David MacDowell Blue

Contrary to all sorts of "common sense" you can quite practically put all sorts of spectacle onto the live stage. Sea battles, exorcisms, poisonings, gunshots, sword fights, etc. If you have the budget, dragons and falling chandeliers are not out of the question. But who cares without the human connection, the power of the human soul coming to terms with itself via contact with another human soul? Movies and video games cannot help but eclipse live theatre for spectacle. It can almost neve... full review

Written by Jola Cora, who joins Annalee Scott and Paul Louis Harrell on stage, this play posits what at first seems only a quirky bit of drama in some side shadow of Hollywood. An actress/movie star wannabe feels hopeless and despondent, urging her sometimes boyfriend to help her see or somehow touch the movie star with whom she is obsessed just once before she gives up. He agrees, knowing someone who knows said movie star's gardener. While she is out, attending a premiere, they sneak into her... full review

"Shiva," as explained by writer/performer Rachel McKay Steele, is a Jewish ritual of mourning, to help the bereaved embrace and thus get past their grief. Doing so for a girl one never met, who has been dead for many decades (she would have been ninety years old in 2019) may seem bizarre. Until one thinks about it. Ultimately shiva is not "for" the deceased. It is for those who feel the pain of their loss. So, Shiva For Anne Frank makes plenty of sense, really. Her diary lets us know her,... full review

Having heard a kind of general positive buzz about the show and since it fit so neatly into my schedule, I got in line for The Last Croissant. While waiting, the cast came out and gave us a musical pre-show which led me to half-expect a musical. Nope. Not a musical. Rather one of the most delightful plays of this year's Fringe. Absolutely in my top ten (and that is saying something, given the quality of this year). The show takes place in a camping site in some national park in Californ... full review

Anyone who does not feel a twinge of sympathy just with the title of this show--I don't understand you. At least, hopefully I do not. Bullies and bullying cause so much misery, so much long term damage to children...yet solving the problem seems to involve no easy solution. The Bully Problem is a musical aimed at children. Refreshingly it speaks to children but does not do so by speaking down. It lacks condescension. Because of this, it also speaks directly to the child still inside each ... full review

I can honestly say Fertile was one show in the 2019 Hollywood Fringe Festival that seemed like a no brainer. Most such must be rolls of the dice, but of course if you know a given performer and their work you walk in with expectations. In this case, my imagination conjured the idea of a realistic and fairly autobiographical one woman show about her attempts to become pregnant. My expectations were not met. I was anything but disappointed. In fact, I was thrilled. Actor/playwright Hea... full review

What this show, written by Aaron Kozak, offers proves very compelling indeed. No less important, it surprises. Saving Cain was described to me as the story of a rebellious teenager trying to deal with his born-again Pentecostal control-freak of a mother. I expected one of two things: Either a dark comedy or a polemic against a certain brand (at least) of Fundamentalist Christianity. Maybe both. I got something a lot better. The pair of mother (Leah Verrill) and son (Lenny Hernandez) play... full review

Aging seems mundane as dramas go, especially among those who lead otherwise good lives. Making such entertaining and genuinely moving presents something of a challenge, one met by Peter Massey in Out of the Blue with a deceptively easy skill. Part of the charm of this show is the performer, who combines several qualities that watching and listening to him pleasurable. Massey has an expressive voice, a limber and expressive form, and clearly understands precisely what he's saying (this is a s... full review

f a Klingon Theatre troupe were to start performing classical works from Earth literature, then Christopher Marlowe's Tammerlane makes for an excellent choice! Hence School of Night (a very good production company) decided to go with this idea! And it works! Make no mistake! Klingon Tamburlaine tells the story of one of the most notoriously cruel (and successful) warlords in history. Putting everyone in Klingon gear, changing a few names here and here, adopting the stereotypical stance of ... full review

On the one hand, Love, Madness and Somewhere In Between deals with a subject of great power. James J. Cox explores a life which for big chunks of it counts as a train wreck--one in which he proved a fundamental victim trying his best (often very badly) to deal with a series of childhood traumas. He dives into a bottle of Jack Daniels for decades, struggling out of it at times only to fall back when confronted by yet another trauma (because life always hurts--otherwise how could it also feel goo... full review