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Heart, soul spill off the stage in isle’s moving ‘La Cage’ musical

"La Cage aux Folles" is not a simple show to produce, nor is it an epical undertaking that requires a gigantic cast and crew to make it all work. What it does require is an exceptional chorus, two immensely talented leads, lavish lighting, a colorful moving set and a massive amount of quality costumes. Maui is not Broadway and this "La Cage" is not unblemished, but there is very little to critique in this wonderful local production. The only constructive criticism I could share would be in comparison to the large-scale expectations of a city like San Francisco.As master of ceremonies, ...

Family Matters with 2014 ‘La Cage aux Folles’

I wonder how the initial financing pitch for "La Cage aux Folles" might have gone. Possibly something like this:OK, so there's this gay couple, and one of them had a one-night stand with a woman 20 years ago. She gets pregnant, but the two men raise the baby. The whole thing takes place at a drag club in France, and you can't tell which performers are men and which are women. The son is now engaged to a girl, and her parents are very conservative, so one dad has to pretend to be a woman in order to trick her parents so the kids can get married . . . and it's a musical.The producers gave ...

Star among the standouts in MAPA’s ‘Fiddler on the Roof’

The Fiddler (Darvis Soo Hoo) in "Fiddler on the Roof" is a metaphor of survival, one who's "trying to scratch out a pleasant simple tune without breaking his neck." The people of Anatevka rely on community and tradition to survive, like Nachum the beggar (Wyatt Deshong), Yente the widowed matchmaker (Carolyn Wright) and Motel the poor tailor (Stephen Webb). Similar to the metaphor and Tevye's tale, Maui Academy of Performing Arts' "Fiddler" is pleasant most of the time, but teeters on breaking occasionally.Keeping "Fiddler" upright is the anchoring performance of Gary Shin-Leavitt as ...

High school stage set for action

It's only fitting that King Kekaulike Dramatic Arts Company opens Shakespeare's "The Tempest" tomorrow night. Maui now embarks into a raging storm of conflicting theatrical productions. However, with crowded houses at "The Play's the Thing" (See Stage Review on the next page), a sold-out opening weekend for "Fiddler on the Roof," three new Maui youth productions set to open, plus large crowds at Maui Arts & Cultural Center all month, the fear that Maui audiences couldn't fill the seats of a dozen performances per week has been quelled."The Tempest," once a rarely produced work, ...

Seasoned cast shines in ‘Play’s the Thing’

Being unfamiliar with the works of P.G. Wodehouse and the current ProArts production, "The Play's the Thing," I was unsure what to expect on Valentine's Day.Early in, I recognized Wodehouse's influence in collaboration with Cole Porter on "Anything Goes" and "The Play's the Thing" is a de-lovely piece of theater. Be forewarned the style is a little dated (published in 1930); however, a script is only as dated as the actors who play it. This seasoned cast ably handles the style and grace of the era.Dale Button, in the lead as Turai, gives an impeccably suave performance, and partner, ...

The role of family

Guess what Eddie Cantor, Lee Strasberg, Walter Matthau, Joan Rivers, Kirk and Michael Douglas, Michael Bolton, Harrison Ford, David Copperfield, Peggy Lipton, Sean Penn, Jennifer Connelly, Robert Downey Jr., River and Joaquin Phoenix, Jake and Maggie Gyllenhall, and Seth Green share in common?These entertainers are the descendants of tsarist Russian Jews, primarily from the Ukraine, who fled to America in the early 1900s in order to escape persecution by Cossacks. "Fiddler on the Roof" mirrors the likely beginnings of 2 million Russian-Jewish grandparents and great grandparents that ...