Stage Raw: "Louis & Keely" transfers to Geffen Playhouse

Check back here Monday after noon for New Reviews of Pippin at the Mark Taper Forum; Jack Chandlers' new comedy-mystery, Murder on the Bounding Main, at Sierra Madre Playhouse; a dance-rock fusion, Vibrating Sun, at Unknown Theatre; Los Angeles Theatre Ensemble's staging fof Macbeth; Echo One-Act Festival at Stage 52; Furious Theatre Company's production of Hunter Gatherers; Leslye Headland's Reverb presented by IAMA Theatre Company at the Working Stage Theatre; Danny Hoch's Taking Over at the Kirk Douglas; and Christopher Moore's new musical, Pope Joan, at the Stella Adler

LOUIS & KEELY TRANSFERRING TO GEFFEN PLAYHOUSE

The Weekly has learned that Jake Broder and Vanessa Claire Smith's Louis & Keely: Live at the Sahara, the runaway musical hit that premiered at Sacred Fools Theatre and then transferred to the Matrix, will be presented at the Audrey Skirball Kenis Theatre of the Geffen Playhouse for a run this spring. This is one of those rare but not unprecedented occasions when a local small theater production works its way up the food chain to settle on the rung of a medium-size regional theater. Others include Deaf West Theater's production of Big River, which transferred to the Taper in 2002, and then went on to Broadway.

Also in 2002, Echo Theatre Company presented Bryan Davidson's War Music in a small-theater staging at the Los Angeles Theatre Center; it was subsequently picked up by Center Theatre Group for a 2004 run at the mid-size production at the Kirk Douglas Theatre

Broder and Smith will be hosting the 30th annual L.A. Weekly Theater Awards on March 30th at the El Rey.

IN CASE YOU'VE JUST TUNED IN

Here is the complete list of NOMINEES for the 30th annual L.A. Weekly Theater Awards, coming up on March 30.  Admission for nominees is free; nominee RSVPs are now being accepted at (310) 574-7208. Tickets for guests and members of the public go on sale February 5 at laweekly.com.

(Please note, guest tickets are $20 each, not $15 as I posted on Monday.)

At your fingertips, the latest New Theater Reviews, Comprehensive Theater Listings, and this week's Cover Story/Stage Profile on Internet pioneer performer Chris Leavins.