A Noise Within Theatre — Attraction in Pasadena

The play, Man of La Mancha, was great, though with modern costumes and prison, changed from the 16th century version I saw in 1966. The cast was excellent, except for the casting of Sancho Panza. He has always been a short, stocky man, even in his statue in Madrid,but this Sancho was a thin, young Conan O'Brien sort of guy, who didn't have nearly the quality of voice as the other actors. Also, as I was sitting on the side of the U-shaped seating configuration and the actors rarely looked anywhere but straight up front, it was often difficult to see their expressions and, sometimes, to hear. I have often seen plays in the round and have never felt like the actors did not care for the part of the audience on the sides. Lastly, parking was very inefficient. There is a nice driveway in front of the theater, but the small parking lot there belongs to the apartment complex. My friend who drove, a 75-year old woman, had to go all the way across the street to park in a shopping center. It wasn't until we entered the building that we found out by asking someone, as there was no signage, the theater's parking lot was around a block further up. These issues need to be addressed before I will see another play here or recommend...

I live next door to this place, I’ve never seen their plays, but I don’t want to because they have an alarm that goes off in the middle of the night for 30+ minutes. I work long hours and sleep is very important to me and my partner. I’m writing this review as the alarm has been going off since 1:20am in the morning and it’s now 2pm. There seems to be no end in sight. I’ve lived here for years and before I was able to tolerate the sound when it would go off every so often, because the sound wasn’t as intense as it seems to be now! It seems that instead of getting a system that shuts down after 5 minutes or so, they put in a louder alarm and nobody to turn it off. I have to believe this is something that they’re aware of, this is a heavy residential area! I’m sure someone has spoken up before! Please try to live within the modern age and figure the alarm system! I don’t expect anything to change, but I’m covering all my bases and will be making sure that I do everything in my power to make sure your...

I saw a performance of A Man of No Importance. It was truly a letdown from all expectations I had. A few notable disappointments were the lighting design, sound design and reinforcement. You can tell that the sound and lighting designers are the "seasonal" type that have likely been working at the theatre for myriad seasons, and do more "phoning it in" rather than high-level professional work. The vocal amplification was tonally horrendous, and lighting felt awkward and naive. Not to mention the seemingly random places to place sound effects, like a toddler choosing when to hit play on the cassette.

The cast had quite a few strong players, especially the actor playing Robbie. But I believe the design elements did a disservice to the cast, who were made to look like a community theatre troupe rather than a paid acting cohort. I believe this theatre can do better, but it needs to invest the time and money to find, and then support, creative staff that will put up a...