Archive for the ‘Live Theater’ Category

by Bondo Wyszpolski

You might be an honest and law-abiding citizen, but would you fudge the truth if it meant sparing someone you love from losing their job or going to jail? Kenneth Lonergans’ “Lobby Hero” – onstage through March 21 at Pacific Stages in El Segundo – explores not one moral dilemma but several in this taut, well-crafted, four-person drama that takes place in the lobby of a high-rise apartment in New York City.

Breathing life into this tale that delves into concepts of self-perception, integrity, and the consequence of our actions is a fine cast directed by Robert Bailey.

Jeff, played by Edward Tournier, is a recently-hired security guard who works the late shift. He’s been described as a slacker, someone who hasn’t found himself. On the other hand, he’s easygoing and chatty and tends to say whatever comes to mind. I noticed that the paperback he’s been reading is Franny and Zooey, and if you think about the author of that book, and what else he’s written, you’ll gain even more insight into Jeff’s character.

The young man’s supervisor is an African-American named William (Kareem Ferguson) who has succeeded in pulling himself up by his bootstraps. If his bearing seems ramrod straight, keep in mind that it’s an extension of his aspirations and character. Jeff’s simplicity and lack of airs encourages William to open up a little. Another subject that “Lobby Hero” brushes against is how and why we confide in others; it is also, perhaps, about what happens when that confidence is betrayed, whether by accident or for personal gain or for revenge.

And so William confides to Jeff that his brother has been arrested for a heinous crime. He may be innocent, but probably isn’t. We never doubt that William is a person of strong moral fiber, who is prepared to see the chips fall where they may and justice run its course – until something convinces him that his brother will not receive a fair trial. All he has to do is provide an alibi for where his brother was that evening…

Meanwhile, two officers, Bill (Nick Mennell) and Dawn, his rookie partner (Dana Lynn Bennett), stop in at the high-rise. While Dawn waits downstairs, Bill goes up. The dynamics between the two police officers can be compared to that between William and Jeff. Where they begin to cross over – for clearly the uniform does not the person make – is when Jeff tells Dawn that Bill is having an affair, not simply visiting an old buddy. The young woman is shaken up, not only because Bill has been something of a mentor and role model, but because he has already made sexual advances to her and she has fallen for them, fallen for the sense of power he exudes and his bogus charm.
The consequences of Jeff’s aside to Dawn are immediate: Bill is furious and all but threatens Jeff for what he’d told Dawn about him – she spilled the beans instead of keeping Jeff’s words confidential. Mennell is very good at portraying a menacing, intimidating cop. When Bill launches into him, Jeff freezes up. If you’re sitting in the first couple of rows you’ll freeze up too.

Now, I don’t want “Lobby Hero” to sound like a grueling and oppressive night out. It’s anything but that! One of the beauties of the play, besides its nuanced and balanced dialogue, is that the intensity of one scene is often counterbalanced by dry wit and humor. There are many funny moments that make the viewer laugh and smile, and they often emerge when we least expect them.

Eventually, all four characters are entangled in the same web, but one key aspect concerns how each of them sees him- or herself with regard to family or upbringing. Jeff continually cites his father, a Navy man, with whom he had a love-hate relationship. Dawn often mentions her parents, William his brother, and Bill the tightly-woven clique of his fellow (male) officers. My guess is that it’s no coincidence that the two most similar – and yet dissimilar – characters are named William and Bill. Probably both of them are or were called William and Bill, but Bill is more informal, and less stiff, while William might be what a Bill would call himself if he wanted to be taken more seriously.

The issues this play examines are never quite black and white, and in fact the canvas is simply an array of gray shadings. Jeryll Adler and Pacific Stages have delivered everything they’ve been promising, giving the South Bay a thought-provoking work of substance, solidly written, well-acted (Tournier in particular makes a tough assignment look easy), and riveting. They didn’t go for a known quantity with their first offering, but they could hardly have made a better choice with which to announce their arrival. This is a class act.

Lobby Hero is onstage through March 21 at Pacific Stages, 2041 Rosecrans Ave., No. 170, El Segundo (across the plaza from Pacific Theatres), with performances Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m., Saturday at 3 p.m., and Sunday at 5 p.m. Tickets, $34.99 general; $25 students. (310) 868-2631 or go to pacificstages.org. ER

by Bondo Wyszpolski

If you gathered up all of the musicals that the Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities has produced during its almost 20 years, and you put them into one great big pile, “Bark! The Musical!” would be the runt of the litter. All bark; no bite.

There isn’t a story or plot, but rather a flimsy pretext: In the first act, Dane Biren as Rocks, the new pup in town, is dropped off at Deena’s Doggie Daycare, where five other canines have been boarded. Each has its little doggie bed on one of the tiers of the set, while the onstage combo placed to the right provides live accompaniment. Visually and musically, it works well.

The problem with Rocks is that he can’t bark, so the other dogs help him out. And that, boys and girls, is pretty much it.

Because there’s nothing here that approaches a narrative, it’s unlikely that the viewer will empathize with the characters. For example, Harrison White plays King – the old gray mare of the pack – and toward the end of the show he delivers a somber but sappy dirge about how his boy-owner Billy promised him the world when they were both young, but later ran off and presumably married a cat lover, and now King is ready to croak. Which he does.

Unfortunately, King’s demise isn’t moving because the show’s creators haven’t given us a good reason why we should be moved. They’ve just provided a diverse collection of trite songs that try to be lyrically clever, and so the whole thing condenses into a musical revue that’s jazzed up to some extent with a string of high school skits.

Maybe grade school, when we consider that the second tune, its subject fairly obvious, is called “Whizzin’ on Stuff.” Biren sings this one – and I hope that by now someone has pulled him aside to say how foolish he looks (no offense intended; I’ve seen him in other plays and he’s a credible actor). The third number is called “Three Bitches,” and it’s sung (naturally) by the trio of girl dogs – Jessica Gisin as Golde, Janet Krupin as Chanel, and Shanna Marie Palmer as Boo – in high-pitched Betty Boop voices that’s reminiscent of a bad moment out of “Little Shop of Horrors.” The additional actor not mentioned, Justin Michael Wilcox as Sam, looks like he was headed off to an audition for “West Side Story” but made a wrong turn.

Of the trite songs that try to be clever, a couple of them succeed, in particular “Il Cane dell’ Opera,” sung by the high-strung and spoiled diva Chanel (her owner was into opera – clearly Poochini). Krupin has an agile, versatile voice, and pulls this one off, with all the antics that go with it, rather nicely.

Costumes? The actors don’t wear any, just fluffy knee pads and wrist bands and so on. It’s not enough. They never impress us as canines, just retarded human beings.

Which is too bad, and which I state with much regret, because all of them – and especially Palmer who sort of looks like Stevie Nicks in “Rhiannon” mode – give spirited performances. We can even applaud the martyred director, Stephanie Coltrin.

Sometimes the choreography edges into the impressive from the ho-hum, but at the end one has only a two-word (So what?) or three-word (What’s the point?) response.

It’s possible that “Bark!” is better suited for the Hermosa Beach Playhouse, where it would have been more intimate and taken less of a bite out of the pocketbook. But, like “The Green Room,” another dog that the company tried to one-over on us, it would still have been a clunker.

No one goes to a musical expecting to be educated or to gain profound insights into human behavior, but neither does anyone go expecting their intelligence to be insulted with pure drivel. Unless you’re looking to acquire a bad case of cultural food poisoning, turn around and run: This doggerel should be avoided at all cost.

Bark! The Musical! thankfully closes on Sunday, but in the meantime is being staged through Saturday at 8 p.m., with 2 p.m. matinees on Saturday and Sunday. Tickets, $45 to $60. Call (310) 372-4477 or go to civiclightopera.com. ER

by Tom Fitt
Ahhhhh, dogs. Man’s best friend – especially if you like your friends defecating on the living room carpet. I had a gray hound named Lion (thanks, William Faulkner). He didn’t hunt bears. Actually, he was slow to find his feeding bowl. The Weimeraner didn’t bring me the newspaper; he didn’t bring me my slippers (probably because he had already ingested the left one). The only treasures he deposited at my feet were small, gnawed-upon rodents and cat excrement he discovered in the front yard. But, give him credit, he was extremely proud of his gift deliveries.

The Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities (CLOSBC) is offering a tribute to the furry beasts, tonight through Feb. 28. “Bark! The Musical” is Executive Producer James Blackman’s unspoken revenge on an Andrew Lloyd Webber show that portrayed a different breed of four-legged foot warmers, the ones who cough up fur balls and sing insipidly boring songs. The cover of the original cast recording of “Bark” (2004) refers to the show as “The Musical That Does It Doggie Style.” Thankfully, the pups haven’t the language facility to read The Kama Sutra, but they do like the pictures. They are in black and white.
Certainly, all involved with CLOSBC must be thrilled at the generous endorsement of this new production provided in the Feb. 1 edition of New York magazine.

The cover story is entitled “The Rise of Dog Identity Politics,” by John Homans. Okay, perhaps the story is not an homage to our local theater, but the timing is perfect and Blackman should consider messengering a box of Milk Bones to the scribe. Large sized biscuits, of course, as both Homans and Blackman are big dogs. The writer describes his dog Stella as “an elegant creature… with the runway model’s trick of looking simultaneously gorgeous and ridiculous.” Sounds like my ex-wife. He continues: “While highly vocal, with a booming baritone bark and a complex secret language of whines and growls, she’s not notably articulate.” This is my ex-wife. Homans also cites a 2008 study that found “a man with a dog had a much better chance of getting a woman’s phone number than one without.” Same can be said about a pencil.

“Bark’s” music is written by David Troy Francis; lyrics by Gavin Geoffrey Dillard and Robert Schrock. The show ran for two years at the Coast Playhouse in West Hollywood, making it the third-longest running theater piece in L.A. history. It received a Critics’ Choice award from the L.A. Times and was nominated for several Drama Circle awards.

“Bark” explores the daily lives of six canines residing at Deena’s Doggie Daycare. I think I stayed there once. Room service sucked, but the breakfast kibbles were tasty. As is the case with real pooches, our characters have definitive personalities. With the show in rehearsal last week, I was given free leash to interview CLOSBC’s artistic director and director of the production, Stephanie Coltrin, and three of the pups.

Howl at the room
How did Coltrin and the powers at CLOSBC come to decide upon “Bark”?
“The authors had done a rewrite and we went to a reading of it in Hollywood about a year ago. All of us at CLOSBC are dog people and we were so completely charmed with it. We loved that it is a small show – only six performers – and for those of us who have dogs, and even if you don’t, it’s first of all hilarious seeing the dogs being personified. It also confirms the feelings you have about your pet that they are more human than not,” said Coltrin. “I have a dog, and James (Blackman) has a dog, our accountant has a dog, the subscription manager has four dogs. Basically we all have dogs.”

In preparing for the show, Coltrin explained that David Troy Francis encourages wide interpretation of the musical he conceived.

“The characters are not really written into the script, so we are in the process of creating these characters.”

On the production side, Coltrin said CLOSBC has expanded the band from the original single keyboard player to a group of five, under the direction of Daniel Gary Busby.

Great Dane
Versatility is a great asset for an actor. Dane Biren appears in “Bark” as the Jack Russell named “Rocks.” Just a couple months earlier, he played a college teacher in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?” at the Hermosa Beach Playhouse. Prof to pup? Most would not consider this to be a giant leap.

With true Stanislavskian diligence, Biren takes his work home with him.
“I have a dog,” said Biren. “He’s a funny mutt, kinda like the Jack Russell I’m playing, but I’m not even sure what kind of dog he is. It’s fun doing character study for a show like this because you can sit at home and watch your pet do nothing.”
As a point of reference, my present pooch – Woody – does exactly that when ESPN televises the Westminister Kennel Club’s annual show. It’s a weekend of serious leg humping as handlers parade the Afghans across the screen.

Biren explains Rocks’ character: “It’s the first day of puppy care, and I’m new, so I’m just taking the excitement of everything that’s new and experiencing all of the wonderment. That’s how I’m approaching it: everything is brand, brand new. Rocks is kinda guided as to how to be a dog and find his own way. I’m like the student.”

Royalty rules
Regal titles make for good doggie names. I’ve owned a Prince, a King, a Duke and a Queenie. The male Rottweiler wasn’t crazy about the last name, but he adapted quickly, learning to urinate without lifting his leg.
Harrison White plays King, “the oldest dog; the alpha dog,” he said. “I think of him as a chocolate Labrador. It’s a fun part and a fun journey, and we’re just getting into it. The music is fantastic; we’re just now beginning to focus on each others’ characters. It’s the quintessential answer to ‘Cats,’ I think.”

White is presently dogless due to living conditions, “but I really want one; a mid-sized dog. I’ve actually gone as far as going down to the pound and looking at dogs, that’s how much I want one.”
White sees King as strong, but also lovable. “He’s probably the leader of the pack, but he wants some nurturing.”

Poodle envy
Do poodles have green eyes? Regardless of her pedigree, Janet Krupin is no barker. Her character, Chanel, is an opera singing diva with an attitude. Have you ever met a poodle sans attitude? Have you ever met an opera singer… nevermind. The beaded dog collar is a most appropriate accoutrement for this coiffed purebred.

This is Krupin’s first appearance at CLOSBC, with or without the bejeweled throat prop.
“I’m the high maintenance one of the bunch. She just has a zest for the joie de vive, the finer things,” said Krupin.

The young Seattle-born actress has never owned a dog (“my father was allergic”) “but I know what kind of dog I would have: a Husky. I like big dogs and I can see myself running along the beaches in Seattle with my Husky dog.”

Are there leash laws in Seattle?

Krupin looks forward to the vocals, as well she should. She most definitely has the pipes. Check her out on YouTube.

“I believe the original cast album only had a keyboard; we’re going to have a few more musicians and we’re redoing quite a bit of the show. It will be exciting to see it on a bigger stage – our new and improved ‘Bark!’”

Also appearing in the show are Justin Michael Wilcox as Sam, Shanna Marie Palmer as Boo, and Jessica Gisin as Golde. Karl Warden is choreographer.

Rawhide chewy bones and arguably fresh toilet water will be available for gnawing and lapping at the show’s intermission.

‘Bark! The Musical,’ in previews tonight and tomorrow, and opening on Saturday at the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, 1935 Manhattan Beach Blvd., corner of Aviation. Performances Tuesday through Saturday at 8 p.m.; Saturday matinees Feb. 20 and 27, at 2 p.m.; Sunday matinees Feb. 14, 21 and 28 at 2 p.m. Tickets, $45-$60. Closes Feb. 28. Call (310) 372-4477 or visit civiclightopera.com. ER

Bill Maher appears at the Comedy & Magic club this week. Photo by David Shankbone

by Tom Fitt

“New Rules: Just because a country elects a smart President doesn’t make it a smart country,” said Bill Maher. “A few weeks ago, I was asked by Wolf Blitzer if I thought Sarah Palin could get elected President, and I said I hope not, but I wouldn’t put anything past this stupid country. It was amazing – in the minute or so between my calling America stupid and the end of the Cialis commercial, CNN was flooded with furious e-mails and the twits hit the fan. And you could tell these people were really mad because they wrote entirely in CAPITAL LETTERS! It’s how they get the blood circulating when the Cialis wears off.

“Worst of all, Bill O’Reilly refuted my contention that this is a stupid country by calling me a pinhead, which A) proves my point, and B) is really funny coming from a doody-face like him.”

That’s what stand-up comedian and social commentator Bill Maher in the Huffington Post on Aug. 7, 2009. The Post is an Internet vehicle to which one responds by typing only with his/her left hand.

Maher appears Tuesday night at the Comedy & Magic Club in Hermosa Beach. Right turns into the parking lot will be strictly forbidden.

In a story by Hector Salanda in the San Antonio Express News on Jan. 26 (prior to a Maher concert), the comedian claims to be a throwback to Jack Paar, Dick Cavett, David Susskind and Tom Snyder, TV talk-show hosts who took time with their guests and issues.

But the star of HBO’s Real Time With Bill Maher also says when he’s doing his stand-up act, deeper topics — from the healthcare debate to the economy to Afghanistan to global terrorism — take a back seat to the laughs.
“Stand-up comedy is the kind of thing where you don’t want to screw around with people. You want to make them laugh really hard,” Maher said. “You want to make their face hurt.”

Maher gained fame as the host of Politically Incorrect, which aired on the Comedy Central television network and later ABC.

Just six days before his weekly series returns for its eighth season, the live comedy special “Bill Maher…But I’m Not Wrong” showcases on HBO with an hour of stand-up comedy on Feb. 13.

Bill Maher, Comedy & Magic Club, 1918 Hermosa Ave., Hermosa Beach. Tuesday, Feb. 9, 8 p.m. Tickets, $40. Call 310-372-1193 or visit comedyandmagicclub.com. ER

by Ally Van Deuren

What makes British farce so humorous? Is it the slamming doors, the screwball circumstances and chaos, the saucy subject matter, or just the actors themselves? You’ll find the answer in the Norris Theatre’s production of “No Sex Please, We’re British,” which combines all these elements and more, to deliver the quintessential bedroom farce.

Written in 1971 by Alistair Foot and Anthony Marriot, this wildly entertaining comedy ran for almost a decade to packed audiences in London’s West End. The plot involves two newlyweds (Frances and Peter Hunter) who live in an apartment above the bank at which the groom is employed. Frances innocently sends a mail-order for some Scandinavian glassware, but instead, receives pornographic photos, films and books. All hell breaks loose as the panic-stricken couple and a hapless bank clerk attempt to hide the sexy material from the groom’s meddling mother who is visiting. Complicating matters even more are Peter’s prudish boss, the police superintendent, an insomniac bank inspector, and two “working” women from the Scandinavian pornography company.

There is a scattering of sexual innuendo and mildly racy situations, but it’s all in good fun. Although such adult humor may be commonplace now, it is easy to forget how risqué and even scandalous this show was considered 40 years ago, and parents are best advised to leave the kids at home.

Each actor brings a lively energy and impeccable timing to his or her part, and there is not a weak performance in the bunch. Portraying Frances and Peter Hunter are Rebecca Morris and Brian Stanton, who play off each other’s kookiness and frantic demeanor perfectly. Struck with the most hullabaloo of all is Jason Hammond, who plays Peter’s eccentric, bumbling assistant, Brian. Hammond’s knack for physical comedy suits his character well and he brings a certain lovable geeky quality to the part. Kudos also for the elaborate set, complete with unique adornments and special mod touches from the British pop era of the late ‘60s.

Walking out of the theater, I had to screw my brain back into its original position. I kept asking myself, what other hysterical shenanigans could have possibly happened? In fact, the action moves so quickly that one doesn’t even have time to concentrate on the absurdity of the plot. It’s quirky all around, including the funky scene change music, which was a crowd favorite. Although “No Sex Please, We’re British” may have the most appeal to an audience with a penchant for somewhat maturely-themed humor, there were loud guffaws coming from all sections of the theater throughout the performance.

Brilliantly directed by Todd Nielsen and produced by James Gruessing, this play takes slapstick situation comedy to an entirely new level and brings forth a mother lode of laughter. Watch all six doors — you never know what will happen next in this seemingly innocent British apartment.

No Sex Please, We’re British plays tomorrow and Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. in the Norris Theatre, 27570 Crossfield Drive, Rolling Hills Estates. Tickets, $38. Call (310) 544-0403 or go to norriscenter.com. ER

by Bondo Wyszpolski
“I had a lot of the same preconceived notions about Los Angeles that a lot of New Yorkers have,” says Jeryll Adler, “which is that it is a vast intellectual wasteland. But as a friend of mine said, ‘That’s what they say to keep people from coming here.’ Once you get here, you discover it’s like any place else; and you find your own community. For me, my community was always about the intellectual pursuit. I was always attracted to an academic and entertainment environment.”
Oh? Then what’s she doing in the South Bay?
Jeryll Adler is the founder and executive director of Pacific Stages, a budding theater group with immense ambitions. For the past several years Adler has nurtured a loosely-formed alliance of actors, directors and writers, and they have presented staged readings of new or lesser known plays in various locations throughout the beach cities.
What’s recently changed for Pacific Stages is that it has a temporary home in the Continental Development building that’s just across the plaza from Pacific Theatres on Rosecrans in El Segundo. The company’s inaugural production – Kenneth Lonergan’s “Lobby Hero” – is in previews starting this evening, with an opening night performance and reception set for Saturday, Feb. 13.
Finding promise in the desert?
An actress in her youth, with previous experience in running a theater and producing plays, Adler, 54, has spent the past quarter century selling and buying advertising for entertainment and media companies. She founded the marketing department for IndieWire, and for the past seven years has been a sales consultant for the Arthouse Marketing Group, which means that she represents the Laemmle theater chain among other high-end clients. She’s been living in California for 10 years now, first in Santa Monica and more recently in Torrance and Redondo Beach.
When she lived at Bay and Main in Santa Monica she used to bicycle to and from Herondo Street, on the border of Redondo and Hermosa Beach. That was how she became familiar with the area, which doesn’t mean Adler was impressed, culturally speaking.
“What I saw in the South Bay was a complete dearth of anything that appealed to me,” she says.
Well, the Bijou was gone, Either/Or was gone, the Insomniac was gone.
Having bought her first house here, but in between jobs, Adler had time to look around and to think about what she wanted to pursue. As she points out, she was alone (no immediate family on the West Coast) and didn’t know anyone. So she asked herself, “What can I do to become part of the community, and what can I do to contribute to the community? And I thought, Well, I’ll build a theater.” She laughs. “And quite frankly, Bondo, that’s how it came to be. That’s about as short a version as I can come up with. I started opening my mouth and talking to people and saying this is what I want to do.”
Adler isn’t dumb. It couldn’t have taken her long to realize that the South Bay isn’t a hub of cultural excitement, and many of her friends in the theater community weren’t encouraging. Even David Emmes, the head of South Coast Repertory Theatre, looked askance. “Your first problem,” he told her, “is that you’re at the beach and you have a 12-mile radius, and half your audience is in the ocean.”
Even so, Adler was sure – and is sure – that the South Bay needs and wants a theater that can go head-to-toe with the Geffen in Westwood and the Taper in downtown Los Angeles. Just last week we might have included the Pasadena Playhouse as well.
“I looked around and said, I can’t be the only person who lives here and feels this way. And the more I met people and talked to them, and said what I wanted to do, the more I discovered that, yes, there was a desire for this. The biggest challenge was that there was no precedent for it. You had to invent the wheel, because ‘Nunsense’ and ‘Smokey Joe’s Café’ do not a theater audience build. That’s an entertainment audience. A real theater audience, like South Coast Rep, that’s what my model is.”
An informal history of theater in the South Bay would reveal that numerous homegrown theater companies have sprung up over the years and some – like the PV Players and the Actors’ Repertory Theatre – enjoyed a moderate success. Francesca Beach had a vision for quality theater at the Cultural Arts Center in Torrance but the city failed to back her. Hermosa’s Second Story Theatre, which gave us a few edgy plays by Angelo Masino, seems to have become dormant. More recently, Brady Schwind staged a number of fine productions at the Neighborhood Playhouse in Palos Verdes Estates, but the last show was back in July. Naturally, I’m not forgetting James Blackman, who has the middlebrow market sewn up with the Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities and the Hermosa Playhouse. His meat and potatoes have always been the splashy tried-and-true Broadway musical, but it would be unfair to say that he never takes chances. He gave us world premieres by Dale Wasserman and Ray Cooney, which counts for something even if the works themselves were marginal.
Very little of this, however, would impress or deter Jeryll Adler.

Mission statement
When asked to give her personal definition of quality theater, Adler replies that it’s “the theatrical version of a literary novel. What appeals to me is great story, great character. Great theater is something that provokes you. It makes you a little uncomfortable, it makes you think.
“It needs to entertain you as well; it can’t be provocation for the sake of provocation. When you walk into the theater you do want to be entertained, you do what to be occupied and entranced and involved for that couple of hours that you’re sitting there. The bonus is also when it has you wanting to think and talk and it stimulates you; maybe it has you thinking differently than when you walked in. That to me is much more interesting, and that’s something that I think contemporary entertainment has too often lost sight of. I like a great musical as much as the next person, but if that’s all you’re giving me I’m bored to death.”
I’m with you there, Jeryll; that’s why I’m Easy Reader’s pompom girl for Long Beach Opera and last week covered their production of “The Good Soldier Schweik.” But what is it exactly that Adler would like to see staged?
“The mission for the theater is to do the early and lesser known works of the best American playwrights.”
During our conversation, which took place over the course of an hour or two at the company’s facilities in El Segundo, slight variations of this key sentence appeared several times. It’s the company’s mantra.
What this means is that Pacific Stages intends to give us our dose of Arthur Miller and Thornton Wilder, but instead of “The Death of a Salesman” and “Our Town” they’ll dig deeper into the archives and pull up, for example, the former’s “The Ride Down Mount Morgan” and the latter’s “The Angel that Troubled the Waters.” In fact, these works were among the 30 or so plays that were done as readings over the past few years.
Quite simply, Adler says, “I’m trying to build a category of theater that doesn’t exist here, and I don’t want to do the same-old, same-old.” To use one of her favorite words, she wants to “leverage” a familiar name with an unfamiliar title. That’s somewhat of a provocative idea in itself, but as someone pointed out to me, maybe there’s a reason why these early or lesser known plays are obscure. It may be an unfounded suspicion, the idea that little known is a synonym for second-rate, but it’s going to enter people’s minds. They’ll need to be convinced it isn’t necessarily true.
The second part of the mission – and this is being exemplified by “Something Happened,” by L. Trey Wilson, which opens March 20 – is to nurture work by the next generation of playwrights, young men and women who’ve written at most a handful of plays but who tend to be under the radar.
My impression is that the ratio of name brand author to fledgling author may be one to one, but that it’s an equation not yet fixed in stone. Robert Bailey, who is both the associate artistic director of Pacific Stages and the director of the company’s inaugural production, “Lobby Hero,” emphasizes – in a separate conversation – their commitment to producing at least one premiere each season, “so that people know [we’re] also serious about bringing on new writers.
“It’s good and healthy for the theater to have relationships with up and coming writers,” he continues, “and perhaps we could even start to commission works by them.”
Bailey says he tips his hat to other companies that incur the risk that comes with presenting plays and playwrights no one’s heard of:
“Part of our duty to the art form is to make sure there’s new work. If a theater company can’t provide the platform for the development of new work, and audiences for new work, how are the new writers going to break out? We’re committed to doing that, but at the same time we would like to know that we’re able to continue to attract a strong audience every season, and you have to achieve that mix.”
The biggest challenge, as he knows, and as Jeryll Adler even says in so many words, is to get people through the door.
Theater in the South Bay has tended towards the conservative, I tell Bailey. We see productions at El Camino College, in the Manhattan Beach Community Church, at the Norris Theatre, and in the Westchester Playhouse, but by and large feathers aren’t ruffled. The Aerospace Players and the Torrance Theatre Company stage familiar work and sometimes it’s well done, but the consistency that makes a particular ensemble or group stand out above the rest just isn’t there.
“I hear the word conservative being applied to the community fairly often,” Bailey continues, “and it always makes me wonder. It seems to be a fairly diverse area when you put together the beach communities and then the very upscale R.P.V., and at the same time you’ve got Torrance and Hawthorne and El Segundo.
“It’s going to be interesting to see over time what kind of audiences we’re able to bring in, and maybe we’ll be clever enough to figure out ways to bring in audiences that would never ordinarily set foot in such a theater.”

Land ho!
A couple of years ago, Jeryll Adler made contact with Richard Lundquist, who heads up Continental Development. They’re the folks who developed Plaza El Segundo, which is the spacious shopping center – anchored by Whole Foods and Borders and other such businesses – on the northeast corner of Rosecrans and Sepulveda. Despite its name, Plaza El Segundo is actually the first phase, and Continental Development has a second phase in the works. Somehow – her bulldog tenaciousness, perhaps? – Adler convinced Lundquist that the area needed a resident theater, having already decided that El Segundo was actually an ideal location.
In pitching her idea for a theater, Adler said, “It’s all about the quality. We won’t know if there’s an audience for this unless we try. But the only way to do it is to do it with the best. And I feel confident I can attract the best.”
Having already staged numerous readings – and some of them with accomplished individuals like Stephen Wadsworth and Shannon Cochran and Chris Pine and Dana Delaney – couldn’t have hurt.
“It’s often easier for people on the Westside to get here than to get down to the Ahmanson or the Taper. It’s an ideal setup for what I call the cultural corridor. One of my models for a great way to do culture is Bergamot station in Santa Monica.”
By cultural corridor, Adler means the kind of mixed-use space that includes art galleries and art house movie theaters, with a midsize, stand-alone theater (although she doesn’t say this outright) being somewhat of the flagship enterprise.
Lundquist then donated land – a parcel in the upcoming second phase of development – to be used by Pacific Stages to build their theater.
Why would he do a thing like that? Coming from a family that owns commercial properties in northern New Jersey, Adler knew why. “I understand what a public benefit component is,” she says, “and when you do large-scale development the cities that you do business with require you to do a certain percentage of allocation for public use.”
Do you see where this is going?
Adler’s intention has never been to remain a 99-seat theater, the kind that depends on volunteers and that barely scrapes by. A lot of actors get stuck in places like that. “It’s disrespectful to the artist, and I think it’s disrespectful to the work,” she says. “My goal was never to end up there; my goal was to start there as my proving ground. And all of a sudden I found myself in the position of being offered the land.”
On the wall behind her is an architect’s rendering of the hoped for facility, inside and out. Adler understands that if people see and are aware of these illustrations they’ll know exactly what it is the company is working towards.

Making choices
Until now, it had all been stage readings, but now it was time to act, and to act fast.
“We got the lease on Nov. 10,” Adler says. “We didn’t have a season because we didn’t know we were getting the space. So all of a sudden we found ourselves scrambling to make choices and to see if rates were available. Normally, theaters plan their seasons at least two years in advance. We had a few weeks.”
The space, formerly a retail outlet for a phone company, will be in the hands of Pacific Stages until at least the end of April, this being another generous offering on behalf of Richard Lundquist and Continental Development. With its natural lobby, a large “auditorium” and several “backstage” rooms, the interior was easily convertible. A set of sturdy risers was constructed in just eight days. Clearly, the company didn’t waste any time.
Although this is the inaugural season, it’s also something of a mini-season since it has just two plays to start with. Adler says that she and Robert Bailey and artistic director Brendan Fox first considered the 30 plays that had been done as readings. “Then we looked more closely. How recently have these plays been produced? How many actors were in the cast? Were the rights available?”
Within three weeks they’d narrowed their choices to Kenneth Lonergan’s “Lobby Hero” and L. Trey Wilson’s “Something Happened.” “Lonergan has one of the best ears for dialogue of any contemporary playwright,” Adler says, pointing out that the company had done a reading of the same author’s “This is Our Youth.” When she mentions that, in retrospect, “Lobby Hero” wasn’t as lesser known as she had hoped – going back to the company’s mission statement of early and lesser known plays by American playwrights – it’s hard not to smile. I can’t imagine very many people slapping their foreheads and saying, Oh, Jesus, not another Lonergan!
It was Bailey who first came across “Lobby Hero” and then spoke about it to Fox, who was familiar with the play from his days at the Old Globe Theatre in La Jolla. Fox concurred that with its small cast and tight set it seemed like a good choice.
“It’s funny, it’s moving, it has a moral quandary at the center of it,” Bailey says. “It’s got an edge to it, a distinctly Manhattan edge. But because it’s Kenneth Lonergan – a lot of people are familiar with his film ‘You Can Count on Me’ – it’s a compassionate piece about flawed people. It has a lot of resonance for the ambiguous situations people often find themselves in. Sometimes it’s difficult to make the right decision. I’m hoping that people take away the serious intent of the playwright but have a real good time with these characters, because Lonergan has created a lot of comedy around a pretty serious subject.”
And it’s a fairly intense play as well, judging from the few minutes of rehearsals this writer was able to catch. It stars Dana Lynn Bennett as Dawn, Kareem Ferguson as William, Nick Mennell as Bill, with Edward Tournier as the Holden Caulfield-like Jeff.
The second work that Pacific Stages will showcase “probably got the biggest reaction I’ve ever seen at any of our readings,” Adler says. “We were all in love with Trey’s play, and I said to him: God willing, I will be in a position to produce this before anybody else wants to.”
Adler doesn’t give away the plot behind “Something Happened,” but says that “there are parents who discover something about their son that makes them uncomfortable, and [this] calls everybody’s relationships into question. They all have to look very closely at the question of love. Do we love somebody because of what they are in their entirety, or in spite of who they are? If it’s in spite of who they are that’s a very sad thing.”
Wilson, who has been recognized by L.A. critics for his writing, will direct his own play.

Forging ahead“It might have been my idea,” says Jeryll Adler, “it might be my energy that’s driving it forward, but this became ‘we’ a long time ago. I believe that we fulfill a need. This project has given me what I hoped for, which is a sense of purpose in the community and for this community. I feel very blessed that I have the ability to imagine something and that other people are helping me build that. I can’t imagine a greater gift; when we had our first read-through I almost cried.
“The arts,” she says, provide and instill a sense of persistence and purpose. “They offer us a place to learn how to follow through, to develop our soul, to develop our heart, and our public systems are just being drained of the arts and sports programs that are so critical to children’s development. It’s also critical to the soul of the community. Great communities don’t stay great unless they embrace the arts in their backyard.”
Lobby Hero opens in previews at 8 p.m. tonight, with an opening reception set for Saturday, Feb. 13. Performances, Thursday through Saturday at 8 p.m., with Saturday matinees at 3 p.m. and Sunday shows at 5 p.m. Pacific Stages is located in the Continental Development building across from Pacific Theatres at 2041 Rosecrans Ave., El Segundo. Tickets, $34.99 general; $25 students; $50 season pass. This week there’s a 30 percent discount (coupon code PSWKONE). Free parking. Through March 14. Something Happened opens March 20. Call (310) 868-2631 or go to pacificstages.org. ER

by Bondo Wyszpolski
When brilliant composers die young, whether it’s Bizet or Gershwin and especially Mozart, people wonder what they might have accomplished had they lived longer. Robert Kurka died in 1957, at age 35, before the premiere of his sole opera, “The Good Soldier Schweik,” which was commissioned and performed by New York City Opera. It’s based on the 1923 novel of the same name by Jaroslav Hasek, an author who also died young – at age 39 – having completed just four of the projected six parts of the book.
“The Good Soldier Schweik” is an anti-war satire that reflects the author’s own experiences during World War I, in particular that of fighting for a cause that isn’t near and dear – in this case precipitated by the assassination of Archduke Ferdinand of Austria. Schweik is an Everyman, somewhat calmly wandering from one calamity or sticky situation to another, and we never know for sure if he’s a little soft in the head or blissfully optimistic that things will work out in the end. In a way, he’s the focusless focal point, and in Long Beach Opera’s production he’s performed by the much talented Matthew DiBattista.
Although Kurka himself was of Czech descent, he was born and raised in America, and his opera – with a libretto by Lewis Allen – was written in English. Most notably, it calls to mind the work of Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht (“The Three-Penny Opera,” “The Rise and Fall of the City of Mahagonny”) as well as “Cabaret.” Here, it bounces from the tavern to the asylum to the field infirmary. The broad comic action is bolstered by lively, brassy music – literally, for there are no strings – and military marches and fanfares and Czech-like folk melodies drift in and out.
The staging suits this sort of carnivalesque atmosphere, minimal and avant-garde and frequently as zany as a runaway college theater production, but then again this is characteristic of the company itself, which can resemble a puppy-like underdog. Their recent offerings – Janacek’s “The Cunning Little Vixen” and Carl Orff’s “The Clever One” – were in the same vein.
By itself, such craziness would grow tiresome, but what punctuates “The Good Soldier Schweik” are the heartfelt arias that often emerge from the wreckage of the previous scene, as if everyone has cleared out of Vulcan’s forge and now the place is quiet.
The cast, many of whom have performed previously with the company, seem comfortable working with one another. I wish I could write about them all, for instance Peabody Southwell as the Baronin v. Botzenheim, looking like she stepped out of a canvas by Fragonard, or the exasperated Lieutenant Lukasch as sung and acted by Jeremy Huw Williams. It’s all highly entertaining, and yet there’s a lingering poignancy when we think of Schweik at the end of the story, laying down his rifle and walking away, who knows where and to what fate.
The Good Soldier Schweik, which played last Saturday at the Center Theatre in Long Beach, is being performed at 4 p.m. on Saturday at Barnum Hall, 601 Pico Blvd., Santa Monica. The company’s artistic director, Andreas Mitisek, conducts. Stage direction and choreography is by Ken Roht, and the set is designed by Justin Jorgensen. Tickets, $45 to $95. Call (562) 432-5934 or go to longbeachopera.org. ER

by Tom Fitt
Weather forecast for the next two weeks in Hermosa Beach:
Funny.
Fritz Coleman, after 26 years as the premier precipitation prognosticator at NBC4 television in Los Angeles, makes viewers believe he knows what’s on the horizon. In this particular case, he’s promising calm skies, light traffic and a couple hours of laughter with a one-man show beginning Jan. 19 at the Hermosa Beach Playhouse entitled “On the Fritz – An Evening With Fritz Coleman.” Can you guess who’s starring?
Comedy and weather make for a perfect marriage. What can be funnier than driving on a rain-soaked, oil-splattered San Diego Freeway during a February downpour? I wet myself laughing whenever I see a jackknifed 18-wheeler on its side spilling a load of rutabagas across five lanes.
Fortunately, Coleman recognizes the humor in life, even given his Aeolusian on-air schedule. (Aeolus is the Greek god of winds, just to save you a Google search. As omnipresent as Coleman is on our TVs, it would be presumptuous to compare him to Zeus, the god that’s really the weather boss. Thank you, James Joyce.)
“I’m not only here in L.A.,” says Coleman. “About six months ago my responsibilities expanded. Now I’m the weekday weather forecaster at NBC in San Diego. I’m doing two stations, five days a week. It’s about a 12-hour day.”
San Diego? Can’t you just put it on a loop and run it 360 days per year? You know, high 77, low 59, sunny…
“I say that San Diego weather is like L.A. weather on Prozac. Thank god it’s not a whole different climate to worry about,” says Coleman. “I’m just very thankful to be employed in my kind of work.”
Fritz broadcasts the San Diego segments from the Channel 4 studios in Burbank, so he’ll not likely be required to negotiate renegade rutabagas in the rain next month.Stand-up and cheer
Christmas Day 2009 marked 26 years with NBC4 for Coleman. Prior to his time in L.A., the native Philadelphian worked in radio “for about 10 years” and served his country by broadcasting on Armed Forces Radio and TV during a stint in the Navy.
Coleman’s stand-up comedy and weather forecasting careers have been as inseparable as January cold pressure fronts and snow in Ohio.
“I did my early stand-up mainly in jazz clubs around central and western New York state,” says Coleman. “When I was in the radio business, I was an on-air personality there and part of the responsibilities of the job was to go out to these music venues and be the emcee for the night. It was a great way for the station to promote itself.
“I got to host in a couple really interesting jazz rooms and began to write material for myself as part of my emcee responsibilities. After a while I developed a little bit of a following because of the comedy I was doing before the jazz shows… Jazz audiences are very forgiving, open minded, so regardless of how bad you were, they made you feel comfortable. It was a great place to incubate my talent. Then, the owner of this one jazz club said, ‘We’re going to give you and some of the other comedians your own night – Tuesdays.’ So, we built a night that eventually resulted in sold-out shows.
“Then, I got a little full of myself and thought, I’ve conquered Buffalo, so I must be ready for the big time. I came out to California in 1980 – I had never been to Los Angeles – and arrived at the peak of the success of the Comedy Store (Sunset Boulevard). If you were ever going to do anything with your life, you had to come to this mecca. When I first arrived in L.A., I slept on the floor of a lady’s apartment. She was the only person I knew here.
“In the audience my first night at the Comedy Store were Gary Shandling, Billy Crystal, Amy Walker, and the closer of the show was a really interesting Robin Williams-type by the name of Charles Fleisher, who was brilliant. The talent was so extreme and wonderful, and I was so disheartened I literally felt sick when I left there. I thought, ‘What am I doing? I have no business being out here in this league of comedians.’
“I crawled back to my car. I thought, well, I can go home with my tail between my legs and admit defeat my first week out here, or I can stay until my money runs out… I came out here way ahead of my talent.”
But Coleman stayed and continued to perform at the Comedy Store. Then, one night in 1982, “The news director from Channel 4 and his wife were in the audience. I talked in my act about having done weather earlier in my career in radio. (Being a weather person) was totally involuntary on my part. My boss at the time literally demanded that I do it because they couldn’t find a vacation relief guy for TV and the night watchman refused to do it.
“After my show, the news director and his wife came backstage and introduced themselves. He said, ‘I know this is a weird question, but I am sorely in need of someone to do vacation relief and weekend fill-ins for weather at Channel 4. I have a weekday forecaster who hasn’t had a vacation in a year because I haven’t had a guy to back him up. Would you be interested in auditioning?’
“I thought, well, I’m making $45 a night at the Comedy Store, when do you want me to start?”

Channel 4 or bust
Coleman auditioned on Tuesday, got the job on Thursday, and was on the air the next weekend. “It was the greatest bit of show business luck since the classic Schwab’s story about what’s-her-name,” he says.
Tens of thousands of NBC4 broadcasts later, Coleman is back onstage next week in Hermosa. Not that he really ever left: Fritz has done stand-up at several L.A.-area comedy clubs and has written three one-man shows during his Southern California residency.
He calls “On the Fritz” a “compilation of stand-up and some pieces of my past… This is an evening of humor and it’s all observational stuff about getting older, life in California, news and weather and aging and raising children, the economy and all sorts of universal topics.
“I do about an hour, we take an intermission, then I come back for a question and answer period where I let the audience complain to me about the news and life. We kibitz and have a lot of fun. It can be really funny; people think they are insulting me or insulting the news business, but I tell them we’re all on the same page.
“I don’t do political humor; it’s just me being Fritz onstage… and I’m so happy to be back down here. It’s a great audience – it’s far enough away from L.A. that the whole idea of live performance is still special. There’s a wonderful open-minded accepting quality with the folks who live along the coastal area. It’s the best audience ever!”
Back to broadcasting, I asked Coleman about the situation of the local news following the ratings-floundering network experiment called the “Jay Leno Show” at 10 p.m. weeknights on NBC. We talked on Jan. 4. The following day, the New York Times reported the demise of the prime time talk show, so Coleman’s comments are 24 hours pre-cancellation rumors of Leno’s show.
“Fortunately in L.A., we’re doing okay. I know that in some parts of the U.S., it’s doing less well than others… NBC took this tremendous chance and put Jay in the middle of prime time. Well, television viewership in America is purely a matter of habit,” says Coleman. “People have rhythms in their lives, and the network asked them to change that rhythm and get into another mindset. But they also forgot the fact that the format he is using was only proven in late night. All of these things at one time is a tremendous experiment and it hasn’t been easy for him.”

A Simpler Time
Coleman is taking two weeks off from his rigorous broadcast schedule to perform at the Playhouse. Feel free during the question and answer period of the show to ask about the planting time for marigolds and if it’s advisable to wash your car tomorrow. He’s a winsome wind blowing through the South Bay to share a good time. “A couple weeks down here is really a godsend for me, believe me.”
‘On the Fritz – An Evening With Fritz Coleman,’ Hermosa Beach Playhouse, corner Pier Avenue and Pacific Coast Highway. Jan. 19 – 31. Tuesday through Saturday, 8 p.m. Sunday matinees Jan. 24 and 31, 2 p.m. Sunday evening Jan. 24, 7 p.m. Tickets, $35-$45. Call 310-372-4477 or visit www.hermosabeachplayhouse.com. ER

by Stacey Morse
“Seussical the Musical” has jumped to the Civic Light Opera of South Bay Cities. And I will have green eggs, Sam-I-Am! I think I like them (but hold the ham).
Director Stephanie Coltrin has gathered a wonderfully diverse ensemble, which keeps individual characters alive while blending where needed, key for a show going everywhere at once. Hold on to your hat! Congratulations also to musical director Daniel Busby, who found a combination of voices and instruments that balance and complement. I do wish I’d seen more kids in this varied cast.
At first blush, “Seussical” has the same issues as “Cats” – trying to blend many works by the same artist into a cohesive tale. Some work, others not so much, but the overall effect is fun and entertaining.
One great thing about this show (which could be its downfall under other circumstances), is the large number of breakout performances that need to go smoothly in order for this conceivably confusing mosaic to work. And a mosaic it is – I lost count of the number of Seuss stories that make up “Seussical.” For some of us of a certain, um, age, this is a blast to the past, and reason to pick up the books again. For others, Seuss is brand new, red and blue.
Sam Zeller is a splendid galumphy surprise as Horton the Elephant, graceful, clumsy, and caring, just like in his book. Minimalist lumber-jack-elephant costuming allows Zeller’s expressions to show, but I would have liked just a little more reminder that he was an elephant who hears a Who! Will everyone, too?
Horton and young John Dombek Lindahl as “Jojo” blend voices beautifully for “Alone in the Universe.” The two are a pleasure to hear together.
Annie V. Ramsey as Gertrude McFuzz is just the cutest bird that ever there was. Ramsey gives life to Gertrude’s cartoonish voice, but never lets it become annoying, which is impressive given the challenging music and tale – er, tail. Songs written with a whine in mind are given a sweet lilt. And of course there’s chemistry with Horton…
Jessica Gisin gleefully grinds out songs as the brassy but clueless Mayzie, whose Bird Girls act as a Greek Chorus, while the tumbling monkeyshines of the Wickersham Brothers torment Horton, and engage the audience.
Harrison White as the Cat in the Hat is our master of ceremonies. The directors made some interesting choices for his characterization, but I was more confused by the tail, more evocative of a scorpion than a Seuss creation. Was this a nod to Seuss’s political commentary, an interesting costuming choice, or do I have issues with scorpions? The Cat’s bittersweet “How Lucky You Are,” was particularly so in the reprise with Mayzie. He’s also a fun lead-in to the second act, which starts slowly but picks up speed.
The Grinch, and Mr. and Mrs. Mayor, bring the whole of Whoville to life, with the help of special-effects scenery, whimsical musical instruments, and fun costuming.
“Technicals” shine in this production. A clever and smooth set by J. Branson evokes the Seuss books without making them seem as if they have been copy/pasted into a set, thus creating a stage where characters can really play.
George Bacon’s costume design is largely fun and evocative, but seems a bit unfinished at times. Some characters have only minimalist costuming; others have an actual character body. The Butterfly is easy and fun with giant glasses for eyes, and the Lion, Snake, Frog, and Lizard and others are easy to spot by costuming and characterizations, but why no ears or tail for the Sour Kangaroo? Other than lyrics, we can tell that belting and beautiful Paula Chimene Jiles is the Sour Kangaroo only because of the Baby Kangaroo nearby.
Lighting by Darrell J. Clark is another star in the show. His creative use of “4-D” lighting makes the audience part of the Seuss-iverse, with lights and shadows that should be taking a bow.
Seamless special effects help create a cartoon atmosphere. With dynamic leads, a great ensemble, strong voices from all corners, and so much to see, Theodor Seuss Geisel – “Dr. Seuss” – would be pleased, and the audience will be, too.
Perhaps because of the dozens of songs, only one melody sticks in my memory, and it may be the theme of the whole show: “A person’s a person no matter how small.”
P.S. Don’t leave the theater without trying the cookies!
Seussical the Musical is onstage through Dec. 20 at the Redondo Beach Performing Arts Center, Aviation and Manhattan Beach boulevards, Redondo Beach. Performances, Tuesday through Sunday at 8 p.m., with Saturday and Sunday matinees at 2 p.m. Tickets, $45 to $60. Call (310) 372-4477 or go to civiclightopera.com. ER