Liisi LaFontaine (left) and Cailen Fu are sibling rivals in "Huzzah!"                                    Photo by Jim Cox

            If you thought a Renaissance faire was nothing more than a grand outdoor dress-up party with a maypole and booze, you’d be mistaken. Uh, to an extent.
            Dressing up, drinking and the presence of a maypole are part-and-parcel of these
Ren faires, which have been around since the 1960s. But they’re also about community and about the freedom to be someone else (even a history or cosplay nerd) for a few hours. As with, say, Comic-Con, they’ve got their repeat attendees who take the whole thing way too seriously, but many who go just want to have fun, and what others think of their idea of fun, well, to the privy with them!
            It’s in this proud and adventurous spirit that the prolific husband-and-wife team of Nell Benjamin and Laurence O’Keefe (“Legally Blonde” on Broadway) have created “Huzzah!”, a world-premiere musical comedy at the Old Globe.
            “Huzzah!” is a musical comedy as advertised. It has an 18-song score that leans heavily on rousing ensemble numbers that allow the period-costumed characters to swing their tankards and kick up their heels and rock back and forth in merrymaking unison. It’s also frequently funny -- humor of the hard-PG-13 variety, unafraid to be bawdy, rowdy or even political.
            I enjoyed the hell out of it, and my personal experience with a Renaissance faire dates back two decades and was long ago consigned to a distant place in my memory.
            “Huzzah!” wrestles back and forth with what is a true Renaissance faire and to some degree the show regards these popular gatherings with a critical eye, but it never makes fun of them.
            Instead the conflict is personified through a family story, about a fictitious Kingsbridge Midsummer Renaissance Faire owned and operated by one Johnny Mirandola (Lance Arthur Smith). The faire is in serious financial trouble at the outset, which complicates his bestowing of the business upon his two daughters, Gwen (Liisi LaFontaine) and Kate (Cailen Fu). (There’s more than a little “King Lear” in this premise – more than we know, it’ll turn out.)
             Gwen, who’s been absent from the faire, has a smart head for business and has long ceased romanticizing it. The dreamier and more impetuous Kate loves the folks and the trappings of the faire so much that she can’t conceive of it as just a business operation.
            But their disagreement doesn’t last long. By the second song in the show, “Dragons,” the two have bonded and decided to see it – the mess the faire is in – through. Seemed like Gwen caved on this too quickly, but other, more emotionally charged conflicts between the siblings lie ahead.
            “Huzzah!” is beautiful to look at (scenic design by the dependable Todd Rosenthal, glorious costumes by Haydee Zelideth) and certainly diverting enough in its first 15 minutes or so. Then it gets an electric jolt of energy with the arrival at the faire of Sir Roland Prowd (Leo Roberts), a swordsman extraordinaire with a shady reputation, flowing locks reminiscent of a Hemsworth brother, and a muscular, soaring singing voice that rings out in the confines of the Globe’s main theater. “The Song of Roland” is part Josh Groban, part Orson Welles.
            By now you’ve probably guessed the source of that aforementioned more emotionally charged conflict between Gwen and Kate.
            This is the story of “Huzzah!”, basically: the equally matched battling sisters against the backdrop of the threatened faire. Is it enough to sustain a two-hour, 15-minute Broadway hopeful?
            Verily I tell you.
            Annie Tippe directs a cast of memorable and likable (or unlikable depending on what’s called for) characters. In the likable corner is Gareth (Anthony Chatmon II), the longtime faire lawyer who’s smitten with Gwen, feels outclassed by Sir Roland and who’s discouraged in his romantic wishes by a trio of happily deprecating lords (Kevin Pariseau, Mike Millan and Josh Breckinridge) in a hilarious number late in Act One. Likable but notorious is Anne Bonny the Pirate Queen/middle school teacher by day (Kate Shindle), she who keeps the faire well oiled. Then there’s Wayland Smith the sword-making blacksmith (Peyton Crim), the faire’s philosopher king with a forge.
            Though he wins cronies by his sheer indomitable charisma, Sir Roland is in a class by himself as the antagonist, and even as he exploits the most injurious aspects of the faire in his boasted quest to keep it authentic and untouched by technology, he’s hard to completely dislike. Even when he goes full RFK Jr. by insisting that the faire’s first-aid services be abandoned. 
            Gwen and Kate remain the anchors of “Huzzah!” – at loggerheads for much of the story but still, when it comes down it, family. Fu’s Kate has a touch of Glinda from “Wicked” in her; she’s shallow and materialistic and loves herself dearly. The boisterous “The Song of Kate!” number that opens the show’s second act finds her in full-blown self-indulgence. Fu is a talented comedian who can get laughs without saying a word or singing a note.
            LaFontaine, meanwhile, is steady and stalwart as the “responsible sister” who can’t help falling for Sir Roland but who possesses a fierce feminist heart and a solid grasp of right and wrong. It’s she who is destined for heroism on behalf of the foredoomed faire, those in it and of women in general, including her sis.
            There’s a plot turn late in “Huzzah!” that comes out of left field and really needed to be at least foreshadowed sometime earlier in the going. It’s critical to resolving Gwen’s and Kate’s differences. Possibly this could be smoothed out as the show moves beyond the Old Globe?
            For a spectacular in which the comic antics, verbal slings and arrows, sword fighting and choreography (by Katie Spelman) built into it are so entertaining, “Huzzah!” does possess a charming musical score too. “Drink in the Day” (no explanation required there) is raucous gaiety, “A Toast to the Bride” sheer naughtiness, while the sea chanty-like “The Stowaway” featuring LaFontaine and Chatmon and the sisters’ childlike melody “Holly Tree and Ivy Vine” are tender and affecting.
            Crim’s “The Weight In Your Hand,” while drawn out, is stirring, and “The World We Live In” with LaFontaine out in front of the company is a big contextualizing climax.
            On opening night, more than a few theatergoers came dressed in Renaissance faire attire, making some of them too flowy for their seats. That’s one way to get to know your neighbor.
            In case you’re interested there’s a Renaissance Faire Costume Guide out there on the Web.
            “Huzzah!” may not redouble interest in Renaissance faires, but who knows? It might bring back doublets.
            “Huzzah!” runs through Oct. 19 at the Old Globe in Balboa Park.

Left to right: Lester Isariuz, Kailey Agpaoa. Kandace Crystal and William "BJ" Robinson in "We Lovers." Photo by Liliana Talwatte

            Christian St. Croix’s “We Lovers” is a less a play and more a melding of four spoken-word performances. Those words are musing, evocative of both human beings and magical beings. Its reflections are sometimes dreamy, other times practically fatalistic. This was its appeal a year ago when a 50-minute version of “We Lovers” was staged during the San Diego International Fringe Festival.
            That’s the appeal now of “We Lovers,” fleshed out to 90 or so minutes for a Loud Fridge Theatre Group production directed by Kate Rose Reynolds at the Light Box Theatre in Liberty Station.
            St. Croix’s particular gift is one for language. Working within the structure of drama, he is a poet down to his soul. There is searching in his explorations of real life and of fantasy, seen not only in “We Lovers” but before that in works including “We Are the Forgotten Beasts” and “Monsters of the American Cinema.”
            Truthfully, this demands patience and acute listening, and certainly so with “We Lovers.” Of the four stories told in the woods by the locals who gather there on a regular basis for just that purpose, only one of them – the tale of a “Lakeside Slasher” that would go nicely with any spooky night around a campfire – is what you’d call straightforward. The others, recalling encounters with supernatural beings and preoccupied with love and danger, are internalized and poetical.
            The first-timer at the “We Lovers” storytelling rendezvous is a young man with a newly blackened eye (courtesy of an abusive father, we learn). He is encouraged by the others – Little Bit (William “BJ” Robinson), Wolf and Bird (Kandace Crystal) and Doctor Sister (Kailey Agpaoa) – to adopt a name of his own. The newcomer (Lester Isariuz) becomes Mama’s Boy. (Better than Daddy’s Boy, for sure.)
            All of the existing storytellers have identities and backstories mundane by comparison to the freedom and community of their weekly gatherings. This is their escape into the metaphorical,  the surreal and possibly into their better selves.
            That’s all immediately appealing to Mama’s Boy, who seamlessly joins the others’ acting out of their narrative scenarios, turning objects into props, improvising dialogue, sharing their shifting emotions.
            It can be slow going in spite of strong, committed performances from these four actors. They’re playing, we’re invited to listen in, but it’ still their game and they know the rules. The stories can be gently introspective at times or, in Mama’s Boy’s case near the end, in frantic motion. The fears seem real as do the longings for love.
            I don’t know that a 90-minute “We Lovers” seems much different than the 50-minute “We Lovers,” and considering that there is no shortage of stories to tell, this could have been a 100-minute version of “We Lovers.” It ends, but as you’ll discover, not when and how you suspect it will.
            Though the characters interact with each other during the storytelling, each one’s turn is essentially monologual – Doctor Sister’s and Mama’s Boy less so than the other two. It’s that structure that gives “We Lovers” its spoken-word motif.
            Loud Fridge has done more with the spare Light Box Theater space than I’ve seen in other companies’ productions. Heather Larsen’s set is appropriately eerie and lantern-lit and strewn with the sort of detritus one might find in a woods where young people hang out to mingle or get high – or maybe to tell stories.
            A consistent soundscape of hooting owls, chirping crickets and buzzing cicadas is heard above the action on stage. Unfortunately the jetliners that fly over Loma Portal intrude on the designed woodsy isolation.
            Well, for flights of fancy such as those in “We Lovers,” the great flying machines piercing the night sky may be appropriate.
            “We Lovers” runs through Oct. 12 at the Light Box Theater in Liberty Station, Point Loma.

Liisi LaFontaine (left) and Cailen Fu in "Huzzah!"                                                                 Photo by Jim Cox

            If you thought a Renaissance faire was nothing more than a grand outdoor dress-up party with a maypole and booze, you’d be mistaken. Uh, to an extent.
            Dressing up, drinking and the presence of a maypole are part-and-parcel of these
Ren faires, which have been around since the 1960s. But they’re also about community and about the freedom to be someone else (even a history or cosplay nerd) for a few hours. As with, say, Comic-Con, they’ve got their repeat attendees who take the whole thing way too seriously, but many who go just want to have fun, and what others think of their idea of fun, well, to the privy with them!
            It’s in this proud and adventurous spirit that the prolific husband-and-wife team of Nell Benjamin and Laurence O’Keefe (“Legally Blonde” on Broadway) have created “Huzzah!”, a world-premiere musical comedy at the Old Globe.
            “Huzzah!” is a musical comedy as advertised. It has an 18-song score that leans heavily on rousing ensemble numbers that allow the period-costumed characters to swing their tankards and kick up their heels and rock back and forth in merrymaking unison. It’s also frequently funny -- humor of the hard-PG-13 variety, unafraid to be bawdy, rowdy or even political.
            I enjoyed the hell out of it, and my personal experience with a Renaissance faire dates back two decades and was long ago consigned to a distant place in my memory.
            “Huzzah!” wrestles back and forth with what is a true Renaissance faire and to some degree the show regards these popular gatherings with a critical eye, but it never makes fun of them.
            Instead the conflict is personified through a family story, about a fictitious Kingsbridge Midsummer Renaissance Faire owned and operated by one Johnny Mirandola (Lance Arthur Smith). The faire is in serious financial trouble at the outset, which complicates his bestowing of the business upon his two daughters, Gwen (Liisi LaFontaine) and Kate (Cailen Fu). (There’s more than a little “King Lear” in this premise – more than we know, it’ll turn out.)
Gwen, who’s been absent from the faire, has a smart head for business and has long ceased romanticizing it. The dreamier and more impetuous Kate loves the folks and the trappings of the faire so much that she can’t conceive of it as just a business operation.
            But their disagreement doesn’t last long. By the second song in the show, “Dragons,” the two have bonded and decided to see it – the mess the faire is in – through. Seemed like Gwen caved on this too quickly, but other, more emotionally charged conflicts between the siblings lie ahead.
            “Huzzah!” is beautiful to look at (scenic design by the dependable Todd Rosenthal, glorious costumes by Haydee Zelideth) and certainly diverting enough in its first 15 minutes or so. Then it gets an electric jolt of energy with the arrival at the faire of Sir Roland Prowd (Leo Roberts), a swordsman extraordinaire with a shady reputation, flowing locks reminiscent of a Hemsworth brother, and a muscular, soaring singing voice that rings out in the confines of the Globe’s main theater. “The Song of Roland” is part Josh Groban, part Orson Welles.
            By now you’ve probably guessed the source of that aforementioned more emotionally charged conflict between Gwen and Kate.
            This is the story of “Huzzah!”, basically: the equally matched battling sisters against the backdrop of the threatened faire. Is it enough to sustain a two-hour, 15-minute Broadway hopeful?
            Verily I tell you.
            Annie Tippe directs a cast of memorable and likable (or unlikable depending on what’s called for) characters. In the likable corner is Gareth (Anthony Chatmon II), the longtime faire lawyer who’s smitten with Gwen, feels outclassed by Sir Roland and who’s discouraged in his romantic wishes by a trio of happily deprecating lords (Kevin Pariseau, Mike Millan and Josh Breckinridge) in a hilarious number late in Act One. Likable but notorious is Anne Bonny the Pirate Queen/middle school teacher by day (Kate Shindle), she who keeps the faire well oiled. Then there’s Wayland Smith the sword-making blacksmith (Peyton Crim), the faire’s philosopher king with a forge.
            Though he wins cronies by his sheer indomitable charisma, Sir Roland is in a class by himself as the antagonist, and even as he exploits the most injurious aspects of the faire in his boasted quest to keep it authentic and untouched by technology, he’s hard to completely dislike. Even when he goes full RFK Jr. by insisting that the faire’s first-aid services be abandoned. 
            Gwen and Kate remain the anchors of “Huzzah!” – at loggerheads for much of the story but still, when it comes down it, family. Fu’s Kate has a touch of Glinda from “Wicked” in her; she’s shallow and materialistic and loves herself dearly. The boisterous “The Song of Kate!” number that opens the show’s second act finds her in full-blown self-indulgence. Fu is a talented comedian who can get laughs without saying a word or singing a note.
            LaFontaine, meanwhile, is steady and stalwart as the “responsible sister” who can’t help falling for Sir Roland but who possesses a fierce feminist heart and a solid grasp of right and wrong. It’s she who is destined for heroism on behalf of the foredoomed faire, those in it and of women in general, including her sis.
            There’s a plot turn late in “Huzzah!” that comes out of left field and really needed to be at least foreshadowed sometime earlier in the going. It’s critical to resolving Gwen’s and Kate’s differences. Possibly this could be smoothed out as the show moves beyond the Old Globe?
            For a spectacular in which the comic antics, verbal slings and arrows, sword fighting and choreography (by Katie Spelman) built into it are so entertaining, “Huzzah!” does possess a charming musical score too. “Drink in the Day” (no explanation required there) is raucous gaiety, “A Toast to the Bride” sheer naughtiness, while the sea chanty-like “The Stowaway” featuring LaFontaine and Chatmon and the sisters’ childlike melody “Holly Tree and Ivy Vine” are tender and affecting.
            Crim’s “The Weight In Your Hand,” while drawn out, is stirring, and “The World We Live In” with LaFontaine out in front of the company is a big contextualizing climax.
            On opening night, more than a few theatergoers came dressed in Renaissance faire attire, making some of them too flowy for their seats. That’s one way to get to know your neighbor.
            In case you’re interested there’s a Renaissance Faire Costume Guide out there on the Web.
            “Huzzah!” may not redouble interest in Renaissance faires, but who knows? It might bring back doublets.
            “Huzzah!” runs through Sept. 25 at the Old Globe in Balboa Park.

Liisi LaFontaine (left) and Cailen Fu in "Huzzah!"                                                                 Photo by Jim Cox

            If you thought a Renaissance faire was nothing more than a grand outdoor dress-up party with a maypole and booze, you’d be mistaken. Uh, to an extent.
            Dressing up, drinking and the presence of a maypole are part-and-parcel of these
Ren faires, which have been around since the 1960s. But they’re also about community and about the freedom to be someone else (even a history or cosplay nerd) for a few hours. As with, say, Comic-Con, they’ve got their repeat attendees who take the whole thing way too seriously, but many who go just want to have fun, and what others think of their idea of fun, well, to the privy with them!
            It’s in this proud and adventurous spirit that the prolific husband-and-wife team of Nell Benjamin and Laurence O’Keefe (“Legally Blonde” on Broadway) have created “Huzzah!”, a world-premiere musical comedy at the Old Globe, where their “Come Fall in Love – The DDLJ Musical” was staged three years ago.
            “Huzzah!” is a better show than “Come Fall in Love,” and to my mind it’s even better than “Legally Blonde,” which doesn’t measure up to the film that inspired it.
            “Huzzah!” is a musical comedy as advertised. It has an 18-song score that leans heavily on rousing ensemble numbers that allow the period-costumed characters to swing their tankards and kick up their heels and rock back and forth in merrymaking unison. It’s also frequently funny -- humor of the hard-PG-13 variety, unafraid to be bawdy, rowdy or even political.
            I enjoyed the hell out of it, and my personal experience with a Renaissance faire dates back two decades and was long ago consigned to a distant place in my memory.
            “Huzzah!” wrestles back and forth with what is a true Renaissance faire and to some degree the show regards these popular gatherings with a critical eye, but it never makes fun of them.
            Instead the conflict is personified through a family story, about a fictitious Kingsbridge Midsummer Renaissance Faire owned and operated by one Johnny Mirandola (Lance Arthur Smith). The faire is in serious financial trouble at the outset, which complicates his bestowing of the business upon his two daughters, Gwen (Liisi LaFontaine) and Kate (Cailen Fu). (There’s more than a little “King Lear” in this premise – more than we know, it’ll turn out.)
Gwen, who’s been absent from the faire, has a smart head for business and has long ceased romanticizing it. The dreamier and more impetuous Kate loves the folks and the trappings of the faire so much that she can’t conceive of it as just a business operation.
            But their disagreement doesn’t last long. By the second song in the show, “Dragons,” the two have bonded and decided to see it – the mess the faire is in – through. Seemed like Gwen caved on this too quickly, but other, more emotionally charged conflicts between the siblings lie ahead.
            “Huzzah!” is beautiful to look at (scenic design by the dependable Todd Rosenthal, glorious costumes by Haydee Zelideth) and certainly diverting enough in its first 15 minutes or so. Then it gets an electric jolt of energy with the arrival at the faire of Sir Roland Prowd (Leo Roberts), a swordsman extraordinaire with a shady reputation, flowing locks reminiscent of a Hemsworth brother, and a muscular, soaring singing voice that rings out in the confines of the Globe’s main theater. “The Song of Roland” is part Josh Groban, part Orson Welles.
            By now you’ve probably guessed the source of that aforementioned more emotionally charged conflict between Gwen and Kate.
            This is the story of “Huzzah!”, basically: the equally matched battling sisters against the backdrop of the threatened faire. Is it enough to sustain a two-hour, 15-minute Broadway hopeful?
            Verily I tell you.
            Annie Tippe directs a cast of memorable and likable (or unlikable depending on what’s called for) characters. In the likable corner is Gareth (Anthony Chatmon II), the longtime faire lawyer who’s smitten with Gwen, feels outclassed by Sir Roland and who’s discouraged in his romantic wishes by a trio of happily deprecating lords (Kevin Pariseau, Mike Millan and Josh Breckinridge) in a hilarious number late in Act One. Likable but notorious is Anne Bonny the Pirate Queen/middle school teacher by day (Kate Shindle), she who keeps the faire well oiled. Then there’s Wayland Smith the sword-making blacksmith (Peyton Crim), the faire’s philosopher king with a forge.
            Though he wins cronies by his sheer indomitable charisma, Sir Roland is in a class by himself as the antagonist, and even as he exploits the most injurious aspects of the faire in his boasted quest to keep it authentic and untouched by technology, he’s hard to completely dislike. Even when he goes full RFK Jr. by insisting that the faire’s first-aid services be abandoned. 
            Gwen and Kate remain the anchors of “Huzzah!” – at loggerheads for much of the story but still, when it comes down it, family. Fu’s Kate has a touch of Glinda from “Wicked” in her; she’s shallow and materialistic and loves herself dearly. The boisterous “The Song of Kate!” number that opens the show’s second act finds her in full-blown self-indulgence. Fu is a talented comedian who can get laughs without saying a word or singing a note.
            LaFontaine, meanwhile, is steady and stalwart as the “responsible sister” who can’t help falling for Sir Roland but who possesses a fierce feminist heart and a solid grasp of right and wrong. It’s she who is destined for heroism on behalf of the foredoomed faire, those in it and of women in general, including her sis.
            There’s a plot turn late in “Huzzah!” that comes out of left field and really needed to be at least foreshadowed sometime earlier in the going. It’s critical to resolving Gwen’s and Kate’s differences. Possibly this could be smoothed out as the show moves beyond the Old Globe?
            For a spectacular in which the comic antics, verbal slings and arrows, sword fighting and choreography (by Katie Spelman) built into it are so entertaining, “Huzzah!” does possess a charming musical score too. “Drink in the Day” (no explanation required there) is raucous gaiety, “A Toast to the Bride” sheer naughtiness, while the sea chanty-like “The Stowaway” featuring LaFontaine and Chatmon and the sisters’ childlike melody “Holly Tree and Ivy Vine” are tender and affecting.
            Crim’s “The Weight In Your Hand,” while drawn out, is stirring, and “The World We Live In” with LaFontaine out in front of the company is a big contextualizing climax.
            On opening night, more than a few theatergoers came dressed in Renaissance faire attire, making some of them too flowy for their seats. That’s one way to get to know your neighbor.
            In case you’re interested there’s a Renaissance Faire Costume Guide out there on the Web.
            “Huzzah!” may not redouble interest in Renaissance faires, but who knows? It might bring back doublets.
            “Huzzah!” runs through Sept. 25 at the Old Globe in Balboa Park.

Ty (Hennessey Winkler, far right) faces off against his ghosts in "All the Men Who've Frightened Me." Photo by Rich Soublet II

            Parenting is hard. Some people aren’t meant to be parents. Parents can make mistakes. BIG mistakes.
             Playwright Noah Diaz’s “All the Men Who’ve Frightened Me” adds little new to those realities but it tries – and tries hard – by creating a reality of its own that demands we suspend belief for two hours, that we accept in the grand pursuit of insight the unlikely and the otherworldly.
            La Jolla Playhouse is staging the world premiere of Diaz’s “house drama,” as he calls it, four years after its incubation in the company’s DNA New Works Series. Then as now it’s being directed by Kat Yen, the Playhouse’s first directing fellow. For Yen, a onetime fellow graduate student of Diaz’s and a longtime collaborator with the playwright, “All the Men Who’ve Frightened Me” is the culmination of her Playhouse assignment.
            This is a reflection on parenthood that turns the likes of, say, filmmaker Ron Howard’s 1989 comedy “Parenthood,” or its slightly more serious sitcom adaptation 20 years later, upside down. Though sprinkled with humor, most of it exploited through the story’s outrageous and uncensored mother-in-law character, “All the Men Who’ve Frightened Me” takes itself very seriously. Its characters – an extended family and then some -- are either grimly unhappy, riddled with doubt, boozily cynical or prone to preachiness. Pretty much everyone’s favorite subject is himself or herself.
            At the outset, young marrieds Ty (Hennessey Winkler) and Nora (Kineta Kunutu) are in the process of moving into the family house given to Ty by his still-living mother (Dale Soules). Nora is in full-blown panic attack mode about what to do next and overly focused on acquiring the right lamps. Ty is calm and placating, though it’s obvious from the start that Nora doesn’t want to live in this handed-down home.
            This seemingly minor drama is very soon usurped by another, a lulu: Nora has an “inhospitable womb” and cannot give birth. Almost immediately – actually, it is immediately – Ty, a trans man who’s been taking regular T-treatments, volunteers to carry the baby himself. Believe it or not, THIS is more credible than most everything else in the play.
            There’s no real backstory about why Ty transitioned in the first place, so his decision poses more questions than it answers. He says he’s doing this for his wife – though Nora doesn’t warm to that affirmation. Part of the problem is that Ty and Nora are never shown in any genuine affectionate moments. They don’t seem like lovers. They don’t seem like loving husband and wife. They’re just … there.
            Until their sleep is interrupted one night by the arrival of three spectral visitors in the house. Actually three versions of the same spectral visitor. At the risk of a spoiler, let’s just say that these three have a direct familial tie to Ty. Before long, they’re accepted, unquestioned staples of the household, busy doing fix-up chores and renovation and making over the house that Nora says she wants instead of the one Ty’s brought her to.
            In the meantime, Ty is starting to show.
            Also on the scene as tangible, flesh-and-blood visitors are Ty’s sister Carrie (Keren Lugo), who’s pregnant herself by a husband she’d just as soon be rid of; and Ty’s and Carrie’s cursing and dipsomaniacal mom, Dale. The latter has a hate on for Nora and is regretting having given the house over to her and her son, though it’s not crystal clear why.
            Very little is crystal clear in “All the Men Who’ve Frightened Me.” Its deliberate deconstruction of what most people consider “traditional parenthood” and its dabblings in magical realism obfuscate what Diaz has stated he wants to say about how the past is prologue for new parents, about belonging, about parenting in all its many facets, with its rewards and trials.
            Though he’s playing one of the least happy expectant fathers you’ll ever see, Winkler is the production’s quiet anchor as Ty. He evokes gentility and we have a sense he’ll do just fine as a parent, even with the legacy of a deserting, deadbeat dad in his personal history.
            Kunutu is charged with being unhappy or angry as Nora, making it difficult to be in her corner. Her character has some legitimate beefs, but she’s made to seem selfish or unreasonable for voicing them.
            Lugo and Soules have the showy, more comedic roles in “All the Men …”, though Carrie isn’t given enough to do and Mom Dale is practically a caricature.
            The three visitors, listed in the production program as First, Second and Third (Leonardo Romero, Armando Riesco and John Padilla respectively), are solid and likable and sneaky-wise for supposedly being collectively disreputable.
            Scenic designer Adam Rigg deserves plaudits for a split-level house interior that functions almost like a character itself as it’s changed and transformed over the course of the two-hour production. Every backdrop and cardboard box, each nook and cranny has a function, if not always to further the story than to at least keep the three spectral visitors in motion.
            One surprise to spill (sorry), though it wasn’t an especially welcome surprise: During a baby shower thrown for Ty the loud playing of the insipid 1972 hit single “Brandy” by Looking Glass (advance to Final Jeopardy if you knew the recording artists as I did). “Brandy, you’re a fine girl / what a good wife you would be …”
            Good grief.
            I’m not a parent myself, and I don’t pretend to know as actual parents do how it feels to raise a child, how to be responsible for someone else that way, or just to know you’re doing the right things. It’s a comfort, I guess, that in “All the Men Who’ve Frightened Me” the one character to have faith in is the self-sacrificing prospective parent who seems to have everything working against him.
            “All the Men Who’ve Frightened Me” runs through Oct. 12 at La Jolla Playhouse’s Mandell Weiss Forum.

Ty (Hennessey Winkler, far right) faces off against his ghosts in "All the Men Who've Frightened Me." Photo by Rich Soublet II

That's Erin Noel Grennan, as Gemma, hiding from her own anxiety in "Beside Myself." Observing her with understandable alarm is Christopher M. Williams and Matthew Henerson (far right). Photo courtesy of North Coast Repertory Theatre.

            Paul Thomas Slade’s “Beside Myself” derives its comedy and its underlying message from the notion that there are two diametrically opposed people inside each one of us: the person who possesses empathy and the one who does not. It’s a dual reality for psychotherapist Gemma, the protagonist of Slade’s one-act having its world premiere at North Coast Repertory Theatre.
            The empathetic Gemma (Erin Noel Grennan) speaks understandingly and compassionately to her patients; the other Gemma wishes they’d just go away, and she’s not above literally ordering one to do so in this funny, albeit strained at times, comedy that opens NC Rep’s 44th season.
            To begin with, one must accept an unlikely, sci-fi’ish premise, that a bit of brain surgery performed by elegant but smarmy Dr. Thatcher (Jacquelyn Ritz) can transform anyone suffering from profound nervousness or anxiety into a calm, confident, high-achieving individual.
            Gemma, first seen in the dentist’s office that she mistakenly believes is the miracle-working Dr. Thatcher’s, is profoundly nervous and anxious – cowering, shivering, face-tapping in the waiting room. Grennan does this so believably that we’re practically worried for her. By way of comparison for TV nostalgics, Bill Shatner in panic mode aboard an airplane in the famous “Nightmare at 20,000 Feet” episode from “The Twilight Zone” would be zen personified by comparison.
            Gemma’s in a twilight zone of her own, scared to leave the house and no longer able to function as a therapist. No kidding.
            Reassured with smiling platitudes and sales-pitchy promises by Dr. Thatcher and her assistant Sylvie (Alanna J. Smith), a walking, talking, beaming satisfied customer of the surgery herself, Gemma goes through the procedure, trembling all the way.
            Wonder of wonders, she emerges afterward in her hospital gown, calm and confident – and cocky – as was promised to her. The first sign of her loss of empathy – the chief side effect of the surgery that is explained later – is taking the flowers brought to her by her doting, wannabe boyfriend Colin (Thomas Daugherty) and tossing them onto the floor the sec he’s gone.
            It’s not long before we see Gemma the transformed psychotherapist back at work, “listening” to her patients as if they bore her, advising them to seek and destroy those who would demean or oppose them, and altogether acting as if she’d rather be anywhere but in their company.
            Playwright Smith could well be making shrewd observations about psychotherapy in “Beside Myself” to the point of subtly suggesting that there is no miracle surgery to cure someone of their anxiety and insecurities, and that there are some lousy shrinks out there too.
            But that’s subtextual. “Beside Myself” relies most on physical comedy and in particular Grennan’s and her fellow cast members’ ability to inhabit two people at once, to show one personality in conflict with another. Watching this being accomplished should result in the heartiest laughs from the audience.
            Grennan does this better than anyone, though in the latter part of the story, when others of Dr. Thatcher’s patients are caught in the same internal battle between their own empathic and non-empathic selves, she is joined by Matthew Henerson, Christopher M. Williams, Smith and Ritz, all playing multiple roles.
            When a remote-control zapper enters the fray toward its climax, “Beside Myself” turns somewhat cartoonish though Grennan manages to remain credible regardless.
            Staging the characters’ back and forth must have been a challenge – though a fun one – for all. Director David Ellenstein makes it work, aided by his likable cast that never appears to take the doings that seriously.
            Admittedly the first thing that I thought of when I heard the description of the “procedure” in this production was a lobotomy, and there’s nothing funny at all about that. But relax. The brain surgery in “Beside Myself” is fairy-tale stuff even as it makes an important point about the value of human empathy.
            Too many people around us, some of them in positions of power, seem to have lost theirs and have no desire to get it back. Dr. Thatcher must have been busier than we know.
            “Beside Myself” runs through Oct. 5 at North Coast Repertory Theatre in Solana Beach.

Foreground: Sandy Campbell and David Humphrey as Sally and Ben. In background: Audrey Duebig and Drew Bradford as the young Sally and Ben.                                                    Karli Cadel Photography

            A Stephen Sondheim musical, even a disjointed one as is “Follies,” will have – guaranteed – at least one song that stirs the heart. In this case it’s “Losing My Mind.” It will also have – guaranteed – at least one lyric demonstrative of nonpareil Sondheim cleverness. In this case it’s “I’m Still Here.”
            There’s more than just those two in this 1971 Sondheim collaboration with James Goldman which debuted in between the more successful and much better “Company” a year earlier and “A Little Night Music” in ’73. “Broadway Baby,” probably the best-known song in the show and delivered in it by the oldest of the reuniting Weismann showgirls Hattie Walker, is an audience pleaser. In fact the numbers written for all the former showgirls to perform together, like “Beautiful Girls” and the charmingly choreographed “Who’s That Woman?”, are even more Broadway than “Broadway Baby.”
            Still, “Follies” received mixed response from critics when it opened half a century ago, and perhaps too because of its huge cast and elaborate staging it’s rarely performed these days. Up to now, San Diego had only seen one production of “Follies”: by the bygone Starlight Musical Theatre 35 years ago.
            But now comes Cygnet Theatre’s “Follies,” which on Saturday night opened the brand-new, $43 million Joan and Irwin Jacobs Performing Arts Center (aka “The Joan”) in Liberty Station. Artistic Director Sean Murray has said that he’s always wanted to produce “Follies” but never had the right size theater space to do so. The 282-seat Joseph Clayes III Theater with its deep and spacious stage fits the bill. The cast is 27-actors strong, and there’s plenty of room for dance numbers and for grand entrances by the “ghosts” of the Weismann showgirls past.
            The choice of “Follies” to open the new Cygnet performing arts space is also poetic: the story, set in 1971, finds Weismann showgirls from the years between the ‘20s and the ‘40s reuniting at the very theater in which they once performed, a theater that is destined for demolition. You could say that the end of the Weismann Theatre and the birth of the new one for Cygnet are parallels in time. This plays beautifully with “Follies” itself: its former showgirls are mirrored throughout by younger versions of themselves in their original show costumes; and Goldman’s story set to Sondheim’s music and lyrics is a very bittersweet reflection on the relationship between past and future, between youth and old age, between dreams dreamed and those later faded or abandoned.
            “Follies” is truthfully two stories in one – intermingled but less a fit than I would prefer and tonally rather at odds. For me, the overarching narrative about the ex-showgirls coming together again and all their rivalries, mixed feelings and shared memories is more resonant than “Follies’” interpersonal drama: the unhappy marriages that former Weismann girls Phyllis and Sally are mired in, made only more untenable and miserable by the presence at their reunion of their husbands Ben and Buddy respectively.
            When the veteran showgirls are clashing, communing or, best of all, performing (as in the showstopping number that closes Act One and resumes at the start of Act Two), “Follies” is a delightful throwback perhaps to the big Broadway musicals that once were. The couples drama, while deepened by a couple of poignant tunes like “In Buddy’s Eyes” and “Too Many Mornings,” feels rather small by comparison, though one could argue that the girls mourning the loss of their old theater and the couples mourning the loss of their once-happier marriages is thematically compatible.
            Then there’s the what will be for anyone new to or unconversant with “Follies” a WTF transition from Act Two to “Loveland” near the end. But I’ll get to that.
            In an inspired stroke of casting, Murray, who directs, has enlisted to play the onetime Weismann showgirls veteran actresses familiar to not only longtime Cygnet-goers but San Diego theatergoers in general -- beginning with Karole Foreman and Sandy Campbell in the lead roles of Phyllis Rogers Stone and Sally Durant Plummer. These two last appeared together in Cygnet’s production of “A Little Night Music” seven years ago, and they’re both top drawer in “Follies.”
          Foreman inhabits all the confidence and don’t-eff-with-me attitude of Phyllis while still conveying the hurt beneath the surface. Her “Phyllis’ Folly” turn in the “Loveland” sequence (“The Story of Lucy and Jessie”) is also the show’s sexiest offering. Campbell’s Sally is a wistfully unhappy woman, self-deceived while trying to be brave about it. Possessing one of the loveliest singing voices in town, Campbell mines the emotional core in Sondheim’s songs time and again. (Nio Russell and Audrey Deubig appear as the young Phyllis and Sally.)
              Also among the cast as Weismann alumnae are Leigh Scarritt as the sexy, showbiz-hardened Carlotta Campion, Anise Ritchie as the flamboyant Solange LaFitte, Amanda Naughton as unfailingly bright Emily Whitman, Melinda Gilb as self-deprecating (and very funny) Stella Deems, Dagmar Krause Fields as soprano supreme Heidi Schiller, and 80-year-old Patti Goodwin as Hattie Walker. Even their entrances and exits are great fun; Scarritt shines brightest with Carlotta’s “I’m Still Here,” a vampy mingling of cynical and self-affirming.
            The chief male roles in “Follies” are either peripheral – the aged major domo Roscoe, played by Ralph Johnson; Dimitri Weismann himself (Will Doyle), and Emily’s song-and-dance hubby/partner (Eddie Yaroch) – or the much more visible husbands of Phyllis and Buddy (David Humphrey as Ben Stone, Russell Garrett as Buddy Plummer) who are critical to the couples drama. Neither is a sympathetic character (no knock on Humphrey or Garrett, both steady), but it’s not hard to imagine Phyllis and Sally being better off without them.
I don’t know how “Follies” was staged on Broadway where it was produced by Hal Prince, but I have to believe that Cygnet’s production honors the sophistication, nostalgia and inventiveness of those days. The presence of the showgirls’ younger selves, their placement and their movement during the storytelling are thoughtful and atmospheric. Elisa Benzoni’s costumes and headwear are stunning, Peter Herman’s wig and makeup design ideal. “Follies” was inspired by the famous “Ziegfeld Follies.” As a tribute and an evocation, it stands tall.
The show is choreographed with high style by Katie Banville, a frequent Cygnet collaborator. Resident artist Patrick Marion leads a seven-piece orchestra, himself on keyboards. At times the music inside the new Cygnet theater sounded a tad too loud, but it’s a new space for me too, and I guess I got used to it. Overall, the acoustics in this venue are very good.
I’ve stalled as long as I can re: the “Loveland” sequence that arrives near the end of “Follies.” It honors the “dream shows” that typified “Ziegfeld Follies” shows of the past, conceived then as performances in the afterlife. In “Follies,” a four-way, full-throated confrontation among Phyllis and Ben and Sally and Buddy gives way suddenly – jarringly –to what will be a swan song (complete with swan-pictured scenery) for the former Weismann girls and a curtain call for the wayward Buddy and the forlorn Ben as well.
A showgirl announces each character’s “Folly” with a sign, after which we’re treated to: the philandering Buddy doing a vaudevillian “The God-Why-Don’t-You-Love-Me Blues”; in shimmering gown Sally singing the torchy and dark “Losing My Mind”; Phyllis’ dance-happy aforementioned “The Story of Lucy and Jessie”;  and Ben, in top hat and tails, trying to keep stiff upper lip through “Live, Laugh, Love.”
There had to have been folks in the Cygnet audience who thought this lengthy “Loveland” coda too weird or over the top. Me, it’s the sort of device I’d build into a stage musical if I had the talent to write one (which I don’t). I usually enjoy a sharp left turn, and sharp this one is.
There’s a palpable sense of melancholy at the very end of “Follies,” but as we know, measuring the past, navigating the present, fearing the future and reconciling all of it while emotionally keeping it together comes with some melancholy. I know this has nothing to do with “Follies,” but here it is: As Omar Khayyam wrote “The moving finger writes; and having writ, moves on.”
Moving on is hard. Our own follies can get in the way.
This production is a suitably opulent and ambitious opening for The Joan. Even with its imperfections, “Follies” is thoroughly entertaining and yet another reminder – as if we need one – of the brilliance of Stephen Sondheim.
“Follies” runs through Oct. 12 in the Joseph Clayes III Theater in the Joan, Liberty Station, Point Loma.

Heartbeats meet club beats in La Jolla Playhouse's "The Heart."                          Photo by Rich Soublet II

            Besides being the organ that pumps life through the body, the heart can be the ultimate metaphor, evocative as it is of the most profound human emotions. That’s no exception in a world-premiere musical at La Jolla Playhouse titled … “The Heart.” It is seen and unseen. Heard and unheard. But ever-present.
            The source material is a 2013 work of medical fiction, “Reparer les Vivants” (Mend the Heart) written by Maylis de Kerangal and later adapted into a film (“Heal the Living”) co-written by its director, Katell Quillevere, and Gilles Taurand. Neither is likely to be familiar to American audiences. No matter.
          With a bit of localizing to San Diego, the premise of De Kerangal’s novel is the same as “The Heart,” which was written by musical-theater playwright Kait Kerrigan: A teenager is brain-dead after an automobile accident and his heart is sought after for organ donation. Onstage, the 19-year-old is a surfer named Simon Lamar, a regular among the waves at Tourmaline Beach. A fictitious “San Diego Medical Center” becomes the flashpoint for a life-and-death decision that will have ramifications long after Simon is gone.
          The Playhouse has an A-team behind this bold and enterprising production: Christopher Ashley directs; Emmy nominated (for the 2025 Oscars telecast) Mandy Moore choreographs. The music and lyrics are by Anne and Ian Eisendrath.
          Yes, that music. The Eisendraths imagined a soundscape in which the hospital-monitored beeps of the human heart, normally in the 60-or-so-beats-per-minute range, are paralleled by the 120 bpm of an electronic music track. It’s an ingenious notion. In reality, “The Heart’s” score is more conventional musical-theater pop and ballads than is it an EDM showcase. Most of its 15 songs (“Strike the Match” is a notable exception) would function just fine without any electronic backdrop or shading. I wanted more. “The Heart” is at its exciting, immersive best when the EDM beats are blasting and the actors are moving kinetically around the stage, when the theater momentarily transforms itself into a techno dance club. (Max McKenna is underutilized as Juliette, Simon’s club-DJ girlfriend, though she does get to preside over a few of these high-octane moments.)
          This heart-racing effect, the ambient composite of hospital, ocean and dance club, is achieved with collaborative technical expertise from scenic designer Robert Brill, lighting designer Amanda Zieve, Gareth Owen’s sound design, Lucy Mckinnon’s video design and of course Moore’s choreography.
          Most of “The Heart” unfolds in a hospital setting, where Simon’s (Zachary Noah Piser) estranged parents (Kenita Miller and Jason Tam) are faced with the agonizing question of whether to allow their son’s organs, including his heart, to be harvested, and they have only hours to decide. A persistent transplant facilitator (Lincoln Clauss) doesn’t exactly inspire magnanimity or sacrifice, while the doctor in charge (Heidi Blickenstaff in one of multiple roles) is blunt and all business. Only an ICU nurse (Bre Jackson) who sings warmly and passionately in the presence of the brain-dead Simon (and is promptly scolded for doing so) provides comfort. “Right Now” is a stirring number.
          It should be said that the nurses and doctors of the hospital are portrayed realistically  (sadly, I know from my own hospital experiences)  – from the dedication and selfless care provided by nurses to an ultra-cocky transplant surgeon like Dr. Breva (Paul Alexander Nolan, redeeming himself for having starred in the Playhouse’s “Escape to Margaritaville”).
          “The Heart” takes place over a 24-hour period, the last part of which concerns the recipient of Simon’s heart, a woman of 50 named Claire (Blickenstaff again) who is partying hard at what she presumes will be her last birthday bash  (“Nobody Gets Out Alive”) when the call comes that there’s a donation waiting for her.
          Blickenstaff is the rightful major presence of this show, a Broadway veteran and a returnee to the Playhouse where she appeared in “Freaky Friday” eight years ago. (Interestingly, New Village Arts in Carlsbad is currently staging “{title of show]”, Hunter Bell and Jeff Bowen’s DIY stage musical in which Blickenstaff was a collaborator; she played herself when the show ran Off Broadway a decade ago.)
          For an 80-minute-long affair, “The Heart” ventures into deeply rooted and intense facets of human existence, posing difficult questions and addressing doubts and faith, not to mention the penetrating mystery of the physical heart itself, its preciousness and life’s preciousness too.
          That’s a lot of ground to cover, even at EDM speed. Its artistic ambitions are high, its intentions noble. If it didn’t touch me on a visceral level, maybe it’s only me being protective of my own heart.

          “The Heart” runs through Sept. 28 at La Jolla Playhouse’s Sheila and Hughes Potiker Theatre, UCSD.