U and Me and My Best Friend P

U AND ME AND MY BEST FRIEND P (Gold Medal) Abby Schachner strikes one as this tornado of neuroses and talent, and her one woman show at the Elephant studio was Ground Zero for me on the night I sat in her audience. Free form to the gills, Abby bounces off the walls reciting her poems (one for every letter of the alphabet), and sharing her Fairy Tales that show the influence of the Brothers Grimm and Mickey Spillane. I would find it impossible to believe anyone left that audience without being utterly floored by her writing, utterly exhausted by her performance and eagerly looking forward to spending another night being thoroughly entertained by her. I SAW 57 SHOWS THIS YEAR AND REVIEWED 43 OF THEM. TO READ ALL MY REVIEWS, AS... full review

#ChanceItLA - This show is an odd duck. The meat of the performance is dedicated to the recitation of what she calls poems, but I would call the text of children's books screaming to be made. They are well thought out, fully developed, unique stories with fantastic rhythm and rhyme. I was enchanted and wanted to go out to find children and usher them in to hear these stories. But then the in between moments were filled with this intense, unrehearsed, nervous, frenetic energy, that was filled with pacing, obsessively picking at and adjusting her clothing, muttering to herself and then eventually singing little manic songs for different letters of the alphabet. Some of which were not overly appropriate for children. The entire show yo-yos back... full review