New Theater Reviews

MY NAME IS EARTHA, BUT YOU MAY CALL ME MISS KITTY! Suzanne Nichols gives an impressive performance as Earth Kitt, in writer/director Sharon L. Graine’s musical tribute to this versatile and dynamic artist. Nichols tells of Kitt’s early life of poverty and deprivation in South Carolina, a vagabond existence in which she, her sister, Pearl, and mother lived hand to mouth, frequently enduring scorn and derision because of Eartha’s mixed-race heritage. It was an aunt in Harlem who rescued her from this abysmal existence, where, before 20, she was touring with the Katherine Dunham Dance Troupe, with her first big break coming in Paris, a period in her life when she was catapulted to stardom. Kitt’s famous run-in with Lady Bird Johnson is also related, which infuriated LBJ to the point that he had her blackballed from network TV, causing the singer to spiral into a deep depression. With Kitt’s trademark sultry, kittenish voice, Nichols sings songs such as “Thursday’s Child,” “Nobody Taught Me,” “C’est Si Bon” and “I Want to Be Evil” with disarming ease and versatility throughout the evening. KSLG Playhouse Theater Players at the Brewery Art Complex, 600 Moulton Ave., L.A.; Sun. 3 p.m.; thru April 30. (323) 227-5410. (Lovell Estell III)

THE VOICE OF THE PRAIRIE Playwright John Olive’s drama is set in the early days of radio, as the night of 19th-century pre-industrialism gives way to the dawn of the modern media era. In 1923, while passing through a Nebraska feed store, traveling radio salesman Leon (Howard S. Miller) overhears farmer David (David St. James) telling stories, and he offers him a gig yakking it up live on his shortwave radio station. David’s tales, told in flashback, consist of memories of his younger self’s (David Garry) adventures on the road in 1895, traveling with a free-spirited blind girl (Ali Burns) who became his sweetheart. Telling his yarns on the air has the unexpected effect of turning David into history’s first shock jock — fortunately without him having to play butt bongo, à la Howard Stern. Director Wendy Worthington stages Olive’s drama itself as a radio play, with sound effects being rendered by performers sitting on the stage’s periphery. Yet, with a stodgy staging that’s undercut by halting pacing and low-energy performances, Worthington’s sadly plodding production is less intimate and folksy than it is a disappointingly dreary trudge — it’s no Prairie Home Companion, that’s for sure. And, for a radio play, the show’s sound design is crucially uninspired — the low-key charms of many of the audio effects are spoiled by the fact that we can barely hear them. Secret Rose Theater, 11246 Magnolia Blvd, N. Hlywd.; Fri. & Sat., 8 p.m.; Sun., 2 p.m.; thru April 29. (323) 769-5858. (Paul Birchall)