Vancouver, BC: I was happy to get a chance to see this show as I missed it on each of my New York trips and I really enjoyed it a lot. I liked the musical variety with Latin rhythms, salsa, merengue and rap,  the energy of the salsa and hip-hop dancing. Not so sure about the overall storyline though.

Vancouver, BC:  If the names did not already tell you that Vanya and Sonia and Masha and Spike is intended to be a comedic homage to Anton Chekhov, the bust of Chehkov in Alison Green's wonderful book-lined sitting-room set would be a strong indication.

Vancouver, BC:  One Man Two Guvnors is an English adaption by UK playwright Richard Bean, of  Carlo Goldoni's 1743 play, The Servant of Two Masters, with the setting transposed to the seaside resort town of Brighton in 1963. Derived from the early Italian performing practices of commedia dell' arte, the play is packed with physical comedy with improvisation and key stock characters. The prototypical rascally Arlecchino servant to whom the title refers, is represented here by Francis Henshall,  brilliantly played by Andrew McNee.

Vancouver, BC: The Arts Club continues its run of crowd pleasing musicals with The Producers. The version of this musical now playing has had an interesting and unusual evolutionary history. The screenplay for the initial 1968 film The Producers, written and directed by Mel Brooks, garnered Brooks an Academy award for screenplay. It starred Zero Mostel as Max Bialystok and Gene Wilder as Leo Bloom. In a reversal of what usually happens, the film was developed into a Broadway musical, which opened in 2001 with Nathan Lane as Bialystok and Matthew Broderick as Bloom. Lane and Broderick recently reprised their stage roles in the 2005 film version of The Producers. This seems to be a new trend with Hairspray following suit.