“Friends Like These” — Selling Out Fast!

Theatre Unleashed's hit show

Some shameless self promotion for my theatre company’s hit show Friends Like These. It makes me proud as an Artistic Director to see a show in our company do so well.

TU examines violence in high schools with original new show.

Theatre Unleashed partners with young adults outside the company for a powerful and provocative full-length fringe show exploring the “why” behind teen violence.

LOS ANGELES – Fresh off the successful runs of 4.48 Psychosis, All in the Timing and “Tales of an Unsettled City: Revelations”, Theatre Unleashed is pleased to announce its first ever “fringe show,” a full-length production working off the company’s Main Stage calendar.

Working with young adult actors, Theatre Unleashed presents “Friends Like These”, running Fridays and Saturdays from Sept. 12-Oct. 17 at The Sherry Theatre in North Hollywood.

An original piece by company member Gregory Crafts, “Friends Like These” takes a candid and poignant look at the staggering issue of violence in our high schools. Garrett is an outsider who spends most of his troubled existence in a fantasy world called Haven…that is until he meets Nicole, the popular cheerleader with a curious mind. As quickly as things begin looking up for Garrett, they come crashing down, forcing him to face both his past mistakes and his harsh present reality while he struggles for redemption. This gut-wrenching piece unswervingly explores the emotional trauma brought on by social mores during high school, forcing a confrontation with the causes and tragic consequences that left us staggered as a nation during Columbine and other high school shootings.

“Although Columbine occurred 10 years ago, violence amongst teenagers and young adults is still an ongoing issue,” said co-director Sean Fitzgerald. “After Columbine, those who dressed similar to the shooters were further ostracized. Our production seeks to explore this cycle and to humanize those who are regarded merely as outcasts.”

“Friends Like These” is a period piece, taking place a decade ago, as the country experienced an outbreak of teen violence.

“What’s interesting to me about this play is looking at it as a period piece, taking into account all the things going on in American and the world at the time that would have informed these high schoolers’ lives,” said co-director Vance Roi Reyes. “It was a violent, violent time in our history for children and young people.”

Wanting to cast age appropriate, Fitzgerald and Reyes sought actors outside the company to play the teenage roles, marking the first time Theatre Unleashed has done a show made up of mostly non-company members. Authenticity was also a priority for Crafts, who identified with his characters.

“I was an outcast in high school and certainly felt like a ‘trenchcoat kid,’ so I had a lot of personal experience to pull from,” Crafts said. “I don’t think the story is very self-reflective anymore and I certainly don’t think its just about a school shooting. It’s a story about five kids and how complex their lives are.”

“Friends Like These” performs alongside the new Theatre Unleashed late night show “Pulp Graveyard”, which presents the stories of old dime store comic book and serials live on stage. Theatre Unleashed is also pleased to bring back “Through a Caffeine Haze” and the sketch comedy troupe “Die Gruppe.”

DATES AND TIMES:
Sept. 12-Oct. 17
Fridays and Saturdays, all shows at 8 p.m,
*Meet and greet with artists after each show
**Immediately following Saturday performances will be
the TU original Pulp Graveyard

LOCATION:
The Sherry Theatre
11052 Magnolia Blvd.
North Hollywood, CA 91601

TICKET PRICES:
General Admission: $15
*$20 for both Friends Like These and Pulp Graveyard

INFORMATION & RESERVATIONS:
For further information, please call: (818) 849-4039
Or check out our website at: www.theatreunleashed.com

There will be no late admission.

(500) Days of Summer; or Did Someone Copy and Paste Their Personal Journal?

Of course they sell the movie with "happy".

(500) Days of Summer is not the movie to take someone to if you have just started dating them. This is not, as the voice over claims in the first few minutes of the film, a romantic comedy, i.e. a film in which the couple ends up happily ever after. It’s fun, funny, in fact it’s a pure joy to watch. It so eloquently captures the ups and downs of a relationship that isn’t meant to be that it draws out of you every doubt in your mind that you could possibly have with the person sitting next to you. And gives you hope in the potential…for the next one…alas not the one you’re with. Ouch.

Now, if you’re pretty confident in your relationship, or have just gotten out of one, you should then, without a doubt, see this film.

“Thirst”: a rich blood soaked love story

Two lost souls…two undead lost souls…which is kind of redundant.

Thirst, the new film by Hitchcock virtuoso, Korean director Chan-wook Park, chronicles a love affair that’s tainted from the beginning and not just because it involves a Priest who becomes a Vampire.

Over the years vampires have been used for a hefty amount of serious metaphors, from the original undying love of Bram Stoker’s creation to the teen angst of Edward Cullen from the Twilight series, to Allan Ball’s “coming out” creations on his hit HBO series True Blood. Park, though, has a way, like Tarantino, of bending a genre to his whims in ways that defy even the best stories out there (such as any of the above) and burning visual moments into your retina that will stick with you until you die.

“Inglourious Basterds”

Steeped in Nazi film ideology, why wouldn't there be a cinea in "Inglorious Basterds"?

In Quentin Tarantino’s new film “Inglourious Basterds” it’s true that the Basterds are on display, all the billboards, all the movie trailers, every blurb makes it appear that they are the main characters, led by mega star Brad Pitt as Lt. Aldo Raine, a good old boy with a deep respect for his Native American heritage, as he leads his merry men on a carnage ladden path through occupied France to scalp some “Naazis”. What a great hook for a film, and it’s pretty close to the truth, but only a part of the truth.

Tarantino gets to that, but he’s smart enough to know that it’s merely a hook. For some filmmakers it would be enough to show this intense group of Nazi killers as they roam the country side, but he’s up to more here. Giant robots fight on Earth. It’s a hook, a great logline to get people to come watch the movie, but that’s all Transformers is. Basterds is full of the richness of a filmmaker that has finally tamed his own desire for pulp retreads, and has found his own voice.

“Taken”

Dude, just give him back his daughter.

There’s something surprisingly and lovingly familiar about Liam Neeson”s new action vehicle Taken. It’s not that Liam Neeson completely rocks no matter what he does. It’s also not that this film follows in the footsteps  of other lesser genre action films from the “written by Luc Besson” canon by being far better than it’s parts than it has any reason to be. Or that you manage to enjoy the scene that you enjoyed so thuroughly in the trailer. Nope. The real reason why is because it’s in many ways a replica of that wonderful 80’s actioneer Commando starring Arnold Schwarzenegger.

In Bruges: And the Biggest Oscar Debacle of the Year — Thank you Focus Features

Good times on the set of "In Bruges"...before Focus Features dropped the ball.

In Bruges, written and directed by Martin McDonagh, is by and far the best movie of 2008, certainly better than several of the Best Picture Oscar contenders, and while worthy of a Best Orignal Screenplay nomination, it’s certaily worth more than that. It’s funny, contemplative, sad, hopeful, tragic, meaningful, poetic, bristling with intensity, violence, romance…any positive adjective you can throw at it will probably stick, and it lingers on all of these without diminishing the tone and overall spirit of the film itself. It’s a work of breathtaking genius that has stuck with me since the very beginning of the year. This is a film that’s just as perfect as last years No Country for Old Men, but somehow it’s been almost completely overlooked at the Oscars. Who’s fault is it that a gem like this isn’t as appreciated as it needs to be?