The History Boys

The Ahmanson Theatre
135 N. Grand Ave., L.A.
Tuesday-Friday 8 p.m.;
Saturday 2 p.m. and 8 p.m.;
Sunday 1 p.m. and 6:30 p.m.
Through Dec. 9
Tickets: $30-80
www.centertheatregroup.org

Following critical raves and piles of awards in London and New York, Alan Bennett’s The History Boys arrives in its Los Angeles premiere at the Ahmanson Theatre with almost impossibly high expectations. Happily, the new production, sporting a mostly American cast, more than lives up to the hype.

Set in a prep school in northern England in the 1980s, Bennett’s intelligent and surprisingly funny script follows the final-year academic and personal exploits of eight boys shooting for admission to Britain’s elite Oxford and Cambridge universities.

To prepare the boys for the arduous admission process, the headmaster (H. Richard Greene) brings in the young—and closeted—Irwin (Peter Paige), who teaches the boys to show off their intellectual acuity by turning essay topics upside down with clever calculation. The play’s counterbalance to Irwin is the beloved veteran teacher, Hector (Dakin Matthews), an old-fashioned lover of language and literature, who encourages the boys to recite poetry by W.H. Auden and act out classically campy movie scenes. That he also “fiddles” with the more attractive boys when giving them lifts on his motorbike proves more pathetic than predatory.

The boys are an appropriately diverse band of precocious over-achievers, led by the prepossessing Dakin (Seth Numrich), the priesthood-bound Scripps (Brett Ryback) and little Posner (Alex Brightman), an eager, effeminate boy who lives with a very public crush on Dakin.

While clocking in at close to three hours, The History Boys flies by in a delicious blur of intellectual debate, comic romping, musical interludes and surprising moments of painful emotion. The lightning-fast scene changes, performed mostly by the boys, are covered with lively black-and-white videos that flesh out the characters and their relationships.

Aside from Greene’s cartoonishly bombastic headmaster, the cast is excellent. The boys have a genuine sense of camaraderie, and all have etched specific and individual characters. Brightman’s Posner deserves special mention for winning our hearts with his earnest openness and awkward, burgeoning sexuality.

As for the teachers, Paige gains steam as the play progresses, turning in a nuanced and appropriately understated performance. Matthews, in the play’s juiciest part, alternately roars like an old lion and pouts like a wounded bear, fully inhabiting the scale and scope of the outsized Hector.

British director Paul Miller’s staging has a stylish fluidity, and Bob Crowley’s Broadway set design is recreated here—in all its Thatcher-era Sheffield mediocrity.

The History Boys’ term at the Ahmanson is surprisingly short. In order to ensure witnessing Bennett’s astonishing act of theatrical alchemy—that is, creating a play that is as erudite as it is entertaining—theatergoers should enroll soon. —Christopher Cappiello

All This, and Heaven Too

Macha Theatre/Films
1107 N. Kings Rd., WeHo
Thursday-Saturday 8 p.m.; Sunday 3 p.m.
Through Dec. 30
Tickets: $25-30
www.plays411.com/heaventoo

What a difference a few years can make. When I reviewed a new musical called Trolls at West Hollywood’s Coast Playhouse in 2001, I was captivated by its calculated silliness, catchy tunes and its warmhearted attitude toward elder gay men—a breath of fresh air, considering the ongoing blight of ageism in the gay community. At first, I had no idea that the current production of All This, and Heaven Too—billed as a West Coast premiere—was a rework of Trolls, which had an off-Broadway run in 2005. Prior to my attendance, I discovered that this indeed was Trolls redux, a prospect that pleased me. So much for keen anticipation.

I viewed a performance during the second week of the run, and some cast members were still giving sluggish line readings, and at least one was blowing lines completely. Under the supervision of director-choreographer Kevin Carlisle, the pace resembled two turtles with broken legs ambling to a finish line—scarcely the proper energy level for a gay frolic. Yet what really surprised me is how insufferable I found much of the material this time. I’m not sure why the endless stereotypical references to gays as show queens (Broadway musical and Garland riffs galore) and the portrayal of some characters as mincing ninnies didn’t bother me before, but they certainly did this time. Perhaps the pauses between line pickups gave me too much time to reflect on the excesses.

The story, by librettist-lyricist Dick DeBenedictis and composer Bill Dyer, is about a group of friends attending the wake of their deceased pal. Among them are a flighty fussbudget (Sammy Williams, Tony winner for the original Broadway A Chorus Line), a silver fox (Steven Connor), a reformed street hooker (Chase McCown), an aging gym stud (Steven Lamar Hirschi), a Carmen Miranda wannabe (Charles Herrera) and a brassy transsexual (Kelly Mantle). Unexpected guests are the bitter sister (Katharine Devlin) of the deceased and the spirit of the deceased (James Warnock). More character-driven than narrative-focused, it’s sort of The Boys in the Band lite, transported to 1986 West Hollywood. The performances vary in quality, ranging from capable to limp. The songs are still captivating, though they sound lackluster against wan prerecorded accompaniment. Here’s hoping the performances improve markedly from the unpolished one I attended. And for me, at least, the material hasn’t stood the test of time. —Les Spindle