Sweeney Todd at the Ahmanson

For most musicals, the orchestra's in a pit and the actors do their singing and dancing thing on the stage. For Sweeney Todd? Not so much.

I wasn't sure what to expect going into the Ahmanson Theatre for Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street. I was going into it cold turkey - no movie-watching, no pre-listening of a soundtrack, no wikipedia-reading. All I knew was that there was a barber and there was going to be some dead characters by the end.

But while the story was a great twist of tangled relationships, dark humor, and memorable songs and characters - the best part was seeing the way the story was produced (which I post-read was a new production).

A handful of actors - instruments in hand - take to the stage to bring the story of Sweeney Todd to life. Try being in character while playing a cello...or a tuba for that matter. These singer/musicians take to the stage, often using their musical instruments to reflect their characters, and wow the audience with not one specific thing - but everything all together.

Sweeney Todd: The Demon Barber of Fleet Street runs at the Ahmanson Theatre from March 11th-April 6th.

-Charity Tran, ExperienceLA Web Coordinator

Interview: Abdul Malik, Community Artists Guild

Daood sits down with Abdul Malik, actor and founder of the Community Artists Guild....

Daood: Before discussing your acting career, you are the founder of CAG (Community Artists Guild). Can you take us back to the inception that led up to this essential institution?

Malik: I left the industry in Hollywood in the late seventies to move back to my original home Detroit and raise my family in a more culturally aware environment. During my first years there I got involved with the professional and community arts industry and realized that a lot of aspiring actors were throwing it all away to go to Hollywood without a clue to what the industry was about. The misconception was that talent alone would ensure your success, which is a big mistake in this city. It's not who you know, but who knows you and what you do. There was also the age old predator factor of unscrupulous producers exploiting local talent and not compensating them because they're uninformed and unrepresented, and mostly non-union. So, I started the CAG to educate actors, with my 30 years of experience in the industry, on what they needed to know in order to be successful in Hollywood and also how not to be exploited in Detroit or anywhere else.

Daood: To what would you attribute significant differences from your contemporaries as an art institute?

Malik: Well, most of their programs have turned their backs on the programs, institutions and visionaries that trained us in this community, such as A.C. Bilbrew's performing arts training workshops, Eubank's Music Conservatory, C. Bernard Jackson's Inner Cultural Center, Nick Stewart's Ebony Showcase Theater, PASLA, Marla Gibb's Crossroads, the Watts Prophet's Workshop, the Mafundi Institute, in that the main focus was training and giving our youth exposure to the arts. Most of the training was free or low cost, also, rather than merely using and taking credit for the artistic resources of the community for their own personal benefit. Our focus is on training our students in the technology and techniques of the future that will give them a viable income in their chosen profession, as well as the skills and humanity to pass those skills on to the next generation.

Just about every Major Black and Hispanic actor in this business who came here with no connections in the 60's, 70's, 80's, and 90's came through those institutions and hasn't done a thing to establish anything to replace them. Nobody's pushing our kids in this community up, so we had better be about the business of pulling them up. And that means all cultures and races in our community or you'll have them all fighting for the same crumbs off the table and trying to destroy each other. The system will only replace them with another group or culture of people and we have failed to understand that.

Daood: .…and those attending CAG have the opportunity to perform a variety of classical text such as?

Malik: We do all the classics from every genre, stage, television, and film as well as independent and avant-garde works. We give our students a well-rounded education in the performing arts from Shakespeare to August Wilson because versatility is the key to survival as a performing artist or technician. Also, the Black, Asian and Hispanic history and experience in America is unique in that there has never been a time when those cultures have not had contact with all the other cultures in the American Diaspora.

Daood: Elaborate on the pertinent aspect of working on scenes from published plays as well as screen plays?

Malik: As a professional performing artist, and especially a minority artist, your job is finding the next job. Therefore you should be auditioning in every aspect of the industry so that you have a constant source of income or you will quickly become homeless in this town. That includes theater, film, television, writing, public speaking, voiceover, narration, and any other form of media. This industry will need your skills at any given time to do any given thing, and as an artist you are here to fulfill their needs, that's how we get paid, by being necessary to tell the story. You therefore need to be familiar with the published scripts and screenplays, which usually is the standard and basis of the genre, as well as being open to the new material being introduced. That is what makes you marketable no matter what your race, creed, gender, religion or color.

Daood: As your students become astute in their craft are there opportunities to perform original pieces?

Malik: Absolutely and more so now than before, because the access to the technology is so easy and just about anyone that has a good story to tell can be seen or heard. There are thousands of stories of the Black Experience alone, from ancient Africa to the present that haven't been told. We constantly encourage our students to crossover into all other trades in the industry.

Daood: Is musical theatre apart of your genre and what are your thoughts of the adaptation of Dreamgirls to the silver screen?

Malik: We have moved away from theater for the most part: 1) because there are many organizations that focus on those areas [and] 2) our focus is to help artists gain and sustain employment to survive, and theater in Hollywood in not something that will sustain an artist, New York is different in that respect. I thought Dreamgirls being adapted to the screen as well as the new version of A Raisin' in the Sun and Lackawanna Blues is a great move to expose our stories from our point of view because plays do give you an opportunity to get more into the story rather the visual nature of the story.

Daood: If you had the opportunity of a live multi-media dream play combining dance, original music, what would be the subject matter and why?

Malik: But I will say that the most important projects these days would be on what the previous leadership of the sixties movement would think about the State of Our Race, Country, communities, leadership and our youth today as compared to their periods and what would be their solutions to our problems today.

Daood: Venturing back into the novelty of acting, at what pinnacle point in which you absolutely new that becoming a thespian was not going to be a short story?

Malik: Probably, every year that I've been actor and found that it was not going to be something that I could do by myself. I want to give up everyday, but can't afford to, and I can't let down all the people who have supported and believed in me, especially my family, wife and children who have sacrificed the most in my absence while on tour.

Daood: With countless films and stage performances, far too many to mention here, apart of your repertoire, is there any particular roles that you have not played of interest?

Malik: I don't know…After portraying Malcolm X and performing for his family, followers, nemeses, and all over the country and world for the past thirty years and playing him at different points in his rich life, and being investigated by the FBI, I think was the ultimate role. Maybe Iceberg Slim or one of the characters in Donald Goines' Books because their stories don't glorify the horrors of the fast life in our communities and are geared toward steering our youth especially our young girls away from that life style.

Daood: Any films, stage performances can we look forward to seeing you in?

Malik: I will be doing my final command performance of the One Man Play Brother Malcolm X: Reminiscences of a Revolutionary by Frank G. Greenwood here in Los Angeles on Malcolm's birthday where I started in 1978. Of course as a working actor you could see me anywhere, Stage, Film, TV, or hear me as a voice over artist.

Daood: Are there any forthcoming CAG projects in which we can look forward to attending?

Malik: Our Big Screen filmed showcase of our workshop actors is forthcoming after the writers strike is over. Also Our First Takes: Kids in the City, Visual Media Communications after school program will be screening their film shorts for the public at Johnnie Cochran Middle School in June.

Daood: Thank you for partaking in the interview!


Those interested in more information about CAG:
Website: http://www.communityartistsguild.org/
Phone: 323 779-7791
Email: dactor@pacbell.net

Behind the Curtains...

Life After Tomorrow is an award-winning documentary that reunites more than forty women who played orphans in the Broadway production of ANNIE, revealing the highs and lows of their experiences as child actresses in a cultural phenomenon—from out-of-control stage mothers to being replaceable at the age of 12. At the age of 12? Talk about potential lifelong complexes waiting to happen. If you want to check it out, the DVD will be on sale February 26th...

Live theater and Broadway's always been associated with the streets of New York, but I wonder how many people ever think back to the once thriving Broadway Theater District in LA's Historic Core, comprised of 12 theaters concentrated in a 7 block span? Even in the present day, the theaters are still preserved in their unique architecture and character; and while LA might now be more known for Rodeo Drive and the glamour of Hollywood, LA definitely has its own historical theater culture to boast about as well.

Here's an interesting fact of the day: The Los Angeles Theater's 1931 opening featured Charlie Chaplin and his movie "City Lights".

Check out ExperienceLA for live theater events taking place all around greater LA.

-Sarah Koo, ExperienceLA Arts/Culture Marketing Assistant

The Odd Couple

For two performances only, Martin Short and Jason Alexander team up for "The Odd Couple", a special event of the Reprise! 2007-2008 season.

Reprise! is also offering a chance to win a pair of tickets to the Friday, January 25th. Click here for more info.

Don't miss out on this special event at the Wadsworth Theatre. While you're at it, I'd highly recommend hanging out in and around the Westwood area, which boasts both a Pinkberry and Red Mango, as well as on Sawtelle with great restaurants like Furaibo.

-ExperienceLA Staff

LA Sports Arena: High School Musical: The Ice Tour

My Tuesday night at the LA Sports Arena featured bright lights, the loud roar of a crowd, and the intoxicating smell of popcorn lingering in the air. What team was playing? "The Wildcats!" "What time [was] it?" "Summerti -" I mean, High School Musical: The Ice Tour...

I suppose my friends Jay and Jessie (who will probably cringe at their names being displayed in this entry) and I looked a bit out of place at the LA Sports Arena last night. At ages twenty-four, we had a few years on the shorter members of the audience and at least the parents could say their kid dragged them along. But we had gotten some tickets and we figured it would be a fun outing.

I actually came with a mission: I wanted to see basketballs on the ice. The thought of basketballs that close to skate blades intrigued me.

You might be asking: How did she know there would be basketballs? How did she know these HSM lines she opened the entry with? How is she using 'HSM' with ease?

At this point, I should make a confession. I actually know most of the songs...and in addition to the basketballs, I wanted to see the pairs routine for "Breaking Free". What better medium to use the lines "I'm soaring...flying..." than the ice!

This blog has featured a fair share of the musicals I've seen (Avenue Q; Curtains), but High School Musical: The Ice Tour is in a lovely canon all of its own.

Acting as a highlights reel of both Disney television movies, the show uses the ice as a stage for the story. The world of High School Musical is brought to life with narration from 'musical playmaker' Kelsi. The story unfolds with the help of skaters who bear remarkable likeness to the movie actors, lights, flexible set design, and a large flat screen that acts as a transition or background for the show. The performers displayed skills as both actors and professional skaters and great choreography was put into the show to re-interpret the show's songs for ice.

As a highlights reel, it might be difficult to keep track of everything that happened in the films if you are unfamiliar with the storylines. While all the major songs were in the show, there were many parts glossed over to fill in the two hour time slot. (I, for one, was a bit disappointed not to hear Lucas Grabeel's "You Got It" as Ryan and Sharpay drove into the country club.) But the show will likely not disappoint any HSM fan. Even if you don't know the songs, you can find yourself 'gettin' your head in the game' and trying to sing along anyway.

The show definitely reaches out to the kid in you and is filled with the kind of story reminiscent of Disney magic. What I like the most about Disney stories is that everything always seems to work out in the end. And while you grow up and know that's not always the case, it's nice to remember that it could be true.

Maybe an opinion on this show is better from someone 2+4 rather than twenty-four, but even surrounded by two people my age, I can't say that I saw anyone in that audience not having a good time (or doing a little karaoke!).

Like the song goes, "we're all in this together..."

-Charity Tran, ExperienceLA.com Web Coordinator

Avenue Q in LA!

One of my favorite musicals is in town - Avenue Q! I had the lovely opportunity to see this hilarious musical again at its opening on September 7th. There's so many great things about this show, I'm not sure where to start...

I had first seen this show in Las Vegas two years ago, when it had a long run at the Wynn. My friends were familiar with the soundtrack, but I hadn't heard much of the musical except for one key track: "What Do You Do With A B.A. in English?" As a degree-holder of a B.A. in English, it's a song that's near and dear to my heart.

Fast forward two years later, having already seen the show, and having memorized all the songs - of course I jumped at the opportunity to see it again in Los Angeles. Appropriately, I asked my friend Trevor to accompany me - a fellow holder of a B.A. in English.

Avenue Q can be succinctly described as "Sesame Street for Adults". Although there are cute puppets and monsters, it's not another day in Sesame Street. The musical touches on topics relevant to life after college, sexuality, and politically incorrect commentary.

But while a lot of Avenue Q is fun for fun sake, at the heart of the musical is a story that any adult can relate to - trying to find one self and making decisions and racking up mistakes along the way. Perhaps what adds to the humor of the show is that most - if not all - the audience has walked along (or is still walking on) their own Avenue Q, looking for their own sense of purpose and trying not to listen to the "Bad Idea Bears" that so often lead us astray with their "good idea at the time" logic.

Avenue Q doesn't prescribe to giving anyone definite answers to what purpose means, but it really does provide the opportunity to laugh at the journey to find it. Goodness knows, I'm still trying to figure out what to do with a B.A. in English!

Avenue Q is presented by Center Theatre Group and runs at the Ahmanson Theatre until October 14th.

-Charity Tran, ExperienceLA Web Coordinator

Theatre: "Twelve Angry Men" at the Ahmanson

Twelve Angry Men rocked. Go see it.

Twelve Angry Men runs until May 6th at the Ahmanson Theatre.

-Charity Tran and Sarah Koo, ExperienceLA Staff

Theatre: "I Land" presented by East West Players

The feeling of anticipation, excitement and the aroma of savory food permeated the chilly evening as the premiere night of actor Keo Woolford's one-man show I Land drew near.

Hawaiian native and long-time friend Jean Yim and her wonderful family looked forward to seeing Woolford bring to the stage his story about growing up and away from Hawaii. Certain images come to mind at the mention of the lush island: Waikiki beach, luaus serving appetizing pork, the police drama Hawaii 5-0 and all those beautifully sculpted hula dancers swaying to the music. A paradisiacal escape the rat race elements of life. For Keo Woolford, his Hawaii is more than ubiquitous ABC stores found at every corner and considers legendary singer Don Ho as the island's representative. The late 20-something Hawaiian native puts together a tight and amusing memoir chronicling his misspent youth and arduous passage into manhood. It is a journey of self-discovery that could have easily ended in destruction.

Woolford morphs into many characters that helped to shape the man he is today. Among these characters is his demanding Hula God who taught him the origin and meaning behind traditional hula at age 14 and his cool friend Li'l Rock who showed him what having swagger can do for a man's reputation. My personal favorite was the I-don't-give-a-damn attitude of one mean dude named Bruddah who was the neighborhood rebel of the group. Woolford provides distinctive personality traits, body language and speech patterns to each individual. He imitates himself as a scared 14-year old trying unsuccessfully to hula and conveys all the insecurities a teenage boy goes through.

Dance was and still is the most significant aspect of Woolford's life. His roots in hula lead him into performing in pageant shows, and this later evolved into membership in the boy band Brownskin, Hawaii's version of ‘NSYNC. It is not all good times and laughs. He details his darkest times at their bleakest, but always manages to show the power to overcome these times and move forward. And it all happened with his first love, hula. Woolford details his coming-of-age story with humor and honesty. The youngest and most adorable audience member Makana provided sound effects with spurts of laughter in between pauses, which made it all the more enjoyable.

At the end, Woolford honors his culture and himself by performing the kahilani dance while wearing a lei po'o (a wreath around his head), kupe'e around his ankles and wrists and a grass skirt made of hau. It is the most awe-inspiring visual of interpreting history using sharp and precise movements.

I Landplays at David Henry Hwang Theater and is presented by East West Players. The show runs until April 8th.

- Mary E. Montoro, Contributing Writer