She’s not a nun, but she plays one onstage. Patti Hannon is this week celebrating the third anniversary of Late Nite Catechism, the interactive, one-nun show in which she portrays Sister, a cranky bride of Christ who teaches an adult catechism class. The comedy was originally scheduled to play for…
I’m still trying to shake the memory of a particularly unattractive production of Jeffrey from several seasons ago, and Alternative Theatre Company’s new take on Paul Rudnick’s charming comedy has gone a long way toward helping me to forget. Rudnick’s writing is so wonderful, even a roomful of apes could…
He’s charming, super-intelligent, and he makes a better bouillabaisse than you do. He’s 11-year-old chef Rio Bowerman, a gourmet kid with a closetful of cooking gear and a featured spot on several local television shows. While most little boys are out shooting hoops and spitting, Chef Rio is indoors, chopping…
Jacqueline Gaston arrives early in act two of Is What It Is Theatre’s production of Critic’s Choice, and her presence is like a breath of fresh air in a stifling room. Which is precisely where this play, a dated comedy by author Ira Levin, happens to take place. But I…
He, like, didn’t get laid while the cameras were rolling, but dude! Matt Slenske did get totally baked in The Real Cancun, the world’s first-ever reality movie. The latest entry in the race for reality programming, The Real Cancun — now tanking at a theater near you — features three…
A couple of hours before the curtain went up on opening night of Parade, a publicist from Theater Works phoned to say that that evening’s performance had been rescheduled as a final dress rehearsal. In Theater land, this is never a good sign. It usually means that the show is…
Black Theatre Troupe has scored another hit with its all-around pleasant production of Blues in the Night at the Herberger Theater Center. While the company has turned out several engaging dramas these past few seasons, its attempts to sell a decent musical have been less notable. This one, though, is…
ShariAnne Fischer needs your help. Her husband, Daved, has end-stage emphysema and, if he doesn’t have lung reduction surgery in the next several months, he may die. ShariAnne doesn’t like to leave Daved alone for very long, so holding down a job is out of the question. But you won’t…
The heck with lap dancing. Tara Eivers, owner of Sinbad’s restaurant in Tempe, has the jump on the next hot trend in entertainment. Several nights a week, Sinbad’s features a bevy of belly dancers who shake their coin-heavy hips and bejeweled fannies at the dinner trade. For the price of…
Anyone doubting that Latino theater has proven itself a worthy subgenre need look no further than last month’s Pulitzers. Nilo Cruz, Cuban-American author of Anna in the Tropics, the play about Tampa cigar-makers set in the Spanish-Cuban community of Ybor City, received this year’s Pulitzer Prize for Drama — the…
Ol’ Blue Eyes is history, but Ol’ Brown Eyes — a.k.a. The Don — is with us still. You’ll find him every weekend in the Marriott Camelback Inn’s supper club, sounding an awful lot like Frank Sinatra and Tony Bennett and especially Dean Martin. The former B-movie actor and part-time…
Spinning Into Butter is an Important Play, one of those that are lauded practically from their first curtain call for being brave and smart and honest in their depiction of difficult subjects. Rebecca Gilman’s work probes hidden racism and political correctness, and is based on an incident that occurred at…
Most of us who have them get smacked for playing with our dicks in public. But onetime show-biz agent Simon Morley has made an art of pulling his pudding in front of others. In Morley’s wildly popular touring show Puppetry of the Penis, he and pal David Friend twist their…
I attended high school with some terrifically horrible people. Imagine my dismay at discovering several of them on ASU’s main stage last week — and my delight in discovering how expertly they’ve been drawn by playwright Jeff Hatcher and brought superbly to life by a group of talented theater students…
Those of us who haven’t endured small-town life or anyone who believes that hate crimes aren’t high on the list of human failings will want to see The Laramie Project, an invigorating examination of hatred and backward thinking. And fans of first-rate theater won’t want to miss what Stray Cat…
Jim Geary is a man of letters. Tiny, embossed letters, printed on smooth wooden tiles. Geary is one of the world’s preeminent Scrabble players, a tournament competitor who’s racked up big scores with words you’ve never heard before. He’s so good that he’s featured among the all-time champs in Scrabylon,…
Peppermint Patty would be horrified. Lucy would scream bloody murder. But Charlie Brown is here to save the day from evil dentists who are filling our faces with evil contaminants. Brown is the legal counsel for the Coalition to Abolish Mercury Dental Fillings, a group of dentists, physicians and environmentalists…
Amadeus is a smartly written, clever character piece that spins the life of Mozart into a demented bedtime story as told by the great composer’s rival, Antonio Salieri. And, as told by Phoenix Theatre, Amadeus is the longest, dreariest production I’ve witnessed all season. Blame it on sluggish direction, or…
There’s theater, and there’s great theater, and Dirty Blonde though enlivened by excellent performances and Arizona Theatre Company’s clever staging is just theater. Not even the best work of our biggest and brightest can make more of this pleasant trifle, a sort-of biography of screen star Mae West. Dirty Blonde…
She’s talented. She’s hopeful. She’s from Phoenix. And she might very well be the next voice you hear in country music, if the USA Network has anything to say about it. Tasha Valentine, Phoenix’s very own honky-tonk gal, has landed a role on Nashville Star, the latest in the parade…
If there’s a flaw in August Wilson’s Jitney, it’s that it bends the rule that says there are no easy resolutions in modern drama. Wilson, in his desire to present proactive plays about black solidarity, ties up too neatly the heartbreak and calamity in the lives of the cab drivers…
You can’t take it with you, but you can have it made into a sparkly hat pin and Scottsdale businessman Bill Sefton can prove it. After his 27-year-old daughter Valerie died last September of Hodgkin’s disease, Sefton had her ashes converted into diamonds by a Chicago-based company called LifeGem, which…
