Pam Kragen

San Diego

Arts & Entertainment Editor at The San Diego Union-Tribune

Arts & Entertainment editor at the San Diego Union-Tribune @sdut

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Articles

Review: Moonlight’s ‘Waitress’ serves up laughs and melancholy

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

When people think about the musical “Waitress,” they often remember two things: The whimsical names of the pies baked by diner waitress Jenna and the beautiful and heartbreaking song she sings at the nadir of her life, “She Used to Be Mine.”Fortunately there are pies aplenty in Moonlight Stage Productions’ regional theater premiere of “Waitress,” which opened Wednesday night at Vista’s Moonlight Amphitheatre. And the show’s star, Lulu Lloyd, sings the hell out of Jenna’s signature song.
Review: OnStage Playhouse’s ‘White Guy on the Bus’ pulls no punches

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

Many of the plays being produced in American theaters these days deal with issues of race and prejudice, and most are written to open audience members’ eyes, teach lessons and offer some measure of hope and solutions. “White Guy on the Bus” is not one of those plays. It’s a scathing, cynical and unsettling indictment of White privilege that offers no hope or happy ending. But it sure makes you think.
Michelin Guide Mexico crowns two more Valle de Guadalupe restaurants with stars

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

Baja California restaurateurs had reasons to celebrate and mourn at the Michelin Guide’s second awards ceremony in Mexico City on Tuesday. Two more restaurants in the Valle de Guadalupe area, a popular food-and-wine destination about 90 minutes south of the San Diego County border, earned coveted Michelin stars, bringing the Baja state’s total number of Michelin-starred restaurants to five. But one of Baja’s Bib Gourmand honorees from last year, Merak, has closed.
Review: At newly opened Lilo, fun is just as important as the food

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

When owner John Resnick and executive chef Eric Bost opened their fine-dining restaurant Lilo in Carlsbad on April 17, they explained that its name — pronounced “LIE-low” — referred to the rekindling of a friendship that’s been “lying low” for years. But in Webster’s Dictionary, “lie low” means to remain out of sight or or inconspicuous.
A year after James Hubbell’s passing, Ilan-Lael Foundation carries on his legacy

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

It’s been just over one year since iconic San Diego arts legend James Hubbell passed away at age 92. But thanks the foresight of Hubbell and his wife, Anne, the arts education mission he spent a lifetime building at their family home and art compound near Julian now carries on without him.
Review: New Village’s stages a towering ‘Mountaintop’

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

Katori Hall’s 2009 play “The Mountaintop” isn’t new to San Diego theater audiences, but it feels particularly fresh and immediate in its third, and best, local production at New Village Arts. The staging that opened Saturday at the Carlsbad theater not only benefits from an excellent cast, great direction and visually stunning projections; It also feels acutely timed for today’s hopelessly divided America. By contrast, “The Mountaintop” is a story about hope.
San Diego Natural History Museum’s long-awaited Paleo Center opens Friday

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

When visitors arrive at the San Diego Natural History Museum, they can explore four floors of exhibits, fossils, dioramas, life-size models, watch big-screen nature films and, on Friday nights, enjoy a bird’s eye view of Balboa Park from the rooftop deck. But come Friday, all of the public’s attention will be focused underground, when the Nat opens its long-awaited Tom Deméré Paleontology Center on its basement floor.
San Diego playwright readies spooky ‘Point Loma’ play for off Broadway run

3 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

Back in 2021, San Diego business executive, leadership book author and longtime theater-lover Tim Mulligan wrote his first play, “Witchland.”The spooky story was inspired by his childhood experiences growing up in Richland, Wash., home of the former Hanford nuclear power plant, where underground storage of radioactive materials have made Richland one of the nation’s most polluted cities.
Review: Old Globe’s ‘One of the Good Ones’ a funny twist on racial bias

4 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

One of the great life passages for many parents is meeting the person who will one day marry their son or daughter. For affluent Latino parents Enrique and Ilana Gomez, this moment goes hilariously wrong from the start, when their daughter Yoli invites her Mexican-born intended Marcos over to the family’s Pasadena home for dinner. Turns out Marcos is White, the son of Bostonites who were living in Mexico when he was born, and he shows up on the Gomez doorstep with the host gift of a piñata.
Michelin-recognized 24 Suns encapsulates its mission in new duck dish

4 weeks ago | sandiegouniontribune.com | Pam Kragen

On Jan. 31, 24 Suns restaurant held its grand opening in Oceanside, and just 3 1/2 months later, it earned a prestigious recommendation from the Michelin Guide. It’s not unprecedented to receive Michelin recognition that quickly (Carlsbad’s new Lilo restaurant also earned a recommendation less than a month after it opened in April). But it does show that Michelin’s anonymous inspectors had their eyes on 24 Suns’ founding co-chefs Nicholas “Nic” Webber and Jacob Jordan for a while.