Los Angeles Spotlight: September 2006

There’s little doubt the most anticipated show in the fall season lineup will be the national tour of John Patrick Shanley’s hard-hitting Tony Award- and Pulitzer Prize-winning Doubt (Ahmanson Theatre, September 22-October 29),. The production reunites the Tony-winning team of stars Cherry Jones and Adriane Lenox and director Doug Hughes from the Broadway production.

The list of musical fare is highlighted by Reprise! Broadway’s Best’s production of that toe-tapping tuner My One and Only (UCLA Freud Playhouse, September 5-17), which incorporates a wealth of classic George and Ira Gershwin songs. Dan Mojica directs a star-studded cast including Rachel York, Michael Gruber, and the legendary Betty Garrett. Meanwhile, Theatre Out, a new gay and lesbian theatre company in Orange County, makes its debut with Stephen Dolginoff’s Off-Broadway musical Thrill Me: The Leopold and Loeb Story (Hunger Artists Theatre, September 1-24), which recounts the chilling tale of Nathan Leopold and Richard Loeb, Chicago’s infamous thrill-killers of 1924.

In a campy vein, the new Valley Musical Theatre serves up Beehive (North Hollywood’s El Portal Theatre, September 22-October 8), featuring American Idol‘s LaToya London in a revue recreating the big hair and shoo-be-do-wop sound of the girl groups and female singers who rocked their way up the charts in the 1960s. Tony Award winner John Rubinstein and soap star Matthew Ashford are among the cast of the Interact Theatre Company’s production of the hit musical Urinetown (Matrix Theatrem September 16-October 22), and Kristen Chandler, Kim Huber, Julie Dixon Jackson, and Bets Malone star in the new pop musical The Marvelous Wonderettes (El Portal Forum Theatre, September 29-November 26).

On the non-musical front, there’s The Nibroc Trilogy (Hollywood’s Actor’s Co-op, September 8-November 26), an epic three-play cycle by Arlene Hutton, presented in repertory. The Last Train to Nibroc, See Rock City, and Gulf View Drive spin a seriocomic love story, following a young American couple’s journey through World War II on the home front and the challenges they subsequently face in the postwar period.
The Falcon Theatre kicks off its season with Tonight at 11!, television weatherman Fritz Coleman’s behind-the-scenes look at a fictional L.A. television statrion (September 6-October 1). Award-winning playwright/actress Dael Orlandersmith brings her six-character solo show The Gimmick to Hollywood’s Fountain Theatre (September 13-October 1), under the direction of Simon Levy.

Theatre a Go-Go presents the comedy The Queen of Bingo (West Hollywood’s Coronet Studio Theatre, beginning Sept. 15 for an open-ended run), by Jeanne Michels and Phyllis Murphy with gender-bending casting. The show explores the worlds of Bingo, family ties, diet crazes, widowhood, hot flashes, and winning. Another comic offering is the West Coast professional premiere of Ken Ludwig’s new adaptation of the raucous 1930s screwball comedy Twentieth Century (Long Beach’s International City Theatre, Sept.ember 1-October 1) by Ben Hecht and Charles MacArthur.

Dan Castalenetta stars in Douglas Steinberg’s Nighthawks (Culver City’s Kirk Douglas Theatre, through September 24), a comedy-laced American tragedy in which Edward Hopper’s classic 1942 painting is brought to life. Lanford Wilson’s award-winning drama Talley’s Folly (September 8-October 14) will be presented by Syzygy Theatre Group at GTC Burbank. And there are two Greek tragedies on the slate:: Sophocles’ Electra (Hollywood’s MET Theatre, September 8-October 7), and Jean Racine’s Phaedra (Glendale’s A Noise Within (September 9-November 19).

If family-friendly fare is what you’re after, there’s the Glendale Centre Theatre’s musical The Little Mermaid (through November 11), based on the classic fairly tale, with music and lyrics by Kerry Kirkpatrick and Bryon Simpson and a book by Jon Hale and Sarah Sandberg.