Tag: reviews-2012

Back in college, I had a girlfriend that loved to go to horror movies. After that relationship ended, I never really went to horror movies again. Thus, I’ve never seen the movie “Silence of the Lambs“. If I had, perhaps I would have understand today’s show a bit more.

Perhaps I should start over…  When musicals are made from properties in another medium, there are two ways the project can go. The first is serious: a serious musical translation of the story to the stage, discarding what doesn’t work on the stage and adapting the production for what does. I’m sure you can think of many examples of this (my first thought was A Color Purple). The second type is the parody, where the stage production is an overly faithful translation, playing up the camp aspects of the production for humor. Again, I’ve seen many examples of this (such as A Very Brady Musical), and there are many I want to see (Toxic Avenger – The Musical). I saw one of the better ones today: “Silence! The Musical” at the Hayworth Theatre. The subtitle of the production is “The unauthorized parody of The Silence of the Lambs“, so now you should understand my opening paragraph.

Story-wise, Silence! is a very faithful presentation of the movie’s story, preserving key iconic scenes, voices, mannerisms, and such. In fact, these characteristics are often overplayed, such as Agent Starling’s accent, which turns ever “s” into an “sh”. Thish can make the dialogue difficult to undershtand shometimesh. This was done for all the characters: Lecter, Buffalo Bill, Dr. Chilton, Jack Crawford, Catherine Martin and so forth. So I shouldn’t need to give you all the details of the story: you can get that from the Wikipedia page. Oh well, if you inshisht, I’ll give you a shynopshish. Clarice Starling, an FBI Behavioral Science trainee, is pulled by Agt. Jack Crawford to try and get information from Hannibal Lecter, a convicted psychopath and cannibal. The hope is that he will help them find another psychopath called Buffalo Bill, who is capturing fat girls, killing them, and using pieces of their skin to make clothing.

But this is a parody, meaning that the authors (Hunter Bell, book; Jon Kaplan and Al Kaplan, music and lyrics) amped up the absurdity. This starts at the get-go, when the opening exposition is done by… you guessed it, a chorus of actors dressed as lambs. Everything was absurd (so absurd, at points, you can see the actors on the edge of cracking up). Some examples. When Lecter is flow to Tennessee, this is portrayed by…. Jack Crawford going around the stage with a paper airplane. When another character is dealing with the weather, the sequence is rain (squirt bottles on mist), snow (paper confetti), and … bubbles. When drawers don’t open, people hand things around the set. When they need smoke for a flashback, the lambs come out and clap erasers together. For the song “If I Could Smell Her C*nt”, there are ballet dancers on stage where the female dancer is conspicuously spreading her legs wide to the audience. You get the idea. Completely absurd… even to the level of mentioning sequels and future Jodie Foster movies. In addition to the book, credit for the absurdity goes to the director and choreographer Christopher Gattelli, who won the 2012 Tony award for the choreography of Newsies! (and yes, there were some Newsies! in-jokes as well). The choreography absurdities includes having the lambs use their hoofs to simulate tap dancing, or use of a doll around the neck to simulate young Clarice.

During this show, the audience was cracking up. Most of them, I am sure, had seen the movie and were riffing on the in-jokes. But even for someone who hadn’t seen the movie and had only a passing familiarity with the story, the absurdity was quite funny sometimes. One would think that the movie would have been low on the “Rotten Tomatoes” scale (and yes, before you ask, there is a “Showgirls! The Musical” that just got funded on Kickstarter), but this was a serious movie that won serious awards (including Best Picture). It is almost as if someone had done Ghandi, The Musical (don’t think about it… someone did). So I think all audiences (if you can get past the language and misogyny in the original story) will enjoy it somewhat. Just don’t go in expecting a serious musical translation. You’ll be seriously disappointed.

The acting in this was top notch, which isn’t a surprise given the cast. In the lead position, as Hannibal Lecter, was Davis Gaines, who played the lead in Phantom of the Opera. Yes, there were times this was parodied as well, especially when he commented about being half man and half monster. Gaines, of course, sang and acted well, but you can tell he was just having fun with the parody and the character. Opposite Gaines was Christine Lakin, who many remember from Step by Step, but who is also doing mockumentaries. Lakin is a very good comic actress (who also had fun with the humor). Perhaps not surprisingly, she was also very strong in the singing and dancing department. The two worked very well together. Rounding out the leads was Stephen Bienskie, who originated the role of Buffalo Bill/Jaime Gumb off-Broadway and has the performance down to a “T”. Overplaying as appropriate, he was at his wildest in the number “I’d F*ck Me”.

Rounding out the cast in various roles (including, when appropriate, as lambs) were Kathy Dietch (Catherine Martin, &c), Jeff Hiller (Sgt. Pembry, &c), John Kassir (Jack Crawford, &c), Latoya London (Ardelia Mapp, &c), Melissa Sandvig (Dream Clarice), Jeff Skowron (Dr. Chilton, &c), and Karl Warden (Dream Hannibal) [Alaine Kashian and Jesse Merlin (who we saw a long time ago in Beastly Bombing) were the standbys]. All of them were great and overacted, where appropriate, well.
[All actors are members of Actors Equity]

The music in the production was quite good, under the direction of Nate Patten, who conducted an amazing 3 piece ensemble (David Manning on keyboards, Alby Potts on keyboards, and Terry Schonig on percussion). They sounded like a much larger orchestra.

Turning to the technical side. The uncredited set design was relatively simple: four panels that were wheeled around to hide actors movements, a desk or two on wheels, and various props to establish locals. The set was supported by videos by Richard H. DiBella that were reasonably effective. The costumes by David Kaley were effectively and presumably truthful to the movie based on audience reaction (from the clips I’ve seen, I know that Starling (I keep wanting to type Shtarling) and Lecter’s were); these were supported by great wigs from Byron J. Batista. The sound by Carl Casella was excellent — both the actor amplification and the sound effects. The lighting by Jeff Croiter did a great job of establishing the mood and setting the scene. Ritchard Druther was Production Stage Manger, with Peter R. Feuchtwanger serving as Production Supervisor. Now, I normally don’t mention publicity, advertising, and producer credits, but there’s one additional credit worth mentioning. This is the first show where I’ve seen a specific credit for Social Media – Camron Cooke. So, for those of you wasting your time on astudiously studying social media, there is hope.

“Silence! The Musical” runs until October 12 at the Hayworth Theatre. Tickets are available online, through the box office, and may be available through Goldstar or Plays411.

Upcoming Theatre and Concerts: Next weekend brings “Xanadu–The Musical” at DOMA; I’ve heard the music, and again this is a great parody. The penultimate weekend in September takes us to the Celebration Theatre in Hollywood for the musical Justin Love. The month ends with  “Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure” at REP East on September 29. October brings some traveling for family with the bat-mitzvah of a cousin in Fresno, and Karen will be travelling for the Pacific International Quilt Festival in Santa Clara. Still, what’s a month without theatre, so… October will start out with “The Fantasticks“ at Theatre West on 10/6. That will be followed by “American Fiesta” at the Colony Theatre on 10/13, “The Book of Mormon” at Broadway LA/The Pantages on 10/27, and “1776” at Cabrillo Music Theatre on 10/28. Continuing the look ahead: November will bring “Moonlight and Magnolias” at REP East, which is booked for the end of the month. It may also bring “Seminar” at The Ahmanson Theatre (still undecided on ticketing; another possibility is “Ruddigore” at the Sierra Madre Playhouse) and may bring a concert performance of Raul Esparza at VPAC, especially if Erin flies in for it (he’s singing on her birthday). Non-theatrically, it will also bring “Day Out with Thomas” at OERM (certainly on some or all of Veterans Day weekend – November 10-11). Lastly, to close out the year, December has nothing formally scheduled (other than ACSAC), but will likely bring “Anything Goes” at the Ahmanson, and may bring “Judy Collins” at VPAC. Lastly, what few dates we do have open may be filled by productions I see on Goldstar, LA Stage Tix, Plays411, or discussed in the various LA Stage Blogs I read (I particularly recommend Musicals in LA and LA Stage Times).

New plays and new musicals are a risk. If you look over the productions I’ve seen, brand new productions are a rarity — I’ve generally seen them only as part of a subscription or if some other party has brought them to my attention for one reason or another. Sometimes they work spectacularly, such as the great production of Pest Control at the NoHo Arts Center. Sometimes they don’t, such as a disastrous production of  As U Lyk It: A California Concoction at the Pasadena Playhouse back in 2006. I mention this because last night saw me at a new production: I Caligula – An Insanity Musical at the Secret Rose Theatre in North Hollywood. Irene Bleiweiss, a long time friend from USENET days was an investor in a new musical, I Caligula — An Insanity Musical. For her investment, she received two tickets; as she was in DC and couldn’t attend, she offered them to me. The weekend was open, and so my daughter and I (a daddy-daughter day before she heads off to UCB) saw the show last night.  I thought she might like I, Caligula, as the synopsis talked about it being an allegory to fascism in the 1930s.

Alas, this was one of the productions that didn’t work. There were two primary problems: the music and the story.

As background, here’s a synopsis of the production. The story takes place in a mental institution. The staff uses drama therapy to help the patents, and in this case, the “musical” they are doing is Caligula, the story of the insane Roman emperor. This musical version, which is based off of the play Caligula by Albert Camus, has as its lead a narcissist. The story is what you would expect: Caligula is in love with his sister, and so to have her he offs his grandfather to become Emperor. One he gets the job, he publicly loves his sister, which causes his wife to poison her. Caligula goes insane, starts having orgies everywhere, and then starts killing everyone while they plot to kill him.

Great subject for a musical right?

Let’s tackle the musical problems first. The music and orchestrations were by Cody T. Gillette, who has mostly operatic experience. This led to this really not being a musical but being an opera. So what is the difference? Operas are sung-through (or mostly sung-through) with musical dialog. The music often doesn’t serve the story or to amplify character growth; rather, it is the carrier for the story. Musicals, on the other hand, have clearly discrete songs in a variety of styles; these songs typically serve to amplify the story and expose the inner thoughts of the characters. Think about characters singing about what they want, what they feel, their hopes, their desires. You can have sung-through musicals (Evita, Les Miserables, and Sweeney Todd being great examples); what makes them musicals is how the songs serve the story. You can have musicals about insanity that have entertaining music (Anyone Can Whistle and Dear World are examples, although neither were successful). You can even have musicals about insane killers (Sweeney Todd and Assassins are examples) that work. Looking at these examples makes clear what didn’t work here. First, the music was monotonous: there was no variety in the style, no distinct songs that you walked out of the production humming. It was operatic in style (both music and vocal), but advertised as a musical, confusing the audience (and I’ll note that an operatic take on Camus’ play was already done by Detlev Glanert in 1960, first performed in 2006). The music needed variety, it needed to be accessible to modern musical audiences. This simply wasn’t.

The second problem with the music is that the songs didn’t serve the story, nor did the music serve as a framing device. The latter is what made Sweeney Todd and Assassins work: they had a framing device the clarified the larger moral lesson the production was teaching (e.g., “To seek revenge may lead to hell / But everyone does it, but seldom as well” from Sweeney, or the songs “Another National Anthem” and “Everybody’s Got The Right” from Assassins). In I Caligula the story was sung but there was no point made. What should the audience learn from the saga of Caligula: he’s unrepentant, so what is the point to teach? The answer, of course, is the perils of narcissism and the focus on just what you want. Ideally, this could have been provided by a chorus of the hospital staff with a framing device… but it wasn’t.  The framing device simply didn’t work here,  or wasn’t utilized as it should have been to make the underlying point. In addition to improving the variety of the score, the setting needs to be utilized to create an allegory about the dangers of narcissism and too much focus on the self. Such an allegory could be very useful in today’s society, which is often focused more on meeeeeee than improving society as a whole.

Next, let’s look at the problems with the story. The first is the selection of subject matter itself. As I’ve noted above, you can do musicals about unsympathetic people. Sondheim has this down to an art, with successful musicals about a barber that kills customers for revenge, or people that shoot the president. Usually such musicals are very difficult — witness the public failure of the recent Wildhorn Bonnie and Clyde. Caligula is a particularly problematic piece. The primary subject is an early Roman emperor who supposedly offed his grandfather to get the throne, had depraved sexual orgies, and in the face of bad financial times offed his citizens to get their estates and build palaces for himself. Camus adapted this story for his play; he described his play in 1957 as follows:

“Caligula, a relatively kind prince so far, realizes on the death of Drusilla, his sister and his mistress, that “men die and they are not happy.” Therefore, obsessed by the quest for the Absolute and poisoned by contempt and horror, he tries to exercise, through murder and systematic perversion of all values, a freedom which he discovers in the end is no good. He rejects friendship and love, simple human solidarity, good and evil. He takes the word of those around him, he forces them to logic, he levels all around him by force of his refusal and by the rage of destruction which drives his passion for life.

But if his truth is to rebel against fate, his error is to deny men. One cannot destroy without destroying oneself. This is why Caligula depopulates the world around him and, true to his logic, makes arrangements to arm those who will eventually kill him. Caligula is the story of a superior suicide. It is the story of the most human and the most tragic of errors. Unfaithful to man, loyal to himself, Caligula consents to die for having understood that no one can save himself all alone and that one cannot be free in opposition to other men.”

In general, this is a story that doesn’t lend itself to a musical treatment too well. The author and lyricist Kai Cofer indicated he chose this story because he wanted he wanted to write something about facism, and Camus’ play was supposedly a metaphor for fascism. His first attempt at adapting the Camus play was too big. His second attempt downsized the production and resulted in it being set in a mental institution. Specifically, he indicated it was supposedly in a modern day mental hospital where the patients were putting on a production of Caligula set in the 1930s. The problem is that none of these goals came across in the final production. The minimalist set never gave the impression of this being a modern mental institution; the production of Caligula itself seemed more Roman than anything connected with the 1930s; the music certainly didn’t reflect the 1930s (which would have had big band numbers, not opera); and most importantly, none of the underlying themes of fascism came clearly across in the final production. The focus seemed to be more on the insanity and narcissism of Caligula than anything else.

There were also problems in the writing itself — some of the songs were rather pedestrian (i.e., seeming lists of synonyms or antonyms), and there were points where the fourth wall was broken in an odd manner, involving the audience to provide support and applause for the characters. Weird.

The connection between the mental institution and the play was also poor. The primary echo was that the inmate playing Caligula was also a narcissist. The inmate personalities of the other characters were never well established. They were briefly mentioned in the opening scene and never seen again. Instead, at the end, we see them coming at the audience to find another Caligula to off. In plays and musicals, one looks for growth in characters. I really saw nothing that showed the inmates learned anything from doing the play; this is necessary to offset the lack of growth in Caligula himself. This is a writing defect; perhaps it is something that could be corrected through proper dramaturgy.

In short, the story problems were this: the wrong story was chosen to musicalize, the transformation of the story failed to bring out the underlying theme the author wanted, and at times the writing was weak.

So setting aside the story now, how were the performances. For the most part, they were reasonable albeit a bit overplayed (I suspended disbelief in the overplay, simply because these were supposedly insane asylum patients who would tend to overplay). In the lead was Dory Schultz (FB) as Caligula. Schultz’s tenor voice was nice, although at points he seemed to be not quite reaching what was intended. He captured the narcissism of Caligula well, although his costuming was distracting (especially those gold shorts). Supporting Schultz were Kevin Dalbey as The Director/Tiberious and Elizabeth Harmetz (FB) as Cesonia. Dalbey had a beautiful baritone voice and worked well as the director, providing more reaction shots than anything else. Harmetz’s soprano was also quite nice, but she came across as cold and didn’t quite seem to be inhabiting her character. Inhabiting characters was a common problem in the cast; I find shows work best when the actors were having fun and enjoying their characters, and this cast didn’t seem to have that joy.

One of the actors who did seem to be having fun with her role was Kelly Derouin (FB) as Drucilla. As the sister of Caligula who is offed early in the first act, she was more eye candy, but seemed to be just having fun with the character (and this came across to the audience). Alas, she had one of those fourth-wall problematic songs, clearly added just so the actor had a song. It didn’t work. Another actor who was having fun was Meredith Overcash as Halicon. Hers was less a singing role and more a supporting role, but she had a number of moments that made clear she was enjoying herself that were quite fun to watch. Josh Shaw (FB) (Skipio) and E. Scott Levin (FB) (Marco) served as the supporting senators — I was particularly impressed with Levin’s lovely bass/baritone voice and performance as Marco. Carissa Lynn Gipprich (FB) played the nurse.

There was one last on-stage cast member: Cody Gillette (FB), the composer. He was in the corner, conducting the program — which was prerecorded and on a Mac. He was also mouthing the words of the production. I couldn’t see the point of his being on stage if there was no live music other than to add to the madness.

The production was directed by the author, Kai Cofer (FB), and I’ve already commented on the style. Choreography was by Heather Lipson Bell (FB) and was probably the best that could be done given the music wasn’t really dance music. Kelly Derouin was the dance captain.

Turning to the technical side of things, for which there were few credits. Kai Cofer, credited as production designer as well, designed a minimalist set: a chaise lounge, some columns, tables and chairs. Much as I understand the intent here, they didn’t do a satisfactory job of conveying either the location or the time period intended. The costuming didn’t help, with bright gold shorts with an obvious “package” for Caligula, a silver bikini for Drucilla, tuxedos for the senators, and odd red and black lingerie for Cesonia. None of this did a good job of establishing the time or the place. The lighting was stark and didn’t serve to create the mood in support of the story. In other words, where the technical might have supported the story, it didn’t.

I Caligula – An Insanity Musical continues at the Secret Rose Theatre in North Hollywood through August 26. Tickets are available online via Ovation Tix or via Goldstar.I Caligula might be interesting if you are into opera or the operatic style and desire to see a study of insanity; it will not satisfy you if you go expecting traditional musical forms.

Dining Notes: It was a daddy-daughter day. Lunch was at Umani Burger on Hollywood Blvd and was yummy; I’ll definitely try the one in Thousand Oaks now. Dinner was at Pitfire Pizza across the street from the Secret Rose, and was also yum (although seating was a bit tight, which they corrected). The day together made up for the weak production, although we did have fun dissecting what went wrong.

Upcoming Theatre and Concerts: The remainder of August is quiet until “Play Dates” at REP East at the end of the month. This is due to a planned vacation to Palm Springs (as well as moving our daughter to UC Berkeley); while in Palm Springs we might go to Idyllwild Jazz in the Pines. In September theatre activity resumes, beginning with “Blame It On Beckett” at the Colony Theatre on September 1. Mid-September brings “Xanadu–The Musical” at DOMA, and the month ends with  “Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure” at REP East on September 29. I”m also looking into “Silence: The Musical” at the Hayworth Theatre, which starts September 8 and runs through December, and the musical Justin Love  which starts at the Celebration Theatre in Hollywood on September 8. October brings some traveling for family with the bat-mitzvah of a cousin in Fresno. It will also bring “American Fiesta” at the Colony Theatre, “The Book of Mormon” at Broadway LA/The Pantages, and “1776” at Cabrillo Music Theatre. Continuing the look ahead: November will bring “Moonlight and Magnolias” at REP East, which is booked for the end of the month. It may also bring “Seminar” at The Ahmanson Theatre (still undecided on ticketing) and a concert performance of Raul Esparza at VPAC, especially if Erin flies in for it (he’s singing on her birthday). Non-theatrically, it will also bring “Day Out with Thomas” at OERM (certainly on some or all of Veterans Day weekend – November 10-11). Lastly, to close out the year, December has nothing formally scheduled (other than ACSAC), but will likely bring “Anything Goes” at the Ahmanson, and may bring “Judy Collins” at VPAC. Lastly, what few dates we do have open may be filled by productions I see on Goldstar, LA Stage Tix, Plays411, or discussed in the various LA Stage Blogs I read (I particularly recommend Musicals in LA and LA Stage Times).

 

This weekend is my wife’s birthday weekend. So a few weeks ago, I brought up a list of shows and concerts that were happening this weekend, and let her pick what she wanted. One of the shows she picked was something called “Fluffy Bunnies in a Field of Daisies“. Now, as it happened I had received mail on the show earlier in the week and based on the description therein, had been intrigued. So I got tickets via Goldstar, and last night found us at the Arena Stage in Hollywood watching a bunch of fluffy bunnies.

Well, OK, so they weren’t really bunnies. Nor were they fluffy bunnies.

So what is this play about, if it isn’t about bunnies? It is billed by Goldstar as a “Romantic Comedy”. Another site refers to it as an “upbeat comedy of sexual politics”. In other places it is referred to as a risque comedy, and given the “parental advisory”, you walk in thinking you’re going to see sex continually happening, so you better leave the children at home and the horses in the street, because it will surely scar and scare them. Even as the show opens one might think this, for the first scene is of a guy and a girl getting together, and within 3 minutes, she has him going down on her.

But that’s not what “Fluffy Bunnies” is about. Especially during the first act, you might think “Fluffy Bunnies” is a stage version of Cheers, How I Met Your Mother, or any of the numerous other sets of TV sitcoms where a bunch of friends sit in a bar or restaurant and comment on the sexual and dating foibles. Certainly this play does have that. The play does concern a central group of four friends: Tommy, Nick, “Baby Boy,” and Jennifer (“Re”), sitting in a bar, talking about their dating problems. “Baby Boy” is sweet and innocent and is looking for something, but he doesn’t know what… but it isn’t meaningless sex. Nick also has opportunity for meaningless sex and booty calls, but is obsessed with figuring  the meaning of his dream about an lamp looking for the right electrical outlet. Tommy, on the other hand, is obsessed with figuring out whether Re is a virgin, because of his belief that all women are either virgins or whores. Gee, writing this out does sound like How I Met Your Mother, doesn’t it?

But there is a big difference. Characters in TV sitcoms generally stay static: this is what permits you to watch episode #1 or #1000 and see the same characters you love. In live theatre, characters exhibit growth. So if I was to compare this to anything, a more apt comparison is I Love You, You’re Perfect, Now Change. The underlying question in this play is: How do we make relationships that are more than superficial? What do we need to change, in ourselves, to do this? This is answered in the second act, where the point is made that to have a real relationship, you need to know and care about the other person in the relationship, not just yourself. You need to stop talking about yourself, and learn about your partner. In doing this, this show makes a significant point for the “me” generation of the 1980s and 1990s: it is not just about you. Relationships are about each person caring about the other person, and knowing them. That’s the growth demonstrated in this show; when the characters take the time to actually learn about someone else, they actually find what that for which they were searching. That is also why, ultimately, this show has succeeded: because of this deeper meaning, it is more than a fluffy bar comedy. It uses the fluffy bar comedy to demonstrate growth.

But this is a comedy. And as a comedy, it works reasonably well. It is stuffed full of dialogue — think Aaron Sorkin or Moonlighting — and relationship or sexual humor. However, it isn’t a continuous rattling off of jokes ala Neil Simon, and it isn’t a sitcom where the humor comes from watching the reaction to those jokes.  The director and author, Matt Chaffee (FB), also does a good job of not creating charactures on stage: he brings out from his actors the real personalities of these characters, and they seem like real people you could get along with on the street (well, perhaps not Tom… he’s a bit annoying). The other thing that this play is not is dated. Although it had a long run in LA around 10 years ago, the subject and the performances remain fresh and delightful.

Let’s talk about these performances. Someone — most likely the director (Chaffee (FB)) or the producer (Drew Brody (FB), of the Infinite Monkey Project) — came up with the interesting idea of double-casting every role in the show. Each night of the show, there is a different permutation of actors in each of the 8 different roles (and as they do under 256 performances, no combination is repeated). So what I saw won’t be what you see. This also makes the show more fun for the actors, as they get to play and have fun and watch for different reactions they haven’t gotten before. This fun comes across to the audience: the actors have fun, and the audience has fun watching them have fun. (and the fun continues afterwards, as the producer invited both actors and audience to the bar across the street after the show to continue the fun!).

The combination that we saw was excellent. As Jennifer (“Re”), Lynsey Harris (FB) had an infectuous personality and style that made you instantly like her; she was easygoing and just inhabited her character. She was perhaps my favorite character in the piece. Also fun to watch were Stephen Pollack (FB) as “Baby Boy” and Dean Cates (FB) as Nick. Pollack gave off a charming naivete, and was particularly fun to watch in his interactions with Amy Sanders (FB)’ Allison. Cates’ Nick was a bit more obsessed with wanting something; his standout scene was when he needed to move a box continually around the stage. In your head, you knew this prop box was likely very light, but his performance made it appear so heavy and awkward you wanted to get up on stage and help him. Rounding out the lead characters was Mike Duff  as Tom, who seemed to be more of a commentator, not looking for a relationship of his own.

In smaller roles were four ladies who portrayed the primary girlfriends and dates. The first one to appear is Samantha Valdellon (FB) as Yvonne, a tiny little thing dating “Baby Boy”. You don’t get to know her character that well, but she is fun to watch (especially at the beginning of the 2nd act, where she has fun with the audience). Next we meet Stephanie Wilcox (FB)’s Tessa, the booty-call obsessed young women who doesn’t know what to make of Nick’s talkative nature. The third girlfriend (who also has some smaller unnamed roles) is the aforementioned Amy Sanders (FB)’s Allison. This character was really fun to watch, both from her demeanor and how she stayed in character even when the focus was not on her. Lastly, there was Bobbi Berkmen (FB)’s Yvonne. She came off a little stiff to me, although I think that was how the character was being interpreted. Still, she had some wonderful moments in her second interaction with Nick.

However, as I noted, this play is double-cast, so you will not see the combination I saw. Other actors in this piece (who you may meet in the lobby) are Karolin Luna (FB) (Yvonne), Kip Garwood (FB) (Baby Boy), Lyndsey Lantz (FB) (Re), Joey Russo (FB) (Tommy), Matthew Hannon (FB) (Nick), Cynthia Murell (FB) (Tessa), Steffinnie Phrommany (FB) (Lyndsay), and Meredith Giangrande (FB) (Allison).

The scenes in this play are structured a bit odd, in that they take place in various locations (apartments, balconies, restaurants), but the main actors in these locations interact with their friends at the bar who are commenting on the action. This can get a bit confusing. It isn’t helped by the set, which is relatively simple and consists mostly of hints of locations, which various images of daisies or bunnies that are simply drawn. Certainly those images do not enhance the set (they don’t have any significance), but I’m not sure whether a realistic set would clarify things either. Still, although the current set (supposedly constructed by the director, Matt Chaffee (FB)) suffices, if the set is ever redone, thought should be given to finding a way to make the locations and the cross interactions clearer. One thing helping the set is the lighting, which serves to focus the audience’s attention well on the significant actions to watch (lighting design is uncredited in the program, but another website clarifies was done by the producer, Drew Brody (FB)). No credit is given for sound or stage management, so those uncredited individuals must toil namelessly.

“Fluffy Bunnies in a Field of Daisies” was produced by Drew Brody of the Infinite Monkeys Project, who I’ll note did a great introduction to the show and was quite a bit of fun to talk to during intermission and at the after-show social event.

“Fluffy Bunnies in a Field of Daisies” continues at the Arena Stage in Hollywood (behind the Egyptian Theater) through July 28; it is worth seeing. It may move after that and resurface somewhere in September, according to the producer. Tickets are available at the door, through their website, LA Stage Alliance, Plays411, or through Goldstar.

Upcoming Theatre and Concerts: This weekend is my wife’s birthday weekend, and we have one more show to see:  tonight we’re going to CSUN to see the OperaWorks production of “Non-Boring Original Opera“, which is an improvised original 3-act opera weaving well-known arias and improvised dialogue into a new storyline. (if you would like to meet us at these shows and wish her Happy Birthday, please join us — dinner is at Peru’s Taste at 530p).  The last weekend in July brings “Meet Me In St. Louis” at Cabrillo Music Theatre. August has a bit less, as we’re going to have some vacation days and will be taking Erin to start UC Berkeley. We’ve only got two shows scheduled: “Memphis” at the Pantages at the beginning of the month, and “Play Dates” at REP East at the end of the month. As an aside: we will be vacationing in Palm Springs, so if anyone knows of live theatre going on there in August, let me know. In September theatre activity resumes, beginning with “Blame It On Beckett” at the Colony Theatre on September 1 and “Sherlock Holmes: The Final Adventure” at REP East on September 29. I”m also looking into “Silence: The Musical” at the Hayworth Theatre, which starts September 8 and runs through December, and “Xanadu” at DOMA, which starts September 7 and runs for about 3 weeks. October brings some traveling for family: the Cal Parents Weekend at UCB (looking less likely now), and the bat-mitzvah of a cousin in Fresno. It will also bring “American Fiesta” at the Colony Theatre, “The Book of Mormon” at Broadway LA/The Pantages, and “1776” at Cabrillo Music Theatre. Continuing the look ahead: November will bring “Moonlight and Magnolias” at REP East, which is booked for the end of the month. It may also bring “Seminar” at The Ahmanson Theatre (still undecided on ticketing) and a concert performance of Raul Esparza at VPAC, especially if Erin flies in for it (he’s singing on her birthday). Non-theatrically, it will also bring “Day Out with Thomas” at OERM (certainly on some or all of Veterans Day weekend – November 10-11-12). Lastly, to close out the year, December has nothing formally scheduled (other than ACSAC), but will likely bring “Anything Goes” at the Ahmanson, and may bring “Judy Collins” at VPAC. Lastly, what few dates we do have open may be filled by productions I see on Goldstar, LA Stage Tix, Plays411, or discussed in the various LA Stage Blogs I read (I particularly recommend Musicals in LA and LA Stage Times).