Review: TV Journalist Michael Ausiello’s 13-Year-Old Self Wrote a Soap Opera—Now It’s a Real Play in Los Angeles

When you’re an adolescent, you’re invincible, and everything you do is superstar material. If you play sports, you’re as good as David Beckham. If you act in your school play, you’re the next Robert De Niro. And if you’re unpolished future television journalist and author Michael Ausiello, you sit alone in your room in 1985 and invent 517 episodes for a trashy (fake) soap opera you call Beverly Hills.

While many of us try to forget our attempts at fame in our early teens, Ausiello bravely unearths his scripts and gathers a team of established actors to breathe life into them, with sidesplitting results. 13-Year-Old Michael Ausiello Presents: Beverly Hills: a Pretend Soap Opera Performed by Real Actors, performing from time to time at Dynasty Typewriter in Los Angeles, spoofs the soap genre tropes that audiences have loved for decades.

With influences from one of Ausiello’s childhood favorites, Santa Barbara, Beverly Hills follows the chaotic lives inside the mansions of the 90210. Espionage, murder, romance, and bad acting fill the short nine episodes of this fake soap’s second season, leading to an explosive cliffhanger at an opulent wedding.

Ausiello has dedicated himself to total integrity by fixing none of the many flaws from those childhood scripts, including scenes that go nowhere, stage directions that defy logic, and bland dialogue.

The actors differ at every performance, and cast members receive their scripts in time for curtain. This leads to unexpected improv and gaffes that put not only the audience in stitches, but the other actors as well. The June 11 line-up included comedian/Oscar-winning screenwriter Jim Rash (The Descendants), and actors including Patrick J. Adams (Suits), Timothy Simons (Veep), Edi Patterson (The Righteous Gemstones), and Keiko Agena (Gilmore Girls).  Plot twists keep the artists off balance, so their shocked reactions are honest. Everyone is having such a great time, it’s infectious.

Standouts on June 11 included Caitlin Reilly (Hacks) as the squeaky, wispy voiced bride-to-be Cindy, who seems to have forgotten she had been near-fatally shot in the season premiere. During the opening credits of each episode Reilly steals attention from everyone else with grandiose postering. Also, Dana Powell (Modern Family) is a hoot as both the no-nonsense nurse and exploited maid. Lastly, as the grand dame of the series, Patty Guggenheim (She-Hulk: Attorney at Law) leans into her inner Joan Collins to be the nastiest and most ruthless rich bitch in town.

13-Year-Old Michael Ausiello Presents: Beverly Hills: a Pretend Soap Opera Performed by Real Actors works best in the end because of its earnestness. Ausiello obviously loves that child of his past, who toiled away alone in that bedroom while other kids played baseball or rode their bikes. Though a parody, Beverly Hills harks back to all our naive dreams and the creative outputs of our youth, no matter how amateurish they had been.