Thursday, September 8, 2011
She’s charming and gorgeous. Vivacious and soulful. In short, Rita Moreno is the perfect candidate for an autobiographical show.
Rita Moreno: Life Without Makeup is not yet the perfect …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:29PMFriday, September 2, 2011
It’s the day after the Richmond-Ermet AIDS Foundation, and Lea Salonga, visiting family in the Bay Area, is still glowing because, at the curtain call, she got to hold hands with Shirley J…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:00AMMonday, August 29, 2011
Nerd-on-nerd love is something to behold.
It's sweet, it's smart, it's funny – at least it is in Cameron McNary's sharply etched play Of Dice and Men, receiving its Bay Area premiere cou…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:00AMThursday, August 25, 2011
In today's San Francisco Chronicle, I talk with TheatreWorks Artistic Director Robert Kelley, set designer Joe Ragey and costume designer Fumiko Bielefeldt about their work on bringing Jane …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:41PMMonday, August 22, 2011
Falling in love with a playwright whose work you're experiencing for the first time feels like Christmas morning at age 6 – giddy excitement, new toys, wonder and sugar high all wrapped up…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 10:00AMSunday, August 21, 2011
Marin Theatre Company's beautiful production of August Wilson's Seven Guitars is the third I've seen, and it amazes me how similar and how different those productions have been. The first wa…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 05:36PMFriday, August 19, 2011
If you’ve ever wondered what happens when the Muppets go blue, check out Stuffed and Unstrung, the blush-inducing, laugh-happy puppet improv show from Henson Alternative, the adult arm of …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:20PMWednesday, August 17, 2011
A beautiful night at the Bruns Amphitheater is made even more so by something marvelous on stage.
That would be George Bernard Shaw’s Candida, a sharp early play (1894) that is concise,…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:17PMMonday, August 8, 2011
If only the actual apocalypse were going to be so enjoyable.
Hand it to playwright JC Lee for making the end of the world – and after – so lyrical, so funny and so, well, human. That'…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 01:20PMSunday, July 17, 2011
In a recent email chat with playwright Kim Rosenstock (see full interview below), I asked her what Bay Area theatergoers might learn about her if they see both of her shows now on local stag…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 07:03PMSunday, July 10, 2011
Let it be known that the world premiere of California Shakespeare Theater's The Verona Project is a hell of a lot more fun than The Two Gentlemen of Verona, the Shakespeare play on which it'…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 11:46PMThursday, July 7, 2011
Hair piled on her head, cigarette dangling out of her mouth and a slight stoop to her posture, Faith Prince can get a laugh just walking across the stage as Mrs. Wilkinson, the dissatisfied …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 06:20PMWednesday, June 29, 2011
When Billy Elliot the Musical caused a sensation in London in 2005 and then swept the 2009 Tonys with 10 awards, you could be excused for wondering what all the fuss was about. Wasn’t this…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:33PMFriday, June 24, 2011
About nine years ago, Trevor Allen lifted the veil on an operation so shrouded in secrecy and intrigue that the merest glimpse inside set people salivating. He revealed what it was actually …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 04:13PMFriday, June 17, 2011
You've heard that old trope about intense pressure turning a lump of coal into a diamond. Well what if that kind of pressure is applied to a human being? In Franz Kafka's opinion, the pressu…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 12:50PMTuesday, June 14, 2011
After performing on the Tony Awards last Sunday with her fellow Company cast members, Anika Noni Rose, all glammed out in a gorgeous white gown, devoured a giant plate of nachos.
The Tony …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 09:47PMThursday, June 9, 2011
Director Joel Sass has such a strong, infectious sense of storytelling that he even makes Shakespeare’s Titus Andronicus, proclaimed to be the Bard’s bloodiest play, enjoyable.
It’s…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 06:51PMWednesday, June 8, 2011
The legend of Tiny Alice looms large. Edward Albee’s notorious 1964 follow-up to his monster Broadway smash Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf baffled critics and continued to cause kerfuffl…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:46PMMonday, June 6, 2011
I can tell you that [title of show] is not for everyone, but I can also tell you that it's for more people than you might actually think. This meta-musical about two guys writing a musical a…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:12PMThursday, June 2, 2011
In the last year or so, Berkeley Repertory Theatre has offered an instructive survey of the solo show. Last summer, as part of the Fireworks festival, local favorite Dan Hoyle offered two of…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 05:58PMThere’s a beautiful line of dialogue that perfectly encapsulates the denouement of Armistead Maupin’s Tales of the City, a tricky new musical having its world premiere at American Conser…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:01AMThursday, May 26, 2011
In many ways, Blue Man Group is the modern equivalent of The Ziegfeld Follies — a lot of razzle-dazzle flash and sound, entertainment for its own sake. Instead of gorgeous gals with gams u…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:00PMSaturday, May 14, 2011
In the spirit of PlayGround's annual 10-minute play festival, I'm going to attempt to write a 10-minute review.
The time is 10:40am. Start the clock.
The joy of a short play festival is …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 02:00PMTuesday, May 10, 2011
What an interesting Sarah Ruhl moment we’re having.
Ruhl’s new version of Chekhov’s Three Sisters is getting a moving and lovely production at Berkeley Repertory Theatre. And her 20…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:03PMMonday, May 9, 2011
How in the world do you follow Strike Up the Band? 42nd Street Moon’s last outing was a spectacularly charming and tuneful production of a Gershwin show that has been unjustly sidelined by…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 05:00PMThursday, May 5, 2011
It was hot and steamy in San Francisco Wednesday. And the weather was nice, too. Hugh Jackman, that final Australian frontier of old-school razzle-dazzle entertainment, put on a show at the …
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:07PMSunday, May 1, 2011
Australian dreamboat and all-around wonderful entertainer Hugh Jackman is about to take the Bay Area by storm. And if he doesn't, he'll be back to settle our hash in his full Wolverine drag.…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 04:24PMSaturday, April 30, 2011
When they said Cats was "now and forever," they weren't kidding. Not even a little bit.
On May 11, the much beloved (and derided) Andrew Lloyd Webber musical about singing pussycats and ti…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 03:41PMHugh Jackman remembers his earliest encounter with musical theater. He was 5 years old, playing King Arthur in "Camelot," and the crown kept slipping down his head and over his nose.
SOURCE: San Francisco Chronicle at 02:37PMThursday, April 28, 2011
Sitting at the computer, hands on the keyboard, I’ve been staring at the screen wondering where to begin describing and opining about The Lily’s Revenge at the Magic Theatre.
Adjectiv…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 05:35PMWednesday, April 27, 2011
Onstage and online, Broadway legend Betty Buckley is electrifying.
If you’ve ever seen her perform on Broadway – perhaps in the original cast of Cats or as Norma Desmond in Sunset Bou…
SOURCE: Chad Jones' Theater Dogs at 07:08PM 
