Stars shine in Cabrillo Stage's bittersweet 'Last Five Years'
The winning streak continues at Cabrillo Stage with its new production of "The Last Five Years," the second offering in the company's 30th Anniversary season. More of a song cycle than a conventional musical play, the show is a tightrope duet that takes its two performers through an entire romance, from joyous beginnings to bitter end. The songs won't be familiar to most audiences, and the staging is intense: two people onstage in the intimate Black Box Theater for an hour and a half, without an intermission. But as a showcase for two terrific Cabrillo Stage veterans, Andrew Ceglio and Ariel Buck, it's a knockout.

Cabrillo Stage offers intimate musical, “The Last 5 Years"
The intimate Cabrillo Black Box Theater provides the perfect stage for the poignant production "The Last 5 Years." Written by Tony Award-winning songwriter, Jason Robert Brown, the musical first opened in the Northlight Theater in Illinois in 2001 where it sold a record number of tickets over the first weekend. Nearly 10 years later, the show premieres at Cabrillo Stage July 8 and runs until Aug. 14. Though its director, Mollye Maxner, is a first-timer with Cabrillo Stage, the play stars veterans Andrew Ceglio and Ariel Buck.

"The Last 5 Years" is a musical that explores the five-year relationship of two career-driven individuals: Jamie Wellerstein, the novelist, played by Ceglio, and Cathy Hyatt, the struggling actress, played by Buck. The show's structure is non-linear as the story begins with two timelines simultaneously: the start of Jamie and Cathy’s relationship from Jamie's perspective, and the end of the relationship from Cathy's. As one of them moves forward through time and the other one backward, the two characters interact for only one song during their wedding in the middle of the show.

Cabrillo Stage's fun, raucous 'Full Monty' delivers the goods
As a property, “The Full Monty” is not for the fainthearted. A live stage musical based on the 1997 film of the same name about laid-off factory workers who produce a full frontal male strip act to raise some cash and reclaim their manhood, it's peppered with profanity, features various degrees of nudity, and demands plenty of singing, dancing and chutzpah from its actors. Any company that dares to put this show on the boards had better have the goods to back it up.

‘Krapp’s Last Tape’ is a light in the darkness of the mind
The expression on Paul Whitworth's face becomes comically distorted as he desperately searches his brain to find the term for the Japanese art of flower arrangement.

A few moments pass in silence, as his café con leche continues to cool on the table. Suddenly, he’s on his feet and wagging his index finger enthusiastically, “maybe this fellow knows.” In the direction of his pointed finger, Whitworth approaches the table of an old friend. The two warmly greet, but unfortunately, no answers are unearthed. He returns a bit disappointed, when a woman sitting at a neighboring table informs Whitworth that the term he is searching for is "Ikebana."

Breathtaking ‘Quidam’ Delves Into Deeper Emotions

When you think about a Cirque du Soleil show, it’s all about that big tent, the stunning acts and the fascinating modern circus-like revelry. Well that, and so much more, but as “Quidam,” one of Cirque’s longest running shows, hits the Bay Area this week, we may be in for a surprise.
And a pleasant one at that.

A slight veer off the track of most Cirque shows, “Quidam” doesn’t take us into an “imaginary realm” of quirky yet fascinating and often larger-than- life characters. It’s more of an examination of our own world. Reality—really? Yes. Here, we experience a land inhabited by people with real-life concerns.

Dreams do come true—“Xanadu,” that curious movie musical/box office blunder of the 1980s, is still worthy of our attention. After morphing into a stage musical several years ago, it surprised everyone by becoming one of Broadway’s rockin’ hits. It broke box office records for the stage at the time and somehow managed to warm hearts in the process.

Why?

The original film, which starred Olivia Newton-John as a beautiful mythical Greek muse trying to help an L.A. artist’s dreams come, took itself way too seriously. True, there were hit songs like “Magic,” “Suddenly,” “All Over The World” and, of course, “Xanadu,” but on stage, thanks to crafty creative shenanigans of the show’s creators—Douglas Carter Beans (book) and Jeff Lynne and John Farrar (music and lyrics)—camp is taken to a new level. And on roller skates to boot! Fun.

Jewel Theatre Company takes over the Actors’ Theatre space
Julie James has some big shoes to fill. And we think she’ll do just fine. As the artistic director of Jewel Theatre Company, one of Santa Cruz’s only equity theater companies, James has decided to ratchet things up significantly with her constantly sold-out theater performances by securing Jewel a home base—the old Actors’ Theatre digs. Actors’ Theatre, a long-time Santa Cruz venue for plays created by the resident company at the time (Actors’ Theatre), and many other shows that have passed through its halls, has moved out of the building. The empty space paved the way for James and her company, Jewel, to take over as the resident company.

The big shoes are the memories that Actors’ Theatre leaves in that building on Center Street. There, the annual 8 10s @ 8 has happened (and will continue to as James is already in conversations to keep that event ongoing). In addition, Actors’ Theatre raised up a cadre of directors, producers, and actors in Santa Cruz, and offered classes, workshops, and much more throughout the years.

Cabrillo Stage welcomes ‘Scrooge’
Christmas Carol” may be a tale as old as time, but for 33-year-old award-winning actor Tony Panighetti, Cabrillo Stage’s winter playbill is an opportunity to breathe new life into one of literature’s most reviled villains.

Ebenezer Scrooge is a complex fellow. Stingy to a fault, the rickety old businessman would be the last person to lend you a quarter for the parking meter. He is, however, not impervious to change.

With the help of his deceased business partner Jacob Marley and the Ghosts of Christmases Past, Present and Yet to Come—think Jiminy Cricket meets Sleeping Beauty’s Three Good Fairies—he finds the spirit of the holiday.

For Panighetti, therein lies the beauty of the Dickensian anti-hero.

Santa Cruz’s own equity theater company soars
In an era when the arts are still getting hit hard financially, and money is so tight that people are hawking things at pawn shops, occasionally, some good rises out of the ashes. And when that good is in the form of the arts, it’s even more inspiring. That’s exactly what’s been happening lately with Jewel Theatre, a local theater company which continues to garner attention for its plays, and for its professional theater status as the only equity company in town, other than Shakespeare Santa Cruz. Just months ago, the company debuted its play, “Clouds,” set at the Broadway Playhouse, directed by renowned local theater director Susan Myer Silton. This time around, Jewel is putting on a production of the musical, “Company,” directed by its own founder and artistic director, Julie James.