Put a Little Drama in your Life
KPBS AIRDATE: APRIL 22, 1998 If linguistic acrobatics is your idea of a good workout, Tom Stoppard will really make you sweat. His plays are not mindless entertainment; far from it. But sometimes they smack of mental masturbatory exercises, like the self-congratulatory and solipsistic “The Real Thing.” But in his 1993 “Arcadia,” he may actually have Read More →
KPBS AIRDATE: APRIL 15, 1998 So, here’s the paradox: ‘The barber of Seville shaves all the men in Seville if and only if they do not shave themselves. Does the barber shave himself?’ Now, this may be totally inconsequential to you, but it’s the kind of thing that can torture a mathematician, and, in the case of a brilliant one like Read More →
KPBS AIRDATE: APRIL 10, 1998 Two dark dramas about miscommunication and misguided morality -- one by a master and one by a novice. The novice wins the day, and gets the decidedly better production. But that’s partly due to the writing. Three-time Pulitzer Prize-winner Edward Albee, once hailed as America’s “most skillful composer of dialogue,” must Read More →
KPBS AIRDATE: APRIL 8, 1998 What would happen if Ally McBeal and Clare Danes went on a May-December double-date with Burt Bacharach and Hal David? The result would be “My So-Called Musical,” an angst-ridden, retro-revue sentimentally obsessed with love and relationship. Bacharach may be experiencing a revival (with recordings from artists as disparate as McCoy Tyner, Elvis Costello and Read More →
KPBS AIRDATE: APRIL 3, 1998 Actually, it’s all in the writing. When a play is beautifully poetic or hysterically surreal, a director has to simply get out of the way and let the language take over. In two very satisfying productions, one director does, one doesn’t, but the result still works out to excellent effect. Read More →
KPBS AIRDATE: MARCH 25, 1998 Two clever musicals. Two historic theaters. Two auspicious events. Starlight hits paydirt at the splendid Spreckels Theatre, and the new Green Room Theatre Company brings to the magnificent Balboa Theatre the first live performance in fifty years. This weekend, the production of “Closer Than Ever” celebrates the 74th anniversary Read More →
“San Diego is a hotbed of theater. Every year, I see 200-250 productions. This is fertile ground for new work. In addition to the prodigious local talent, theatermakers from around the country come here to premiere their latest creations. San Diego sends more shows to Broadway than nearly any other city in the U.S.”
-Pat Launer