaudeville entertainment. This West Coast premiere of Rollin’ on the T.O.B.A. comes direct from Broadway where it played to sold out houses and rave reviews in ‘99. On the positive side it stars the original Broadway cast - the justifiably famous Sandra Reaves-Phillips (whose three best-selling cd’s were on sale in the lobby), Ronald “Smokey” Stevens, who conceived this entertainment and is co-author and co-director, Ted Levy, and piano playing David Alan Bunn, who is the musical director. Their artistry in comedy, song and dance bring to vivid life the best of show business past and the songs and talents of Duke Ellington, Fats Waller, Eubie Blake Bessie Smith, Bill “Bojangles” Robinson, Ma Rainey, Pigmeat Markham, Mobs Mabley and many more. On the negative side is the still-being-fixed sound system which left many of the funny patter and routines often hard to understand. Time will surely fix this problem and make the 399-seat El Portal Mainstage one of the finest mid-size theatres in the Southwest, with an arena-style seating arrangement that allows theatregoers to be be no further than 15 rows from the stage. But sound notwithstanding, this musical revue has the legendary performers, swingin’ songs, smokin’ tap dancing and sassy comedy to delight all audiences. But hurry, it closes April 9. (See listing)

Two Rooms
by Jennifer Pearson
Lee Blessing's play Two Rooms, which premiered at The Sanford Meisner Center and runs through April 22, is a gripping, powerfully driven, politically-saturated production that will leave you emotionally spent. The play opened here in NoHo on the anniversary of the Beirut kidnappings of CIA member William Buckley in 1984 and of reporter Terry Anderson a year later, and that in itself is a powerful statement. One thing you'll realize, if you haven't already by watching the television clips of real-life hostages Buckley and Anderson, is the frailty of life.
Two Rooms revolves around an American professor in Beirut who has been kidnapped, beaten and blind-folded by Shiite Muslims, and the wife who, having grown resentful of the state department's bureaucracy over the matter, takes her husband's study and turns it into a cell similar to the one in which he lies imprisoned. There she communicates with him, imagining his pain and his bleak surroundings.
Christopher Warren gives a compassionate performance as the broken, imprisoned husband Michael Wells, and Amy Henry is electrically charged as the deeply suffering, brooding wife Lainie. Wylie Small and Daniel Hutchison give strong performances as the state department official and the reporter, who are both 'just doing their jobs'.
Directed by Sarah Knight, the play follows a tightly crafted pace. Despite a couple slow moments in the first act, the pace was quick and fine throughout.

A Streetcar Named Desire
by Marjorie Joyce Hall
Bravo, bravo, Deaf West Theatre, for their rendition of Tennessee Williams' classic, A Streetcar Named Desire, which is nothing less than exquisite. As you take your seat, you are brought back in time to a hot summer day in New Orleans, the date '47.

The set, designed by Robert Steinberg, is complete from the cluttered bedroom with a day bed for Blanche peaking from the closet to the smudges on the door of the refrigerator. Ted. D. Schumacher delights with live and wonderful sounds of the trumpet.

Award-winning Suanne Spoke offers a troubled, lost and desperate rendition of Blanche Dubois, all the while signing the entire performance in American Sign Language. Spoke's performance is a pillar in the center of the story from which everyone else had place to draw. Troy M. Kotsur, playing Stanley Kowalski, brings a weak and instinct-driven Stanley to the stage and finds a way to cover his character's true nature with boisterous and overbearing behavior. Terrylene convincingly portrays Stella as the sister who truly loves Blanche, but is too obsessed with Stanley to put anyone else before him. Bob Hiltermann's Mitch has a certain class about him. He cares for Blanche but in the end does not have the strength to overcome his reactions to her past.

Director Deborah LaVine has executed a work of art. Her list of wonderful directorial choices converge to create this cohesive artistic experience called "A Street Car Named Desire." Great applause for the speaking actors. Each actor demonstrated successful manipulation of voice to develop their characters. Hats off to the entire production staff: sound, lighting, props and costumes--the work of a well-organized stage manager was clear.

Be sure to see this Tennessee Williams' tale about a dysfunctional family. One sister, Blanche, shattered by life, arrives to visit her sister, Stella. Blanche, hoping for a safe haven, discovers that Stella is married and pregnant by a man she considers less than desirable. He ultimately decides not to let Blanche stay with them. Blanche finds another man who might have saved her, but in the end he lets her down, and she is alone once again.

A Hunter’s Obituary
by Archie Rothman
Can a hunter’s obituary be wild and crazy? Go to Theatre West and find out. There’s a story that makes a play and a production like this possible. It starts over 50 years ago when those working in films and tv wanted to pursue their stage experience in a theatre of their own. Thus began Theatre West, making it one of the oldest non-profit “small” theatres in Los Angeles. That concept is still going strong today, as is evident by their current production of A Hunter’s Obituary. The playwright is Jason McGaffey, an active member of Theatre West who developed this play in Theatre West workshops and readings,utilizing the director Larry Travis and many of the present 9-member cast in its development. Then John Gallogly, Theatre West’s executive director decided to produce it and add it to his previous producing and directing of the theatre’s big hit, Steve Allen’s A Christmas Carol. Thus we have the world premiere of this unusual play about a hunter, Fernuckle McCragen (David Starwalt) and his adventurous life that’s taken him from a tropical forest of indigenous tribes to the Inuit territory of the frozen North to the office of obituary-writer Mel O’Grady (Debra Henri) where he supposedly dies from a murderous bullet. Who did it? This is the start of a strange, wild and crazy murder mystery that takes us back to Fernuckle’s adventures, with actors Kathy Bell Denton, Douglas Gabrielle, Anthony Battelle, Elizabeth Narrett, Richard Tatum, Jeanne Jackson and Lynn Pickett portraying fashion models, pygmies, savages, eskimos, icemen and hunters, to the present where the villain(s) are revealed. A Hunter’s Obituary plays 5 performances a week till its closing on April 19.

The Foreigner
by Archie Rothman
The Foreigner gets a funny welcome at Actors Co-
Op. One of the certainties of the local theatre scene is the quality productions from Actors Co-Op. With its stable of 60 professionals to draw upon, under the guidance of producing director Nan McNamara, this theatre always manages to stage accomplished entertainments. Ifs current production of The Foreigner is no exception. With the deft hand of director Henry Polic II this comedy by Larry Shue lives up to the comic strengths that have made it a country-wide favorite since it was produced in New York in 1986 where it ran for a record-breaking 700 performances. The plot centers around shy Charlie (Ted Rooney) who retreats to a Georgia hunting lodge where he pretends to not speak English to avoid speaking to strangers. Thinking the “foreigner” can’t understand them the lodge guests reveal themselves with surprising and hilarious results. The Foreigner plays at Actors Co-Op’s Crossley Theatre in Hollywood till April 9.

A “Nice” Family Gathering
by Archie Rothman
Group Rep Theatre continues to attract audience with A “Nice” Family Gathering. Through its long history Group Rep (now named Lonny Chapman’s Group Repertory Theatre to honor its founder and creative director) has achieved its greatest successes with domestic comedies and dramas. Now they are continuing that popular formula with the winner of a National Playwright competition in Minnesota, A “Nice” Family Gathering by one of the Group’s resident playwrights Phil Olson, the Norwegian-American who wrote the Group’s big Minnesotan comedy hit, Crappie Talk. Based on Olson’s own family the play begins with the first family gathering at the Lundeen house since Dad died. As the grown children come home to comfort Mom (Bobbie Snyder), Dad (Bert Kramer) appears as a ghost to Carl (Phil Olson) the middle son. Dad’s mission is to get Carl to tell mom what he neglected to do when he was alive, that he loved her. Carl also discovers things about his Dad’s greater love for him than for his older doctor brother Michael (Vince Cefalu), Michael’s barren wife (Mary Jo Niedzielski), his gay and pregnant sister (Kit Paraventi), and Mom’s twice-married suitor (Chris Winfield). Director Patrick Maloney, with a 25 year career of credits in over 100 stage and tv productions, skillfully keeps the interaction moving among the family members, with the actors giving uniformly superb performances, with Phil Olson and Bobbie Snyder especially effective as son and mother. When I complimented Olson on his actual tears during his dialogue with the play’s father, he revealed that he was still mourning the recent death of his own father, maybe explaining why Olson’s honored play has the ring of truth, the emotional power to move the audience.