Amelia Reynolds - Page 5

Cynical tributes to the holidays can easily fall into cliches, feeling as stale as the fruitcake they mock, but Seattle Repertory Theatre's Jinkx Monsoon & Major Scales: Unwrapped was a bejeweled middle finger to Christmas that, ultimately, was touchingly sincere. Back by popular demand, the drag duo Jinkx Monsoon (Jerrick Hoffer) and Major Scales (Richard Andriessen) ask you to sit back, kick back your stilettos, and enjoy a swig (or ten) of brandy from the turkey baster.

When I was young, my father told me about when his father saw The Wizard of Oz for the first time on the big screen, and how, for the first time, he, as a young boy, saw a cinematic world unfold before his eyes in technicolor. That awe, that feeling of being completely dazzled and hypnotized by something so visually stunning and new was how I felt when I saw Copious Love's CODENAME: KANSAS, Witch Hunter.

I do not enjoy watching scary movies because I cannot remove myself from the horror that is being screened before my eyes. I can, however, appreciate a well done scary movie when thrilling realism draws me in to a point of no return. That is how I felt when I saw ArtsWest's My Mañana Comes.

When I heard that The Annex Theatre was putting on a play about a 19th century club of fencing lesbians, I figured I was in for a night of camp and euphemisms. Although that direction would have surely been entertaining, Elizabeth Hershly's world premiere of My Dear Miss Chancellor by Caitlin Gilman was coreographed with elegance, charm, and a rapier wit.

I am a sucker for multimedia storytelling, so when Theatre22's Water by the Spoonful advertised their play to have a jazz structure, I could not wait to see how director Julie Beckman interpreted the rhythm and dissonance of jazz into a narrative arc. Confusingly, Water by the Spoonful's storylines knit together too smoothly, not achieving the dissonance that is promised by the playbill, the score, and the dialogue.