Forbidden love, American dream and real-life ‘Blue’ on stage

Plays are sprouting all over town like dandelions after the rains!

LA Opera presented a world-class, richly textured production of Claude Debussy’s “Pelléas & Mélisande” (1902). Based on Maurice Maeterlinck’s 1892 play, the opera explores the longings of forbidden love. Golaud (Kyle Ketelsen) finds Mélisande (Sydney Mancasola) in the woods, brings her home (and marries her when older), only for her to fall in love with his half brother, Pelléas (Will Liverman). Happiness turns to tragedy, and love, like water (a major symbol in the opera), can only breed disease and death when it stagnates, festers and is not allowed to flow.

Conductor James Conlon brought out Debussy’s Impressionistic palette, but lovers Mancasola and Liverman lacked any chemistry, undercutting the score’s tension and putting the focus on the jealous Ketelsen. The result had more in common with Othello than Romeo & Juliet, which might bode well for the Opera’s next production: Verdi’s “Otello.”

LA Opera will present a live simulcast of its May 13 opening night at both Cal State Dominguez Hills and the

Theater Review by Louis

Fantasia

Santa Monica Pier.

For more information, go to LAOpera.org/OperaAtTheBeach or LAOpera. org/OperaOnTheLawn. The live-streamed performance, starting at 7:30 p.m. on May 13, is free.

Repressed desires are at the center of William Inge’s “Picnic at the Odyssey.” Featuring an all-Black cast and set in Kansas in the 1960s (rather than Inge’s 1950s), the production, under John Farmanesh-Bocca’s direction, features a strong, talented ensemble which seems to populate a world created by August Wilson rather than Inge.

Inge’s theme is the claustrophobic, smug, American small-town mentality that keeps desire and dreams, especially sexually charged ones, at bay. The script is still topical (the local library bans Carson McCullers’ “The Ballad of the Sad Cafe”), but something goes amiss and off-key in the updating.

Inge’s critique of the American Dream (shared with contemporaries Arthur Miller and Tennessee Williams) is lost in this well-intentioned transposition to an under-represented world. (Through May 28: OdysseyTheatre.com; 310-477-2055, Ext.2.)

Repressed is the last word anyone would apply to Ava Gardner, whose life is on stage at the Geffen in “Ava: The Secret Conversations.” Based (as was an earlier, different production reviewed in February) on Gardner’s biography (ghost written by journalist Peter Evans), the dirt is dished about her multiple marriages as well as numerous relationships.

Actress Elizabeth McGovern, who wrote the three-character play, has enough star-power to command the stage, but occasionally slips into a generic star-is-born stagey alcoholism. Aaron Costa Ganis nearly steals the show with his quick-change impersonations of Evans and husbands Artie Shaw and Frank Sinatra, but there is more information than insight to the script. Still, the Gen Zers in the row ahead of me were completely baffled. “Who ARE these people she keeps talking about?” one whispered. Oh, dear!

What to watch for

Presented by Latino Theater Company, “Whittier Boulevard,” a world premiere, tackles ageism while searching for the divine in each of us. LATC through May 28; 866811-4111; latinotheaterco.org/

Stephen Sondheim’s “A Little Night Music” is at the Pasadena Playhouse through May 28; 626-356-7529; pasadenaplayhouse.org.

Three years after his death, William Shakespeare’s closest friends put together The Book of Will, otherwise known as the “First Folio.” At A Noise Within through June 4; 626-356-3100; anoisewithin.org

“Six,” the musical, lets the queens of Henry VIII have their say and get their revenge! Pantages Theater through June 11; 323-468-1770; hollywoodpantages.com

Oh, dear!! (Through May 7; tickets.geffenplayhouse.org; 310-208-2028.)

The Independent Shakespeare Company, known for its family-friendly Shakespeare in Griffith Park, is presenting an equally friendly version of Noël Coward’s classic, “Private Lives,” at its Atwater Village indoor ISC Studio. Set in Acapulco and Palm Springs of the 1950s (instead of Coward’s Riviera and Paris), the production owes more to Lucille Ball and Desi Arnaz than Coward and Gertrude Lawrence. Slapstick and farce replace wit and style, and the production makes up in energy what it loses in elegance. A fun night, but I’m not sure the Master, Coward, would approve. (Through May 7; iscla.org; 818-710-6306.)

The best production this month is Rogue Machine’s “Blue” at the 29-seat Henry Murray stage at the Matrix. June Carryl’s 65-minute script about the interrogation by a Black, female LAPD detective of a white cop who has shot a Black vet at a traffic stop veers close to cliché, but that may be because the scene has been played out in real life too many times (not just in L.A.!). Julianne Chidi Hill and John Colella give memorable, gripping performances under Michael Matthews’ taut, immersive direction. (Through May 14; roguemachinetheatre.com; 855-585-5185.) Plenty of options — go!