Las Vegas Spotlight: July 2005
Happy endings and sad endings are both on tap with this month’s theatrical offerings in Sin City and its surroundings.
It’s sad times for the Social Experimentation and Absurd Theater (SEAT), which is preparing to close its doors on July 31. The Test Market Theater, which runs the enterprise, has decided to focus its attention and finances on other projects, such as the New York Underground Comedy Festival and the Annual Samuel Beckett Festival.
While it’s still there, you just have a couple more chances to catch SEAT’s production of David Mamet’s gritty ’80s Hollywood drama Speed-the-Plow (which closes on July 2). After that, the company will do a run of Ernest Hemmings’ play Eccentric.
If you don’t catch Speed-the-Plow in time, there’s more Mamet to be had at the Community College of Southern Nevada Performing Arts Center. Sexual Perversity in Chicago, Mamet’s landmark play about four young people looking for love, begins July 8. But since this is Mamet, don’t expect a wistful summer romance so much as a deadly battle of the sexes.
On a happier note, in celebration of the Las Vegas Centennial, Las Vegas Little Theatre is presenting the Sin City Serenade. This musical retrospective will feature the songs that have made Las Vegas famous, from tunes of the city’s early days and the Rat Pack era to the present. The production stars Anita Garland, Bruce Moore, Mark Langberg, Kellie Wright, Timm Starr, and Rebecca Zisch; Terrance McKerrs directs, and Joseph Cottone provides musical direction. You have until August 14 to be serenaded.
The Super Summer Theatre is also in a celebratory mood, now that the seasonal company has reached its 30th year. It’s located at an outdoor stage in Spring Mountain Ranch State Park, just 18 miles outside of Vegas in Redrock Canyon, and audiences watch performances from the adjacent meadow. (The gates open about two hours before each show; you can rent a chair or bring a blanket; as well, you can take picnic foods along or purchase snacks purchased on the premises). This month, the company is presenting Once Upon a Mattress, the beloved fairy tale musical, which features a score by Mary Rodgers (daughter of the legendary Richard Rodgers and mother of Tony-winning The Light in the Piazza composer Adam Guettel) and Marshall Barer.
