Los Angeles Spotlight: July 2005

Midsummer is usually considered the time for light, undemanding fare — the theatrical equivalent to triple-fudge sundaes. And indeed, there are three lighthearted musicals and a couple of promising comedies opening in L.A. during the scorching month of July. But there is also a surprising amount of challenging dramatic fare on tap.

Heading the list of high-profile tuners is the West Coast premiere of the hit Off-Broadway spoof, The Musical of Musicals — The Musical (Laguna Playhouse, opening July 9). Pamela Hunt, the director of York Theatre’s premiere production, will be on hand to stage and choreograph the merriment served up by writers Eric Rockwell and Joanne Bogart. The clever pair use that old melodrama hook, “I can’t pay the rent–you must pay the rent” as the basis for a quintet of mini-musicals, relating the same story as if it was being told in the styles of Rodgers and Hammerstein, Stephen Sondheim, Jerry Herman, Kander and Ebb, and Andrew Lloyd Webber. The hilarity promises to be as high as an elephant’s eye in this affectionate yet irreverent “sorry/grateful” romp.

Equally exciting is the rare revival of the 1970 Broadway classic Purlie (Pasadena Playhouse, opening July 5). This landmark paean to civil rights and cultural pride is based on Ossie Davis’ play Purlie Victorious. The venerable Pasadena Playhouse artistic director Sheldon Epps helms this highly anticipated production, which features original Dreamgirls star Loretta Devine. Also of interest is Musical Theatre West’s Guys and Dolls (Long Beach’s Carpenter Performing Arts Center, opening July 9), helmed by award-winning director Nick DeGruccio, and starring Kevin Earley, fresh off his triumph in Reprise’s Applause, as the dapper Sky Masterson.

Before getting to the angst-filled plays of summer, there are a couple of comedies bearing mention. If a stylish comedy of manners in an outdoor setting sounds like the perfect respite following a blisteringly hot day, check out Anna Cora Mowatt’s 1845 satiric lark, Fashion (Topanga’s Theatricum Botanicum, opening July 2). The sly piece skewers consumerism, class-consciousness, and the pitfalls of debt culture. Ellen Geer directs the play. (Her late father, actor Will Geer appeared in an Off-Broadway staging.) Moving to the present-day, Cody Henderson’s Pacific Daylight (Hollywood’s Theatre of Note, opening July 2), is a story about two women searching for home, love, and meaning in contemporary L.A.

The mask shifts to tragedy with A Good Soldier (West L.A.’s Odyssey Theatre, opening July 1), a drama set in modern-day Iraq, inspired by Sophocles’ classic Antigone. Oscar-nominated screenwriter Nicholas Kazan wrote this work in a mere eight days, following his outrage at the outcome of the Nov. 3, 2004 Presidential election. Politics and social history also are at the heart of Sinan Unel’s Pera Palas (Pasadena’s Theatre@Boston Court, opening July 23), which explores three periods of Turkish history in the 20th century, as hotel guests strive to keep up with the rapidly changing world.

The highly praised Theatre Tribe troupe offers the world premiere of Joe Cellini’s The Intern (opening July 22), a crisis-of-conscience tale about a missing female intern and a sex scandal that erupts in the U.S. Congress.

Finally, there’s a pair of interesting revivals coming up this month. Martin Sherman’s Bent (North Hollywood’s Deaf West Theatre, opening July 15) is a powerful tale about homophobia in the terrifying Nazi era in Germany. And Goose and Tomtom (Hollywood’s Sacred Fools Theatre, opening July 13) is a rarely revived 1987 work by renowned playwright David Rabe (Hurlyburly) Small-time gangsters are at the center of this hard-hitting piece said to include “sex, love, guns, crime, tough guys, tougher talk, beautiful women, and dark humor.”