Very polished preview. Only one stop per act. Really good caliber performances from the leads…even by non-high school standards. Obviously they can’t say f***. The big problem song obviously is La Vie Boheme: They can say masturbation but they can’t say erection? They can’t say dyke. They jumped a section with lyrics right before the talking interlude…marijuana? Roger is phenomenal and this is his first onstage performance ever! He’s a sophmore varsity football player and he’s got a really good voice. 30 hi-quality cordless mics! Fancy LED footlights and high end lighting throughout! Really good show! Check it out before the protests shut it down!

Yay! We got Brian Benoit (the original Trekkie Monster, et al.)! I was lucky enough to see him AND John Tartaglia when I first saw the show in Vegas (before it was trimmed down to 90 minutes), and it’s awesome that he loves doing the show so much that he’s now on the national tour. Great production. Obviously I can (and will) complain about things, but first and foremost, I had a great time! Why didn’t the orchestra play the final hit of “My Girlfriend Who Lives In Canada”? Rod was even sitting there waiting for it?!?!?! Why were lyrics cut from “Schadenfreude”? Straight-A students getting B’s? Ex-es getting STD’s? Watching tourists reading maps? Seeing doormen taking naps? CEO’s getting shackled? Watching actors never reach the endings of their Oscar speech? Brian and Christmas Eve didn’t say that they sold all their wedding gifts for money… Why didn’t the ensemble … Continue reading →

Great individual performances, horrible combination. Great sounding tracked orchestra. Oscar was a real piano player with bad hair (not period hair I mean), and also played weird interludes during the barfly scene. Speaking of that scene, Abner Dillon wasn’t heavyset with a handlebar mustache, so he was a cobra and a hick instead of cobra and a walrus….boo! Although the theatre was well used because they had a balcony set piece for Dorothy’s hotel room. And speaking of the balcony, they cut the doctor scene at the top of Act 2 and opened with Sunny Side (To Every Situation)…what the deuce! And the worstest part is after Sunny Side they ran up to the other balcony where they could have done the damn doctor scene!!!! WTFH!?!?!?!!!! Just doesn’t make any damn sense… Oh! And they mixed up Shuffle Off To Buffalo! Traditionally, Bert Barry gets married to Anytime Annie and … Continue reading →

A+ for the cast, D- for the technical Maybe it was that day’s performance…maybe the economy forced their hand…or maybe they shelled out way too much money for the cast (most of whom did the show on Broadway, in Las Vegas, or both) and had to hire a deficient tech crew that hobbled together a set out of spit and bailing wire (MacGyver they ain’t)* and forgot half their cues…I don’t know! The most disappointing thing about this production is Ulla’s “tidy up” gag. Near the end of Act 1, Max and Leo hire a hot Swedish girl as their secretary/receptionist. They instruct her to tidy up the office. When everyone comes back for Act 2, the entire office and furnishings are painted white, and when asked when she did all this, Ulla says intermission. At least that’s what happened on Broadway, in the movie adaptation and every national tour…not … Continue reading →

A fairly decent youth production (although it was Starlight’s first “audition only” show) of this delightful Menken-Ashman show. Mushnik was a little over the top for me, but as Laira explained, you hve to balance over the top performances with high energy…don’t want the kid diluting his/her performance to catatonic when they’re asked to tone it down. I know this is a youth production, but do we really need an announcement telling us that it’s intermission when the lights just came up? Or an announcement saying, “weren’t those kids great?” after we just gave them a standing ovation?!? Really??? Presented in the George Nakano Theatre at the Torrance Cultural Arts Center.