By Shari Barrett
ArtsUP! LA’s Theatre by the Blind, the only all-blind theatre company in the USA, proudly presents the World Premiere of Off Key by Christopher Ureña featuring an all-blind cast at The Blue Door in Culver City 2/28-3/14. The production is directed by Greg Shane, Artistic Director of ArtsUP! LA, and produced by Bryan Caldwell, Executive Director of ArtsUP! LA. The Theatre by the Blind cast features (in alphabetical order) James J. Alvarez, Ronnie “Talksho” Chism, Miguel Casillas Clarin, Melanie Hernandez, Julio Hoyos, Leela Kazerouni, Joslyn Sky Marquez, Maliaka S. Mitchell, Marvin Dexter Moore, David Lee Rickman II, Matthew Saracho, Myrachele Thomas, and Jennifer Vazquez.
Set in a smoky, late-night jazz club, the play follows Candi (Maliaka S. Mitchell), a once-celebrated matchmaker whose business – and confidence – are falling apart. As Marvin (Marvin Dexter Moore) the jazz piano player underscores the action, she juggles a series of disastrously mismatched dates, each couple revealing more about her own fears of failure, loneliness, and control. When fantasy collides with reality, Candi’s trainee Doreen (Joslyn Sky Marquez) is forced to confront a painful truth – she has been searching for love instead of living inside it. Through music and honesty, Doreen’s journey culminates in an unexpected revelation about her own life.
Between improvised music and overheard confessions, the matchmaker begins to realize that her obsession with perfect pairings has kept her from listening to the messy human rhythms of real connection. By the final set, the club becomes a place not of romance solved, but of vulnerability shared – and a chance for Candi to start over.
The technical team includes assistant director Genevieve Erickson, set designer Gabriela Nunez, set builder Lanny Savoie (Savoie Construction), scenic painter Joyce Hutter, costume designer Courtney Dickens, lighting designer Doug Gabrielle, and sound designer Anthony Lorenzo Garcia.
Off Key performances take place Saturday, February 28 through Saturday, March 14 on Friday/Saturday at 8 p.m. and Sunday at 3 p.m. at The Blue Door theater, 9617 Venice Blvd. in Culver City 90232 (on the North side of Venice Blvd. between Cardiff and Watseka Ave.). There will be a short talkback with the playwright, director, and cast members after each show. Parking is available at street meters and in the local neighborhood, but please read parking restrictions signs to avoid ticketing and/or towing. Two Culver City municipal pay lots are located at 3846 Cardiff Ave. and 3844 Watseka Ave.
General admission tickets are $20, available online at https://www.artsupla.org or at the box office starting a half hour prior to the performance. The play runs for two hours including an intermission, and is appropriate for all ages, with children under the age of 12 requiring an accompanying adult. All patrons regardless of age must have their own ticket. This performance is made possible in part by the City of Culver City and its Cultural Affairs Commission, with support from Sony Pictures Entertainment.
Special offer for Off Key patrons: For 20 years, Ugo has been offering authentic and freshly made Italian cuisine at 3865 Cardiff Avenue in Downtown Culver City, just a few blocks from The Blue Door theater. Ugo is proud and excited to be supporting ArtsUP LA! as a theater and arts group serving people with disabilities, military veterans, and LA youth by offering discounts to the next ArtsUP! LA show when you order a Neapolitan Pizza made in its wood-burning oven or its handmade pasta Pappardelle Bolognese. It’s a great way to enjoy dinner and a play, or brunch and a matinee when attending ArtsUp! LA shows at The Blue Door in Culver City.
Mandy Patinkin has been fortunate to carve out a varied career including theater, the concert stage, film, television, and as a recording artist. On February 7, I was lucky to be in the sold-out audience for Mandy Patinkin in Concert: Being Alive with Adam Ben-David, who has been his piano accompanist for 16 years. The special one-night performance took place at the Richard and Karen Carpenter Performing Arts Center at Cal State Long Beach.
And who better to reconnect us with the joy of being alive than the incomparable Mandy Patinkin? Whether you know him from Broadway (Evita), film (The Princess Bride), TV (Chicago Hope) or follow his hilarious and wise social media posts, you’ve glimpsed his incredible warmth, humanity, and humor. Both his incomparable talent and style were on full display while he performed his favorites from Broadway and the American Songbook.
Several times Mandy sang mashups of songs from different productions that matched each other in subject matter. For instance, he opened the show with a medley of “Inch Worm,” “School Days,” and “Time in a Bottle” to salute the process of growing up and then wishing to go back and save those memories as forever fresh. But then he also shared more modern classics such as “Bohemian Rhapsody” written and performed by Freddie Mercury with Queen.
Taking a seat center stage gave Mandy the opportunity to share memories close to his heart, including the story of visiting New York City as a child with his father and attending his first Broadway show, Mame with Angela Lansbury. And like so many of us in the world of theatre, that first magical experience led him to pursue a life on the stage. Later when he was rehearsing on Broadway, Mandy shared how he decided to do the same thing with his second son, Gideon. But that experience was so different since Mandy admits he spent all his free time learning his lines and wasn’t able to spend as much time exploring New York City with Gideon as he had done with his father.
Incorporating his social activism about the welfare of children into the show, Mandy performed a medley of “You’ve Got to Be Carefully Taught” by Rodgers and Hammerstein from South Pacific and “Children Will Listen” by Stephen Sondheim from Into the Woods, reminding us to recognize how our words will influence the next generation. It reminded me how important it is to always speak with kindness in the presence of others. And Joe Raposo’s “It’s Not Easy Being Green” originally performed by Jim Henson as Kermit the Frog highlights the other side of the coin, and how important it is to walk in someone else’s shoes before putting them down just for being who they are.
For the evening’s encore, Mandy sang “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” by Harold Arlen and E.Y. “Yip” Harburg from The Wizard of Oz in Yiddish, the language spoken by his parents when they arrived here as immigrants from Eastern Europe and struggled to pursue the American Dream. As a board member of the Arava Institute, Mandy continues to work with the International Rescue Committee (IRC), highlighting the plight of refugees worldwide. His heartfelt rendition added a beam of hope for the future, as if opening a modern Pandora’s box to send us on our way to enjoy every moment Being Alive in the place we call home.
For more information about his tour, visit www.mandypatinkin.org. For more information about upcoming events at the Carpenter Center and purchase tickets, visit www.carpenterarts.org
