Well Hollywood Fringe 2016 has come to a close and with it comes the last of the Round Ups

I really love theatre that boldly goes where no ensemble has gone before. In the past William A. Reilly and Gary

Check out this "Game of Thrones" location video focusing on Iceland and Spain; just luscious

Two more clips released from HBO with hints at what we can expect this coming season: Cersei Lannister all but threw

A lot of attention is being given to that first basket, the “basket of deplorables,” as Mrs. Clinton called it

We're back on the boat deck filled with potential Survivor contestants, waiting to see who will commit by jumping into

By Ernest Kearney  —  Playwright Lauren Gunderson is the current “flavor of the month” of the American theatre scene, with

Office Beat: A Tap Dance Comedy playing now at 2016's Hollywood Fringe: A review

Katori Hall’s The Mountaintop won the 2010 British Olivier Award for Best New Play. In 2011 it opened in New York

By Ernest Kearney  —  In my opinion, Long Beach’s International City Theatre artistic director, caryn desai has a genius for

Hollywood Fringe 2016 is bubbling over with choices. Here we have two shows that share common ground and perhaps even

By Ernest Kearney — Bad Jews at the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble was hard for me to watch. Hard in the same

By Ernest Kearney — At the start of "The Last PowerPoint," which played The Hollywood Fringe Festival 2019, the

"Do You: Migration of the Monarchs" is a dazzling concept conveyed in a visually rich language, not a play as

The Bravest Show of the Summer goes to: The Honorable Woman. Series creator Hugo Blick's masterful eye created a world of

The peaceful dawning has come and gone. This day is like a long breath of air that has been held

by Darwyn Carson — Monopoly, I would wager, was always one of the first go-to games of choice amongst friends

By Ernest Kearney — " Miss America’s Ugly Daughter" written and performed by Barra Grant, the daughter of

A life lacking passion is paralysis. The particular focus of that passion counts for beans. Take your pick: Video Games, Persian rugs,

At 100% full on energy the entire night, Garth Brooks IS the ultimate entertainer. From the moment he takes the

These days, every comedian and commentator seems to be paraphrasing Bette Davis in All About Eve: “Fasten your seat belts,

"It was like the eve of a battle; the hearts beat, the eyes laughed, and they felt that the life

I hate writing "bad" reviews for shows. Hate it. Don't get me wrong, I will bring out the ol' file and

Hollywood Fringe, Week One —Part IV  The main stays of any Fringe are the solo performances; one-man shows, one-woman, one-whatever shows.

For the Hollywood Fringe 2016, I employ a rating scale that should be familiar to my readers. For newcomers, I've inserted

"The more things change the more they stay the same" (Les Guêpes, January 1849) Jean-Baptiste Alphonse Karr They are ale drinking, rabble-rousers. Musket

By Ernest Kearney  —  James Royce is an okay mime. It’s ironic in a way that he’s performing his show in

By Ernest Kearney — In "Lock Your Heart, Elder P.," Performer/Writer Robert Perkins offers an absorbing insight

By Ernest Kearney — Its title, "The Other Side of the Razor Ribbon," refers to the modern style

Just as we were about to yawn and say pass the potatoes please, three unique Points of Play in The

By Ernest Kearney  —  "Uncivil Correctness: Joan Rivers, Abbie Hoffman, Bin Laden," apparently, began as a class project and, unfortunately,

Obama’s had a great couple of weeks politically, but he’s still gone as of January 20, 2017. That leaves a

By Ernest Kearney  —  In these turbulent and twisting times that find so many bewildered and baffled, suckered punched by

Pete Docter began Inside Out with a seedling of an idea, after he noticed the transition that his adolescent daughter

By Ernest Kearney  —  When the Russian poet Vladimir Mayakovsky was found on April 14, 1930—a suicide at the age

Heck

When Stephen Colbert coined the word "truthiness" in 2005, he meant "

Well once again you have the opportunity of experiencing one of the true treats of L.A. Sunday, May 22 – Forever

From Space.com: Overall, dark energy is thought to contribute 73 percent of all the mass and energy in the universe. Another 23

If not for a twist of fate and a bit of luck we might never have been witness to David

The Hollywood Fringe Festival 2015 has drawn to a close. The following is the Medal Tally for the 57 Shows I attended: 13

by Ernest Kearney - Epics tend to be about champions, giant defeaters, kingdom conquerors, warriors of a thousand battles.

At the top of where the Angel’s Flight Trolley once deposited its riders (and hopefully will again one day), nestled

In the words of an FTWD character: “When civilization ends, it ends fast.” That’s Right. I love The Walking Dead. The discovery that I

Check the trailer for Sense8 from the creative minds of the Wachowskis, Grant Hill and J. Michael Straczynski. Streaming everywhere

The 2014 Pulitzer prize-winning drama, “Water by the Spoonful,” at the Mark Taper Forum through March 11, is Act II

By Ernest Kearney  —   There is nothing so evasive as engendering effective and credible dread in a live theatre environment.

by Ernest Kearney — The world premiere of "Jackie Unveiled" by award-winning playwright Tom Dugan has been extended at the

By Ernest Kearney — Step by step, inch by inch – The Hollywood Fringe Festival 2019 draws nearer. Must

Last year (2014) The Honorable Woman snagged two TVolution Honors: the Bravest and the Best Freshman Drama of the summer. A creative

Queen Latifah stars as the legendary Bessie Smith whose talent and perseverance resulted in her becoming an iconic "Empress of

By Ernest Kearney —  A small town unemployed knuckle-dragging ne'er-do-well (Adam Ferguson) is approached by a producer of reality TV

The Puckwit Gang’s "Chimpskin" is a stylishly clever history of Lucy (1964-1987), the chimpanzee raised by Maurice and Jane Temerlin,

When I started on this mission of writing about songwriters and how they weren’t being properly acknowledged, I had absolutely

You need valleys. Without valleys how can you appreciate the heights of hills? For me 2016 was a valley, 2014 and 2015

Some of the most jaw dropping, chill raising, and yes tear inducing, imagery ever shot makes up BBC America’s prequel

It is surprising how a vocal style dating back before the 1500s can still strike one as so immediate. Such

"My Janis," at The New Collective during Fringe 2017, is not actually a play. It is a moment

Loser! The Tweet Defeat of Donald Trump did not begin with “Liddle’ Bob Corker” and his oh-so-devastating viral tweet: https://twitter.com/SenBobCorker/status/917045348820049920? Wham! Impressive. But

Netflix is shooting out product faster than the bullet train. The Jason Bateman starrer, "Ozark," streaming now, is sprinting toward

Next Fall by Geoffrey Nauffts is a stunningly sincere and heartfelt drama that is sure to move any audience. That may

“Hell is really cold, wet and smells like fish.” In the tale of his time as a greenhorn on a commercial

What do you think? Have your say HERE: #Savetwinpeaks14251

Dry Land by Ruby Rae Spiegel drew its inspiration from a 2012 article in The New Republic concerning the assault

Well, what with the solid production at the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble of the seldom seen Kingdom of Earth, and now

The Hollywood Fringe Festival's Week One Diary—Part III is all about the Bard who is nicely represented this year with a

by Ernest Kearney  — The origins of Taiko drumming in Japan is lost in that vast attic called history, but

Star Bill Nighy and writer/director David Hare on the character evolution of Johnny Worricker, his true intentions, and where he

What do the New Players Bring to the Game?

By Ernest Kearney — "Jamba Juice The Musical" is a rough, toe-tapping little ditty, a kind of “Hey, I’ve got

By Ernest Kearney — We enter the Broadwater, the venue where I was covering my first show for Hollywood

Okay, a quick side bar. My mother came to Los Angeles in the early '50s as a single parent. She was a

By Ernest Kearney  — Bill Posley’s superbly slick, and raucously funny show, "The Day I Became Black," reveals to

By Steve Schlich  —  Admit it: you’ve clicked on the link “How the Right Lost Its Mind” and read with anxious

Mrs. Elizabeth Handy, wife to the “Father of the Blues” W. C. Handy, lay critically ill on the street outside

After a wait of more than a decade since her last release, Melissa Manchester's 20th album, You Gotta Love the

A lot of us who respect Barack Obama’s eight years in the White House want to curl up and hibernate

I expected President Drumpf to embarrass himself—and us by proxy—when he went abroad last month. He did not disappoint, so

I wanted "Zombie Clown Trump" (Surprise! It's a musical), so badly, to be great.  But if wishes were horses….

…and the biggest problem with democracy is that every damn fool gets one vote. You heard me right. The metric

by Ernest Kearney  —  Matei Visniec is a Romanian playwright who sought and was granted political asylum in France in

Actually, “muttered” does no justice to the chanting and booing that echoed like city noise down an abandoned alleyway as

"Stringmates" by Amanda Noriko Newman takes its core concept from the Asian legend of the “Red String of Fate,” the

Last year no one knew what to expect. The burning question was: "Who is Orphan Black?" This recap is for anyone

By Ernest Kearney — "Loose Underwear" has a great deal going for it not the least of which is Writer/Performer

The Democratic field has lost half since we last spoke. Not the Republicans, the Democrats! Joe Biden: gone, even if

"Bono and the Edge Waiting for Godomino's" by writer/director Richard Lucas approaches being the ultimate Hollywood Fringe Festival offering.

…that’s the current liberal fantasy, and we can sweeten it even more by taking the rest of America’s “left coast” with

By Ernest Kearney — There are seldom any survivors when a relationship crashes and burns, just those who walk away

By Ernest Kearney — Actor, Playwright, Joshua Thomas was last at the Hollywood Fringe Festival in 2014 with

The American Heritage Dictionary of the English Language has five definitions for "entropy" [ěn′ trә-pē]. Four of the five could

What can be said about A Haunted House 2? My, it is rare to see such a testament to mediocrity.

"La Razón Blindada," by Argentinean playwright Aristides Vargas, achieves many things on stage; it is disturbing and insightful, but more

For those who have not cultivated an appreciation for the theatrical craft and are unaware of the merits and delights

The tunes in "Save Me a Spot" were both charming and moving, and wisely limited to ten in number.

By Ernest Kearney  —  There is some solid writing in Playwright/Director Travis Snyder-Eaton’s "Glitch," a two-person play about Rachel, a journalist

The Fringe Week One Continued

At 11:30 on New Year’s Eve, a friend asked me what actual “new” things would come in 2016. The political

Wendy Williams stops by Books and Books in Coral Gables to sign her new book Ask Wendy. How you doin'?

by Ernest Kearney —  My Own Private River Phoenix is a smart and funny piece that is just not ready to

Take a sneak peak at my experience on the red carpet for the Los Angeles, California movie premiere of The

By Steve Schlich — A lot of people think of our president as a divider, but last weekend he did

…and tracks it all over our political kitchen floor! Not that the place was spotless to begin… This edition was supposed

THE GOLD MEDALS: ANNA IN THE DARKNESS LA LA LA STRADA NELL GWYNNE – A DRAMATICK ESSAYE ON ACTING AND PROSTITUTION SHAKESPEARE'S LAST NIGHT

The most disappointing feature of Lee Blessing’s succinct if a tad “lite” A Walk in the Woods now gracing the

The Antaeus Theatre Company always amazes me. The work they do is of the highest quality, and the actors that make

by Ernest Kearney — "Bright Star," currently on stage at the Ahmanson Theatre, is the epitome of what the Broadway

Forgive the projection, but are producer/writers David Benioff and D.B. Weiss attempting to 1) let us down easy by forecasting

Hollywood Fringe 2016 is better than ever and continues on for two more weeks: dance, artistry, plays. There's also plenty

Placas: The Most Dangerous Tattoo has only a week left on its limited run at Casa 0101 in Boyle Heights,

By Ernest Kearney — A writer (Scott Golden) is assigned to do a book on the town of

ShoWorks Entertainment has traveled from South Africa to stage two offerings at the Fringe, both written by South African playwright

By Ernest Kearney  —  David Lucarelli’s "Doctor Zomba’s Ghost Show of Terror" is straight forward fun.  As directed by Kevin

And when chemotherapy fails, what’s left—Kryptonite? There’s no easy cure for the cancer that is metastasizing in the Republican Party right

Political Survivor: USA. This show plays almost continuously, with an ever-changing cast, on many shows and many networks. I discovered the

The Boundless Artists Theatre Company has presented Fringe audiences with a production of the fairy tale The Little Mermaid, which

For those of you who are unschooled in America’s favorite pastime, Van Lingle Mungo was a Major League pitcher who

I love Shakespeare. Straight up. If I could cook him down I'd probably be mainlining the Bard. Any Shakespeare junkie has a

"The Second Coming of Klaus Kinski" writer, performer Andrew Perez presents Kinski and all his demons with such unnerving commitment

By Ernest Kearney  —  Well what do you know? Here’s The Tvolution’s final list of recommendations prior to the opening

Well another Fringe has come and gone. I attended 60 shows and managed to review 55 (denoted by the asterisk:

Sunset Baby is an intelligently written play with a superb cast that positively gleams from those benefits which blesses any

By Ernest Kearney — "Too Much Sun" by Playwright Nicky Silver, presently a guest production at the Odyssey

It took several tries before I could finish this Charles Krauthammer article about the Republicans squandering their “victory” over the so-called mainstream

As I write this, it’s just a few days until the crucial Wisconsin primary, and the impossible is seemingly in

Okay

In "The Girl who Jumped off the Hollywood Sign" written and performed by Joanne Hartstone, under the direction of Vince

By Ernest Kearney  —  The International City Theatre mounts sturdy, structured and splendid productions of nearly every play it presents.

There have been a number of performances that will travel with me for quite some time during Hollywood Fringe 2017…

In its quintessence, theatre is the bonding of poetry and dance. That is oft forgotten in this age of directors as

Whether you view the later works of Irish playwright and novelist Samuel Beckett as avant-grade, Theatre of the Absurd, tragicomic

Hamid Rahmanian is a film maker and graphic artist who in 2013 undertook to illustrate the Shahnameh.  He has now

By Ernest Kearney  —  "The Big Picture" is as cluttered, chaotic and confused as your average, interstate, multi-vehicle pileup and

Above: Screen grab from a YouTube video of the 2018 Golden Globes on NBC. There are so many ways to be

A few weeks back, Molly Ball wrote in the Washington Post about the 2016 Presidential Campaign’s “…rich irony that America's

I love speaking to a kindred soul whose passions are rooted in another field different from mine. It always fascinates

By Ernest Kearney  —  "Fool for Love" by Sam Shepard, which just closed the Lounge Theatre in Hollywood, is

Start in a state with an active electorate of six million (say, Pennsylvania in 2016). Now poll a thousand of

...Not even close. Primaries are the tribal councils of this metaphorical Survivor season. That’s because opinion polls and voting are not the same

By Ernest Kearney — The best theatre I’ve seen has been on bare stages, under looming oak trees, in gloomy,

By Ernest Kearney  —  "Henry V" has long been considered one of Shakespeare’s problem plays; called a “stirring piece of

By Ernest Kearney Playwright Greg Kalleres opens "Meanwhile Back at the Super Lair" interestingly enough; with a

In spite of a ferociously inappropriate title, "Two Motherfuckers on a Ledge," running at Asylum @ Studio C during the

Unlikely heroes unite against an unknown making its way through the underground of New York and perhaps

Starting June 1st and running throughout the entire month Hollywood Fringe 2017 will be offering up 356 shows; all vying

Sometimes, someone posts something on Facebook that is of intrinsic value. The following thought-piece—published here with the author’s permission—is such

The 25th Annual (Silver Anniversary) Los Angeles Women’s Theatre Festival (LAWTF) has a roster of distinguished artists who will co-host four days

The TVolution Hollywood Fringe Festival Awards Coming Soon!

I’m wondering how I will suit up for the coming debates. No need to choose. I’ll don wings and a

By Ernest Kearney —  There is nothing as intoxicating as watching a Performance – capital “P.”  It matters little if

By Ernest Kearney — Premise-wise "Small Mouth Sounds," by Playwright Bess Wohl, has a lot of potential. The highly touted

Summary: What would it be like? It’s 1962, fifteen years after the end of World War II and the ultimate

In the hands of the right actors "The Complete Works of William Shakespeare," by playwrights Adam Long, Daniel Singer and

Ana Lily Amirpour's intelligent and superbly crafted film A Girl Walks Home Alone at Night is definitely a world view

By Ernest Kearney  — The Fountain Theatre's production of  "Runaway Home" by playwright Jeremy J. Kamps, is a cannonade of

The Lula Washington Dance Theatre (LWDT) the Los Angeles-based repertoire dance ensemble will perform in a joyous evening of dance,

By Ernest Kearney  —  "Easy Targets: Artists and Heroes" doesn’t quite reach the same heady heights as the Burglars of Hamm’s HHF17

WHEN TO WATCH: Pick a broadcast network and watch the nightly news. Any day. Or pick a cable network opinion-veiled-as-news

Playwright Michael Leoni’s characters connected with the audience to an intense degree, and yet

Michael Ondaatje’s eponymous 2011 novel grants romance and intrigue to the lowliest dining area on a ship—The Cat’s Table. There

Noel Coward’s Hay Fever at Theatre Palisades is a wonderfully delivered comedy of manners. Laughs and folly spring from the

By Ernest Kearney  —  There is a great deal of love and passion that has gone into Shannon Penrod’s one

“I was trained as a classical musician, so my approach to theater comes from a different perspective than most playwrights.”

There's a lot of hot to the touch TV to watch these days. Only a few shows on the buzzed

We are all Donald Trump now. In 1963, JFK went to the Berlin wall and said, “Ich bin ein Berliner” (I

The Fall: Season 2, on NETFLIX, got more personal and crossed more lines than could be handled by the Paris Metro

What "Help! I Might be Fabulous" presents is a modern fable by way of Stonewall and "La Cage aux Folles,"

By Ernest Kearney  —  "Jack Benny (A Ménage En Train)" is the first perfect Fringe show of 2018.  What does

Conceived, written and produced by Linden Waddell — who also performs, with Miller directing — Hello Again! The Songs of

It is always a pity when a show falls through the cracks, and with 375 Fringe 2017 shows that is

The Clone's world has expanded

By Ernest Kearney  —  Writer/director Giovanni Zuniga has succeeded in doing what few playwrights seldom do: knock one out of

One of the high points for me in Fringe 2015 was the Proboscis Theatre Company’s La La La Strada! An

I haven’t teased you with a Survivor metaphor in months. Well, the last time someone got voted off the island was in

by Ernest Kearney  —  "The Book That I'm Going to Write, by Judy Garland" is an idea that someone should

OMG Moments on Empire • An unexpected gift, a single red rose, is dropped at the entrance to Cookie's swank apartment

By Ernest Kearney — Watching Renée Taylor’s one-woman show, My Life on a Diet, is akin to sitting

By Ernest Kearney  —  The onset of Alzheimer’s and the devastation it wreaks on lives has been oft chronicled and

By Ernest Kearney — An Amazing Abyss of Artsy Abstract Absurdity.* I ran into Mitchell Bisschop, ("Pit

"Silent Sky" in its final weekend at Long Beach's International City Theatre, is a well-crafted feel-good evening in the theatre. 

It was rather fitting that on the night of the first presidential debate I found myself sitting in the audience,

By Ernest Kearney  —  As I’ve been proclaiming for as long as I’ve been reviewing theatre in L.A., the hottest

By Ernest Kearney  —  Ain’t That America offers a truly unique viewpoint on a segment of our country that has

The wait’s been long, but the time is nigh: April 24th is coming. Books in the series whose stories will play

Memories from a long ago hit spark flames between Lucious and Cookie and ignite the passionate encounter we've been waiting

By David Nairne — Proudly go get your geek-on at "The Bully Problem," now playing at the Broadwater Main Stage

by Ernest Kearney — Klaus Kinski (1926-1991) was celebrated for his talent and disparaged for the madness that served as

A one-woman-show on Barack Obama’s mother

By Ernest Kearney — "Earhart: More Than A F**king Mystery" is your basic fun-time show.  It doesn’t go into the

The intended purpose of this monthly column is to bring to the attention of cinema junkies those odd and typically

By Ernest Kearney — So here you have the second round of Hollywood Fringe Festival 2019 offerings that

With the return of Sherlock premiering on New Year’s Day, this past week, BBC Worldwide and Fathom Events will present

Set in suburban New Jersey in 1985, Red Oaks centers around college student David Meyers—a young man at a crossroads

By Ernest Kearney  —  Still is a stylishly staged deconstruction of a murder mystery, involving three high school students, that

For Daniel Holden, danger lurks not just behind shadows, but in the harsh light of day; often prancing down the

Back in the days of the Soviet Union, there were two official newspapers: Pravda (“The Truth”) and Izvestiya (“The News”). A

Round One has begun, a first clang! in the bruising prize fight that Donald Trump’s presidency threatens to become. It’s

You enter the REDCAT (Roy and Edna Disney/CaLArts Theater) to find a mass of chairs arranged seemingly haphazard in the

Is anyone still criticizing quarterback Colin Kaepernick for kneeling during the national anthem? “Some people say” that his actions are

by Ernest Kearney  —  That Sussan Deyhim’s The House is Black Media Project had such a limited engagement at the

Our culture shoots black men. Kills them. And our culture acquits their killers—if they are the police. This headline grabbed

The American election season never ends with the election. Not anymore. Nailing the president-elect for reneging on his second-biggest campaign promise

Post-debate note: The political wind seemed to change at the second debate. So--praise cheeses!--this may be the last Trump-centric column. He’s

Please believe me when I tell you that Julia Migenes is an amazingly talented performer. She originated the role of Hodel

By Ernest Kearney — This year the TVO crew and I saw 76 shows and from those, here are THE

Donald Trump knew that he lost the third debate long before it was over. As he seems to know, finally,

By Ernest Kearney — "I Am Not A Man" is a stand up routine trying to pass for a solo

Photo above is from Creative Commons: “hacker army 2.0” by Rodrigo Paoletti is licensed under CC BY 2.0

Coming Soon!!

When I first heard news of a weekly series set in hip hop and R&B music industry with a predominately

By Ernest Kearney — A chair and a twisted statue are all that is on the stage as the audience

In his latest recorded musical venture, Grammy-winning jazz pianist Billy Childs takes on the music legacy of Laura Nyro–and the

THE GOLD MEDALS: ANNABELLA BOOZE, BALLS AND BLUEGRASS THE DEVIL YOU SAY RESERVE CHAMPION REVOLUTIONARY LOVE THE THREE MUSKETEERERS: CLOWNS WITH SWORDS THE BRONZE MEDALS: FIFTY SHADES OF

The November 13 Paris attacks changed the trajectory of our 2016 presidential election, and not for the good. I know

Talk about being overly optimistic. My previous TheTVolution post seems positively Pollyanna-ish. The headline read: "The Voice Finally Acknowledges Songwriters."

There are more individuals whose talents deserve some Note of Distinction this year, and we, at TheTVolution wish the privilege

By Ernest Kearney  —  We are told by author Alan L. Brooks, he is "a doctor, not a playwright –

When the bar is set as high as writer/director David Hare and thespian extraordinaire Bill Nighy (yes, I am biased)

The old elephants in the room for Republicans—racism, sexism, disdain for the poor (to name a few)—are no longer invisible

By Ernest Kearney — Are we the sum of our parts, or our parts themselves? Can we ever be

The folks who produce Survivor think that they understand tribes. Jeff Probst’s first official duty, on the first episode of every season,