Encroaching middle age and the fractured landscape of love are the concerns of Kathryn Graf's The Snake Can, now at the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble in West Los Angeles. And while the playwright gets in a goodly share of heartfelt exchanges and bon mots from her characters, we are exhausted at...

The recently wrapped 24th annual Palm Springs International Film Festival had, amongst its 182 features from 68 countries, an exciting mix that drew viewers from the world over. These are the most notable among 38 films viewed:

Blancanieves (Spain/France), dir. Pablo Berger
Writer-director Berger waited more than a decade...

Polisse (Sundance Selects)

A gritty, emotion-laden and surprisingly uplifting look at the Child Protection Unit of the Paris police. Director Maiwenn Le Besco captures the ugly secrecy of ritual sexual abuse, the difficulty of interrogating children and the bonding of the men and women who work every day to attain...

Red (Center Theatre Group at Mark Taper Forum)
It's rare to be dazzled by a two-hander, but Josh Logan's rich writing made this tale of artist Mark Rothko (a career turn for Alfred Molina) and his newly hired, oft-abused assistant (Jonathan Groff) nothing less than entrancing. Logan's depiction of...

The 18th annual Palm Springs International Short Film Festival and Film Market, the largest festival of its kind in this country, completed its run June 19-25 and this writer's eyes have started to come back into focus after seeing more than 50 shorts in two days. The standouts among those...

From June 14-24, theatre, comedy, music and some indescribable forms of performance were once again presented in venues that were blessedly within walking distance of one another in Hollywood.

Voices in My Head: A Life by Bill Ratner

More than just the premiere voice-over talent in Hollywood today, Ratner writes...

They say imitation is the sincerest form of flattery but that is completely wrong. Adaptation is the sincerest form of flattery.

One of the great joys of my career was getting to know Ray Bradbury, who recently passed away at 91. The first time I met him was at a...

Records taken from "The Human Body" chapter of Weird Wonders and Bizarre Blunders: The Official Book of Ridiculous Records:

Strangest Birth Defect

Dieter Schlippenbach of Rechtenfleth, Germany was born with two lobster claws in place of hands. Scientists are unsure whether his mother's pre-natal consumption of seafood...

Site specific theater can increase the inherent pleasure of a theatrical production exponentially. Some productions that have had the greatest impact on me were performed in a New York City storefront; outdoors while listening to early Walkmans in Marin County; in an abandoned department store, made up to be a...

America will never lack for political scandal, nor for public fascination with it. The tawdry details of the John Edwards trial seem perfectly timed for the rock musical The Fix, in its West Coast premiere at the International City Theatre in Long Beach. John Dempsey, who wrote the...

As the desert oasis and playground, two hours to the south of Los Angeles, Palm Springs has long been a retreat. Thankfully, the changes in the Coachella Valley are not housing developments but updating and refurbishing of properties for the visitor. Formerly the hotel Ballantine's, the Palm Springs...

[Generation P, courtesy Generation P, LLC]

The 23rd presentation of the Palm Springs International Film Festival, concluded January 14, presented 188 films from 73 countries, including 40 of the 63 foreign language offerings for the Academy Award. But as is often the case...

Margo Veil, Odyssey Theatre Ensemble
Bart DeLorenzo directs masterfully Len Jenkins's almost indescribable, thrillingly inventive science fiction-noir mystery. DeLorenzo has assembled actors from his excellent Evidence Room brethren here, including Dorie Barton, Tom Fitzpatrick and Lauren Campedelli, in a tale of transferred minds and bodies that, with the...

1. Senna (dir. Asif Kapadia) Thanks to more than 15,000 hours of archival footage, expertly edited, this thrilling and complex doc on three-time Formula One driving champion Ayrton Senna has the narrative drive of a scripted feature. A legend in his native Brazil, we see how Senna's religious fervor led...

It is high praise that the documentary feature on Brazilian race car driving legend Ayrton Senna has been attracting more women than men and plenty of non-racing enthusiasts to its previous screenings. For the film, which has been culled...

When you find yourself as a journalist at the largest short film festival and market in North America, it is neither daunting nor unlikely to see 87 films in three and a half days. Palm Springs may...

With the release of Richard Rush's landmark film The Stunt Man on DVD and Blu-Ray, I've reposted a piece on Rush I wrote for Entertainment Today in 2000.

The American Cinematheque, operating out of the luxurious Lloyd E. Rigler Theatre at the Egyptian on Hollywood Boulevard, is doing, arguably, some...

The move from the campus of UCLA to USC for the L.A. Times Festival of Books could not dampen the enthusiastic attendance for the largest American book fair. Everything in life is a tradeoff: The congested 110 Freeway to the USC campus versus less stairs for children and the elderly...

There seems to always be a strong field of short animated films for Oscar consideration each year, regardless of what has been selected as short live action and documentaries. Last year's stunning Oscar winner, Logorama, from France, began comedically with corporate...

[Adventures of Power]

Much is made of the films that get picked up for distribution each January at the Sundance Film Festival in Park City, Utah. If you read the trades, there are updates on who has ponied up and how much they've...