THE WICKED STAGE and the gag reel

by Rob Kendt

I've gotten some flak from sensitive readers for dishing in this space about shows I haven't seen (Glengarry Glen Rose, anyone?). But as this is my entirely subjective fall/winter preview column, I must plead guilty in advance to charges of critical bias as I look ahead at a busy theatrical season. They say pride comes before the fall, but here is my humble take on upcoming offerings in the Southland.

The Christian thespians--say that real fast 12 times--of Actors Co-Op have named their season "Piercing the Darkness," which reminds me of a quote from T-Bone Burnett about his faith and his music: "Once you've seen the light, you can either write about the light or about what you see by the light." But the Lights of Michael Grady's world premiere comedy, bowing Sept. 19, are of the competitive-neighborhood-decoration variety rather than the spiritual kind. In October, the Co-op mount Brian Friel's cutting Translations. In February is the L.A. premiere of the musical The Spitfire Grill… In October Tim Robbins directs his first self-penned show at his Hollywood Actors' Gang space. We've heard mixed things about the Iraq-themed Embedded, which has been workshopping as a late-night after The Mysteries: Some say it's a return to form, others that it's bombastic and preachy (maybe it's both). A limited run of the Second Annual Actors Gang Holiday Show runs in December. In January, Gang fave Beth Milles returns to direct a new play by Carson Kreitzer called Self-Defense… The big news at the Ahmanson is that Phantom of the Opera is returning Oct. 11, and that tickets are going fast, even without the local stars of its historic four-year run there (1989-1993), Davis Gaines and Dale Kristien. (What, no Robert Guillaume?)… Local touring clearinghouse Broadway LA will bring more coals to Newcastle in September with The Graduate, now featuring Rider Strong (a perfect porn name squandered) and Jerry Hall. Then comes the cheesy Jesus Christ Superstar, Oct. 8-26, as if to pave the way for Lloyd Webber's ultimate kitsch nightmare, Starlight Express, in January at the Pantages (this is the follow-up for The Producers?)… After its currently running Toys in the Attic, in October the Colony Theatre fires off Gunmetal Blues, a detective noir musical by Scott Wentworth, Craig Bohmler, and Marion Adler (the folks who brought us the sweet backstage confection Enter the Guardsman). Does the Colony have some trade deal with Laguna Playhouse? Gunmetal had a popular run down in the O.C. in 1999, and the Colony's perfect Laramie Project of 2002 will play Laguna in September (see below). Glancing ahead to February, if Marc Saltzman's Clutter, about early-20th-century pack rats the Collyer Brothers, sounds familiar, it's because Richard Greenberg treated the same sad pair in last year's The Dazzle at South Coast Rep… I'm a little more excited than usual about Cornerstone's You Can't Take It With You (Hel-Yome): An American Muslim Remix, Peter Howard's adaptation of Kaufman and Hart's comedy classic, at the Jean Delacour Auditorium of the Museum of Natural History in October. Among the show's stars is Shishir Kurup, coincidentally one of two L.A.-based recipients of a TIME grant from Audrey Skirball-Kenis Theater Projects--yep, that's $45,000 for Shishir to do his thing. We tremble with anticipation… Cornerstone's piece is but one offering of the fifth annual Edge of the World Theater Festival, which will take over L.A. Oct. 4-19; the list of participants is too long to list here (check out www.edgefest.com), but one I won't miss, at the spacious former bra factory we call Evidence Room, is a new play by Gordon Dahlquist, Messaline, to be helmed by ER artistic director Bart DeLorenzo. It's not a sequel to Dahlquist's intermittently fascinating and frustrating Delirium Palace, which ER mounted in 2001 at [Inside] the Ford, but it does feature a returning character (played by Lauren Campedelli). The holiday show, natch, is the discount-store dance romp The 99-Cent Show, from the mind of the multi-faceted Ken Roht, who with Shishir is the other lucky TIME grant recipient. Drinks are on you guys next time… Garry Marshall's Falcon Theatre has announced its least interesting season yet, kicking off in September with An Evening With Jack Klugman, in which Quincy will chat about his storied career, and continuing in October with an entirely unnecessary production of Steel Magnolias. (Is Marshall trying to "brand" with films he's done? What's next, Frankie and Johnny?) At least providing some fun, even if the formula is fraying, is Troubadour Theatre Company's holiday show, It's a Stevie Wonderful Life in December. Will these merry pranksters ever run out of these titles? We hope so… The Fountain will mount Terrence McNally's paean to Maria Callas, Master Class, Nov. 7-Dec. 14, under Simon Levy's direction. I'm not a fan of the play, but it's a great actor's showcase, and Karen Kondazian should have quite a romp in the lead… Over at the Geffen, where programming risk has alternated with temerity pretty equally, things are looking up with Stephen Jeffreys' blues-themed I Just Stopped by to See the Man in September, directed by Randall Arney (who, I always love to recall, appeared in Steppenwolf's production of Tom Waits' Franks Wild Years back in the early 1980s, and whose brain I've always wanted to pick about that). In November, making her triumphant return to L.A. stages is the peerless Sandra Tsing Loh with Sugar Plum Fairy. Here's hoping director David Schweizer will make us forget the embarrassment of last year's He Hunts. The Geffen's winter is even more exciting: Bryan Davidson's War Music, plucked from a local production last year, and Steve Martin's droll The Underpants. (And how about bringing Kristine Nielsen from the New York production to L.A.?)… ASK's final Hot Properties series at [Inside] the Ford goes out with bang with Joy Gregory's The Shaggs: Philosophy of the World, opening Nov. 7. Next year is L. Trey Wilson's Stage Directions and the apparently author-less Daisy in the Dreamtime… North Hollywood's Interact Theatre begins its season on Sept. 30 with a solo show, Stephen Hack's Willy's Son, but we're looking forward to the promised Guys and Dolls. Please, tell us Matthew Ashford will star... In the under-rated burgh of Long Beach, International City Theatre opens its season in September with the singularly uninspiring choice of Visiting Mr. Green, then kicks it up a notch in November with The Crucible... In addition to the aforementioned Laramie Project, Laguna Playhouse will mount an ambitious West Coast premiere of Lonnie Carter's The Romance of Magno Rubio, about a lovestruck Filipino farm laborer, to be directed by Loy Arcenas, in a co-production with New York's Ma-Yi Theatre Company. Peeking ahead to January, we see Jason Robert Brown's new musical, The Last Five Years… Glendale's classical mavens, A Noise Within, mix rare and redundant for a season that kicks off in September with the gnarly, seldom-staged Coriolanus, which runs in rep with Molière's The Miser and Arthur Miller's The Price. The requisite holiday show is Sabin Epstein's A Wilde Holiday… From what I can tell, the Pasadena Playhouse--whose 2004 season includes Claudia Shear doing Dirty Blonde and Enchanted April--will stay dark in 2003 after As Bees in Honey Drown closes Oct. 21 (see correction below)… The Road Theatre, still running its unstoppable The Woman in Black (now at the Coronet's upstairs space), will open Coby Gross' Marked Tree Sept. 12. The Arkansas-set period drama is directed by John DiFusco… South Coast Rep's season is pretty low-watt--The Last Night of Ballyhoo, Ted Tally's Terra Nova, and Antigone on the mainstage--but the smaller Argyros stage boasts a Pulitzer winner, Nilo Cruz's Anna in the Tropics. And SCR does have two premieres slated for 2004: John Strand's Lovers and Executioners and another TBA… Gordon Davidson's last season at The Taper is shaping up well: After the currently running Gem of the Ocean is Tony Kushner's Homebody/ Kabul, which, sources say, Kushner massively rewrote since its Chicago run--then rewrote again so it's closer to the original. In December, a still untitled jazz anthology musical to be directed by Davidson has me worried: He's not someone I think of as a musical director, composer Cy Coleman is alternately brilliant and hackish, and lyricists Marilyn and Alan Bergman aren't exactly Dorothy Fields. Here's hoping the band is good, at least. The following year brings Topdog/Underdog--rumored casting for Suzan-Lori Parks' two-hander: Don Cheadle and Harold Perrineau--and Christopher Hampton's psychoanalyitical The Talking Cure... At Theatre of NOTE, Steve Morgan Haskell's piece about Dr. Kinsey, Fucking Wasps, opens Oct. 3 (another EdgeFest entry), and a revival of last year's beloved, awards-bedecked A Mulholland Christmas Carol (a piece created for EdgeFest two years ago), rings out the year… West Coast Ensemble opens To Kill a Mockingbird in September, but its October off-night show, Tom Coash's Cairo-set Cry Havoc, looks like the one to see. And that's all the fall that's fit to print.

Note 08/28/03: In last week's Wicked Stage (Back Stage West, 8/21/03), it was erroneously stated that the Pasadena Playhouse had no shows scheduled after the current As Bees in Honey Drown closes. In fact, the next show is Noises Off, Oct. 10-Nov. 16, followed by Plaid Tidings.

Also, omitted from the column's cursory fall preview were upcoming shows at East West Players--which include Sondheim's Passion (Sept. 10-Oct. 5), Lloyd Suh's Masha No Home (Nov. 12-Dec. 7), and Philip Kan Gotanda's The Wind Cries Mary (Feb. 4-29)--and at Pacific Resident Theatre, which will open both Orpheus Descending and Prelude to a Kiss in mid-September.