Category Archives: Theater & Fine Arts

With a cast of “Noolians” and a set adorned by feathery “Truffula trees,” Hooligan Theatre Company is letting its inner child run wild.

Opening tonight and running through April 9, the second of four final exhibitions by Master of Fine Arts students will be showcased at the Broad Art Center’s New Wight Gallery.

Pretending to be someone else takes finesse. Now imagine juggling eight characters in the course of one night.

Tom Burmester had a mission statement. The Los Angeles Theatre Ensemble, founded by Burmester in 2004 after he graduated from UCLA with a master of fine arts in directing, had a “commitment to strike a balance between … the works of new playwrights and revisiting timely and important classics.”

Most radio shows play music, deliver the latest news or serve as platforms for political debate. Radiolab, on the other hand, is keen on answering some of life’s biggest questions.

“It’s a show about asking about how the world works, and asking big religious-sized questions,” said Radiolab host Jad Abumrad.

On March 23 and 24 at 8 p.m., hosts Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich will perform live recordings of Radiolab with cellist Zoe Keating at Royce Hall.

Radiolab originated in New York as a free-form set with Abumrad performing for three hours, late at night, at a time when no one was listening.

“I remember just being lost, confused, excited and experimenting ““ and more than anything, just feeling like this will never work,” Abumrad said.

In 2004, Abumrad met radio host Robert Krulwich and had him guest-host one of his radio shows, which were loosely science-based and officially dubbed “Radiolab.” The two eventually became very good friends.

Abumrad said both he and Krulwich never expected anyone to like the show.

Now, Radiolab is co-hosted by Abumrad and Krulwich.

If Disney’s “Beauty and the Beast” is a cautionary tale for anything, it would be that no one should ever go into the woods unless they want to be chomped up by wolves or get stuck in a castle with a man-beast.

The need to tell the story of Jane Eyre and her romance with her brooding employer Mr. Rochester is an itch that has been scratched time and again.