​Two women – one a liberal sophisticate, the other a conservative fanny-packer – waiting 90 minutes in an airport lounge for a plane and striking up a conversation is all that happens in San Diego Rep’s Walter Cronkite Is Dead. Well, it’s almost all that happens. That the very strained conversation becomes if not a friendship then at least a realization of mutual respect is the result of solid performances by Ellen Crawford and Melinda Gilb. What might have been static dramedy thankfully is not.

​In his 1937 novella “Of Mice and Men,” John Steinbeck wrote: “As happens sometimes, a moment settled and hovered and remained for much more than a moment.” As it happens, Steinbeck could well have been writing about the stage adaptation of his story directed by Daren Scott and now on stage at the New Village Arts Theatre in Carlsbad. It’s a deliberately paced (especially in the first act) telling of the tale of migrant ranch workers George and Lennie in which systematic silences and aching tension predominates. Moments do indeed settle and hover during the two-and-a-half-hour staging, some more absorbing than others.
            Moments stretch like hours as the actors, and the audience, wait in silence for the offstage mercy killing of a decrepit dog; and Lennie’s accidental throttling of the ranch boss’ son’s wife, the tragedy that precipitates another, ultimate mercy killing, hovers effectively to the point where you want to look away. On the other hand, the opening scene introduction of and conversation between George and Lennie prior to their arriving for their new ranch jobs lags, as does some of the Act 1 interplay that follows. (Act 2, by comparison, is swift, violent and as impactful as a kick to the solar plexus.)
            Part of NVA’s season Ensemble Project, Of Mice and Men flexes its dramatic muscle on the strength of solid performances by Justin Lang as George and Manny Fernandes as a poignant Lennie, with notable support from Jack Missett as old one-armed Candy and Kelly Iversen as the lonely, ill-fated wife of Curley (Kyle Lucy)

​Hearing the music of Jesus Christ Superstar for the first time, in 1970, was thrilling. The concept album featured Deep Purple’s Ian Gillan, an incomparable hard-rock singer who also gave throaty passion to ballads, as JC, and the theatrical-voiced British actor-singer Murray Head as Judas. Subsequently seeing Jesus Christ Superstar on stage, then on the screen (it was a 1973 film) was a disappointment, even if the Andrew Lloyd Webber/Tim Rice score remained a dynamic one.
            To revisit Jesus Christ Superstar now, 40 years later at La Jolla Playhouse, is to be reminded of the ferocity, cleverness and occasional beauty of its music. Yet it’s still not wholly satisfying theater, even in the inventive hands of Des McAnuff, director of this Stratford Shakespeare Festival production that is already bound for Broadway. At La Jolla, McAnuff previously breathed new life into The Who’s Tommy, the original album of which was released a year before the Jesus Christ Superstar record. The Playhouse’s former artistic director presides over this new JCS’s technical dazzlements (notably an electronic-ticker backdrop that evokes a Times Square-like Judea), athletic choreography (by Lisa Shriver) and a subtle departure in plot from traditional productions of the show that suggests Jesus (Paul Nolan) and Judas (Josh Young) each have a weakness for Mary Magdalene (Chilina Kennedy).
            The contemporizing of the setting is accomplished without distraction, and nothing visually is as over the top as the devices in Norman Jewison’s ’73 film (remember the tanks?). Nolan, Young and Kennedy are each sincere and physically attractive, but none radiates exceptional charisma. Kennedy isn’t aided either by his solo turn on the title song, when he takes the stage as if clad for “American Idol.” Having the most fun is Bruce Dow, whose “Herod’s Song,” a ragtime hoot of considerable camp, is played to the hilt. Edna Turnblad should get so juicy a crowd-pleaser.
            For all its early flash, this production mirrors the original album’s denouement in tone – one of reflection and understatement. It’s not quite prayerful, but close. 

​Burt Bacharach, at 83 years old, is still telling us that what the world needs now is love, sweet love.
            There’s no other way to view Some Lovers, Bacharach’s first original stage work since he and Hal David (with a book by Neil Simon) collaborated on Promises, Promises back in 1968. Some Lovers, which runs through Dec. 31 on the Old Globe’s Sheryl and Harvey White stage, is also Bacharach’s first full-length musical score in nearly five years. It’s about love past and present, and in this one-act holiday nibble, the two are intertwined.
            Ben and Molly, both young and middle-aged versions, share the theater-in-the-round stage throughout Some Lovers, which is set on a Christmas Eve in New York City. At the same time that young Ben (Andrew Mueller), an aspiring songwriter, and young Molly (Jenni Barber) are falling giddily in love, the older, solemn Ben (Jason Danieley) is finding out in a phone call with the older, sadly resigned Molly (Michelle Duffy) that she is moving to Michigan. The two scenarios play out in sync, frequently interrupting each other in earnest attempts to rewrite the past. Will present-day Ben and Molly learn from the emotional trials of their younger selves and reunite on Christmas Eve? That is the question.
            Besides the holiday seasoning, the musical, which Bacharach wrote with Steven Sater (“Spring Awakening”), wraps itself around the irony and sentiment of O. Henry’s short story “The Gift of the Magi.” It’s a narrative device that feels overplayed and more like a Christmassy gimmick than anything else. Ben and Molly’s down-but-not-out relationship, in all its fleeting joys and disillusionments, should be enough.
            It doesn’t really matter. Some Lovers is a chance for Bacharach fans to bask in the master tunesmith’s enduring knack for breezy pop and dulcet ballads. The jangly title song sounds right out of Bacharach’s hall of fame canon, as does “Welcome to My World.” “Ready To Be Done With You” is as good a breakup song as Bacharach has written (credit Sater’s lyrics, too).
            The Bens and Mollys of both eras are likable and sincere performers, and even if we know how this one’s going to end, we’re happy for all concerned.