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Showing posts from November, 2011

A Hopeful Glimpse into Difficult Times — A JIVE BOMBER'S CHRISTMAS at KKT

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The year is 1943, and as war rages overseas, the American government commits its own atrocities at home. All around the country, internment “camps” fill with Japanese Americans—camps surrounded by fences and posts where soldiers guard the “campers” with guns. A Jive Bomber’s Christmas , by Dom & Sachiko Magwili, is set, primarily, in one such camp. Jive Bomber’s is part play part musical revue, with the change coming at intermission. The first act—though there is music and some singing—is the drama half, also functioning as the setup for the second-act variety show, something the camp resident prisoners decide to put on in the name of Christmas cheer, despite the fact that everyone involved is dealing with their own personally painful subplot. Director Stephanie Conching has her work cut out for her with only one act to develop numerous characters and plotlines that should all be resolved in the end, and hardly any dialogue or scene work in the second act that isn’t part of

Quickly Crazy — THE HOUSE OF BLUE LEAVES at HPU

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by Guest Contributor  Lindsay Timmington McGahan John Guare’s The House of Blue Leaves takes place on October 4, 1965 (or the day the Pope came to New York) and features Artie Shaughnessy (Rob Duval), a zookeeper who lives in a shabby apartment in Sunnyside, Queens and dreams of becoming a famous Hollywood songwriter. Problem is—he’s no good. Problem is—he’s saddled with a schizophrenic wife (Bananas) and an overzealous girlfriend (Bunny) who’s obsessed with all things celebrity, including the Pope. Bunny (Lisa Barnes) wants Artie to dump Bananas (Stacy Ray) at the mental institution, “The House of Blue Leaves,” on their way out to Hollywood to meet up with Billy Einhorn, Artie’s childhood friend who is a big time Hollywood director. Artie will also leave behind his son Ronny (Jason Kaye), who has been drafted to Vietnam but is plotting his own shot at stardom with a plan skillfully hidden from his parents. Blue Leaves is a darkly comic, almost absurd look at dreams, politi

The Whimsical World of the Futrelles — FUTRELLE-OGY: CHRISTMAS BELLES at TAG

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by Guest Contributor Tracy Hanayo Okubo Brad Powell, Artistic Director of TAG—The Actors’ Group, may have already been honored with the Pierre Bowman Lifetime Achievement Award from the Hawai‘i State Theatre Council, but that doesn’t mean he’s going to slow down anytime soon. Always one ready for a challenge, Powell took on the daunting task of directing not one, but three full-length shows to be performed in repertory. Welcome to The Futrelle-ogy , the trilogy of Dearly Beloved , Christmas Belles , and Southern Hospitality —three comedies by Jessie Jones, Nicholas Hope, and Jamie Wooten that follow the Futrelle sisters and their wacky adventures. Christmas Belles is the second of the Futrelle-ogy plays, but if you didn’t see the first, Dearly Beloved , the show does begin with a quick “re-cap,” much like with some television shows, so that you are at least partially caught up. The play picks up from where the last play ended, with the eldest Futrelle sister, Honey Rae Fu

An Alternate World of Captivating Drama — OEDIPUS THE KING at LCC

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Perhaps the most well-known play of all time, Sophocles' Oedipus the King has been transported to something like a present-day corporate office in New York City for Leeward Community College Theatre’s current production of the classic. The tragedy crackles and hums—it vibrates—in this modernized staging. The house opens and the audience fills in, while on a large projector screen, news-like images flash, accompanied by sections of voiceover. In the background, on either side of the screen, the city looms dark. As showtime arrives, a reporter is heard to say something about a solar power disaster… The screen is gone, and in stream the screaming, horrified masses—or, more precisely, shareholders. And what do they want? Oedipus, of course. Joshua Weldon plays Oedipus as a young CEO certain of the love of his people—his company shareholders and those in the audience addressed as the “people of Thebes”—coming off a bit like a politician. Weldon, with the lion’s share of the lin

OKLAHOMA! with a Little Something for Everyone — at UHM

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'Ali Hakim' & 'Ado Annie' Theatre can be a lot of things for a lot of different people. The most popular shows in terms of ticket sales, both locally and nationally, are the big “Broadway” productions, especially musicals. People, it would seem, want to be entertained. In the world of American Theatre, Oklahoma! holds an iconic status among musicals. It’s been produced on community, professional, high school, and university stages across the nation, even way out here in the 50 th state—quite a trek, geographically and culturally, from state of the union number 46, Oklahoma. In program notes, director of the Kennedy Theatre production at UHM Lurana Donnels O’Malley calls the musical “groundbreaking” and dramaturg Yining Lin notes that the original production, which opened on Broadway in 1943, “had a stunning 2,212 performances, a record that lasted for 15 years.” So, what—you might be wondering—is the big deal with this show? Why has it been so popular f

What Gets You Off? — HOT 'N' THROBBING at UHM

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Late Night theatre at UHM has certainly taken a turn for the touchier topics: namely, sex and violence. While the first offering of the season, Stop Kiss , focused on a female/female relationship, Hot ‘N’ Throbbing —which opened last night—explores S&M in a family setting. The play, by Paula Vogel, asks what the difference is between pornography and erotica. Between a woman’s version of sex as entertainment and a man’s. And, where does fantasy end and reality begin? How does one influence the other? Which is in control? The writer, the director, the man, the woman, the body, the mind…? Get ready to meet some twisted individuals. Not that the members of this highly dysfunctional family don’t have their tender sides—Mom sleeps on the couch so the teenage brother and sister don’t have to share a room (which is a good thing, because if they did, they’d probably be fucking). Oh, if you didn’t like my use of the F-word just then, you probably shouldn’t go see this show. Because i

A Familiar 'Shop' with a Few Highlights — LITTLE SHOP OF HORRORS at MVT

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I kicked off my Halloween weekend this Friday with a trip to Manoa Valley Theatre to see their production of Little Shop of Horrors —a gentle entry into the season of fright. I haven’t seen the show on stage before and I haven’t seen the movie with Rick Moranis in I don’t know how long, but long, and yet this production felt familiar. The little flower shop of horrors—Mushnik’s—is set in urban Skid Row, in the…“now”? That’s what it says in the program, though it felt thoroughly past-tense; when, exactly, would be hard to pinpoint. In the opening lines of the show, the audience is told that the story happens “...in an early year of a decade not too long before our own...” OK, so that settles it. Good. It’s in the past, with corded telephones. The story is also set in a place and time when it’s “normal” for a girl to get beat up on by her boyfriend and for others to stand idly by (until someone doesn’t...). That could be the present or the past, depending on where you are and who y