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City Garage Theatre

"Art is not a mirror held up to reality, but a hammer with which to shape it" – Bertolt Brecht

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  • “...a production that demands to be seen...”

    —Travis Michael Holder, TicketHolders LA

  • “WOW! .... Sparkling performances”

    —Steven Stanley

  • “compelling, thought-provoking….as timely and as it is relevant”

    —Steven Stanley, Stage Scene LA

  • “TOP TEN! RECOMMENDED!”

  • “Dynamically staged…thought-provoking and topical”

    —Steven Stanley, Stage Scene LA

  • “WOW!”

    —StageScene LA

  • “...an uncanniness that feels friendly and welcoming, suggesting a place where we can all be mad together...”

    —Amanda Andrei, Stage Raw

  • “... sometimes scorching, sometimes hilarious, always intriguing exploration of human relations…what really grabs our attention and hearts are the performances.”

    —Zahir Blue, Night Tinted Glasses

  • “Contemporary theater at its most informative and impactful … stunning, gut-punching”

    —Steven Stanley, StageSceneLA

  • “it hits like thunderclap…”

    —David MacDowell Blue, The World Through Night-Tinted Glasses

  • “Stellar performances from the cast under Frédérique Michel’s direction”

    —Stage Raw

  • “Approaches the “hallelujah” level!”

    —Don Shirley, Angeles Stage

  • “...startlingly compelling as well as rather surprisingly funny...”

    —Zahir Blue, Night Tinted Glasses

  • “eerie, atmospheric ... well suited to the stylish City Garage aesthetic”

    —Philip Brandes, Los Angeles Times

  • “... a Greek myth scaled down to human proportions ... It’s simple, it’s quiet, it’s deeply personal”

    —Anthony Byrnes, “Opening The Curtain” KCRW

  • “THE BOURGEOIS GENTLEMAN had the audience laughing from start to finish.”

    —Ilana Lifshitz

  • “Superb acting….Frederique Michel’s clockwork-like direction of Schimmelpfennig’s tricky, provocative play and Charles Duncombe’s atmospheric stage design also deserve the highest praise possible.”

    —Will Manus, Total Theater

  • “City Garage, known for daring, highly stylized sociopolitical theater, is the ideal local company to revive this infrequently done, disturbingly timely play.”

    —Margaret Grey, The Los Angeles Times

    Andrew Loviska

  • “Crowd-pleasing and consistently funny!”

    —Stage Raw

    Claire Pida, Bo Roberts, and Buddy Brown in Moliere’s “School For Wives”

  • “The piece is fascinating to watch... handsome and visually stunning production, stylized and ritualized.”

    —Neal Weaver, Stage RAW

    Kimshelley Lessard

  • “The writing and the performances crackle...”

    —Paul Birchall, Stage RAW

    Andrew Loviska, Johanny Paulino

  • Yukiko Hadena, David E. Frank, Megan Kim

  • “A marvelous evening of theater... a distinctive, individual form of dance-theater, using a movement vocabulary that... communicates immediately with gestures sometimes like seductive cabaret performance... ”

    —Gray Palmer, Stage RAW

    Lindsay Plake, Alexa Yeames

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City Garage Theater

Bergamot
T1 Space
2525 Michigan Ave
Santa Monica, CA 90404
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310-453-9939

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For listings and reviews of other Los Angeles Theaters, check out Stage Raw.

Copyright © 2026, City Garage Theatre/Aresis Ensemble. All photos by Paul Rubenstein unless otherwise noted.

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