Alan Portner - Page 10

The characters in Eugene O'Neil's "Moon For The Misbegotten," now being performed by the Kansas City Actors' Theatre at Union Station, are tours de force for serious actors and serious audiences.   The story, while not autobiographical, follows the life path of O'Neil's brother James.  They are, in some ways, similar to the tragic heroes of William Shakespeare and the tortured souls of Tennessee Williams.

“Elegy For A Lady” is a tiny fragment of a play lasting no more than forty minutes, but also an insight into the mind of American playwright Arthur Miller.  Instead of being performed in a traditional theater, Bob Paisley and Heidi Van inhabit their characters inside a tiny lady's boutique in the Crossroads among, rather than in front of, a tiny audience of about twenty people.

Alan Lerner and Frederick Lowe's 1956 musical megahit 'My Fair Lady' opened last weekend at Musical Theater Heritage inside its three-venue Crown Center complex with a re-imagination by Kansas City's Heidi Van. This cast is multi-racial and sensitive to the modern relative roles of men and women in today's society.

The Spencer Theater, KC Rep audience roared its approval at the world-premiere, musical production of Steve Kruger's 1998 novel 'Last Days Of Summer.'   In collaboration with Composer Jason Howland and Director Jeff Calhoun, Kruger's new play takes its first full scale step toward a hoped for long run on the Great White Way

'Love Never Dies' is absolutely worth seeing.  It is lush.  The voices are beyond exceptional.  Sets, costumes, and effects are haunting. The direction by Australians Simon Phillips and choreography by Graeme Murphy AO completely envelop the space allowed.  The traveling pit orchestra conducted by Dale Rieling is as good as it gets.  There are several, new, show stopping songs and lots of achingly beautiful echoes of the original Phantom score.

Great theater requires a willing suspension of disbelief.  'The Producers' by Mel Brooks and Thomas Meehan requires a willing embrace of 1940's Catskill schlock and shtick.  That said, MTH's 'The Producers' is so much inspired silliness, so well performed, and so meticulously put together, it is tough to stop giggling and smirking and groaning at the awful, hysterical, politically in-correct, funny, one-liners.   The Saturday night, Crown Center audience for 'The Producers' thoroughly embarrassed itself and was delighted to do so.

'The Wizard Of Oz' as produced by Kansas City's 'Theater League' in the cavernous outdoor concert venue now called Providence Hospital Amphitheater

Donna Sheridan (Shanna Jones) was the lead singer in one of the early female power trios, 'Donna and the Dynamos,' back in the summers of love period in the late 1960s. She found the love of her life, Sam Carmichael (John Franklin), and lost him to a previous personal commitment while Donna and her crew performed among the Greek Islands in the Mediterranean Sea. That summer Donna had two rebound relationships with other men. All three relationships were documented in her diary. Donna became pregnant by whom Donna is not sure.

Johnson County's Community Theatre in the Park performs a top quality and charming version of Steven Sondheim's 1987 musical mashup of every fairy tale you have ever had told to you as a child.  We've got Jack and the Beanstalk, Cinderella and her dysfunctional clan, Rapunzel in her tower, Little Red Riding Hood, her wolfy friend, a couple of princes, an odd looking guy never named but definitely related to Rumpelstiltskin, and even a mention of Snow White snoozing in her crystal casket surrounded by suspicious looking short guys. 

Two sold out audiences leaped to their feet in group appreciation of 'Disney's Newsies,' a co-production of the Jewish Community Center's White Theatre (in Overland Park) and The Coterie Theatre (normally operating out of Crown Center).

'South Pacific' at the huge 'Theatre In The Park' outdoor amphitheater is a super community theater rendition of the Rogers and Hammerstein 1949 ground-breaking classic.   The scene is a tiny island on the stepping stone chain of Polynesian Islands being retaken by the U.S. Navy and Marine Corps following the Pearl Harbor attack on December 7, 1941.

The 2018 edition of the 'Heart of America Shakespeare Festival' offers a very nice production of Shakespeare's 1599 comedy 'Much Ado About Nothing.' 'Much Ado' is a comedy/farce in many ways similar to other Shakespearian comedies 'Taming of the Shrew,' and 'The Merchant of Venice.' All three plays depend on misdirection and romances somehow gone way awry.

Next up at the White Theatre is a joint production with Crown Center's Coterie Theatre of “Disney's Newsies;” a live stage musical version of the 1992 musical film. “Newsies” recalls the real-life newsboys' strike of 1899.   

J. Kent Barnhart's Quality Hill Playhouse trots out another of his patented cabaret style revues, "Sinatra's Songwriter."  This revue celebrates Sammy Cahn, the longtime lyricist and songwriter for legendary crooner Frank Sinatra.  If the well loved music of the long Sammy Cahn-Frank Sinatra collaboration pings at your heartstrings, then this cabaret show is for you.

Musical Theater Heritage presents a super re-imagination of Andrew Lloyd Weber's 1982 'Cats.'  This show is a two magical hours that will be savored by its audiences.  Director Tim Scott has built a team of designers, actors, dancers, and musicians who would be tough to match on any stage.  'Cats' is total ensemble producing. 

This week at Starlight Theatre; 'Dirty Dancing.'  If you are a die-hard fan of the 1987 film "Dirty Dancing," the live-on-stage version of the film might be the "Time of Your Life."   For others, not so much.

Unicorn Theatre bills itself as a venue for "Bold New Plays."  Its current production, 2014s "Hir" (pronounced "Here") by the playwright Taylor Mac certainly fits in with that expressed goal.  Hir" bills itself as a dark family comedy performed as absurd reality.  It is funny in places and tragic in others.  It blows up traditional values in favor of being on the leading edge of change. 

The original Broadway production of 1975s 'A Chorus Line' ran 6,137 performances because it caught something true and sometimes sad about all those people who labor in the background of musical theater. This new iteration produced by 'Big League Productions,' a non-equity tour company, captures something of the original.

Kansas City Actors Theatre "Skylight" by British playwright David Hare features excellent performances in a top-caliber production running now through June 10th at the H&R Block City Stage inside Union Station.   "Skylight" relates a single evening in the life of three people as they relive and reexamine a complicated relationship history.

Fans of Gloria and Emilio Estefan and their Miami Sound Machine are in for a treat with the touring version of their musical 'On Your Feet!' now playing through Sunday as Starlight Theatre in Swope Park.  'On Your Feet' kicks off Starlight's 2018 summer Broadway season.