Lifestyle
You go to this L.A. play. When you get there, you find out you have 60 minutes to escape
A few minutes after the play begins, the actors stop, empty their pockets and repeat their last few lines. And then they do it again. And again. And again. This live approximation of a vinyl record that catches on loop goes on for a few more minutes, the actors getting slightly louder and a tinge more testy as they continue the repetition.
They can’t move, they say, as they are “waiting for Godot.” But they are actually waiting for us, the audience, to get out of our seats, walk onstage and start to piece together a puzzle out of the fragmented pieces of paper they‘ve dropped.
Cards and letters lay on the ground for audience members to discover the next clue.
Melanie Pentecost holds a rock that gives the next context clue to to move the play forward.
This is “Escape From Godot,” an escape room that is also a work of theater — or vice versa. It upends the conventions of both. This is a play in which audience members become participants, the game requiring patrons to hop on the dials and interact with props in order to propel the narrative forward. Puzzles are hidden in the script, ensuring that the players become actors and are in abstract communication with the performers.
But its greatest trick? Inspired by Samuel Beckett’s “Waiting for Godot,” the theatrical escape room taps into the themes of the original work, creating an open-for-interpretation piece of playfully interactive art that grapples with existential questions — how we communicate, or fail to, with others, and the balance among selfish behavior, free will and empathy. Like Beckett’s play, there is no Godot who will come, but we are all caught in a world where the mundane, the absurd and our own desire for answers propel us forward.
Our group — I’m playing with seven strangers — hesitates to jump onstage and set the game afoot. It’s a break of decorum, both of theater protocol and personal boundaries. One player nervously scans his ticket, trying to find a missing clue, another flips through a notebook that was placed on her chair and most of us look at each other and whisper questions about what to do. Realizing, after about seven minutes, that there will be no end to “Escape From Godot” if we don’t move, my group begins to hesitatingly work together. In order for the actors to proceed to the next scene, we need to get them a message crafted from the ephemera that they have dropped.
Actor Phil Daddario kicks into the air during his performance.
Daddario wipes sweat from his face while performing.
Audience members look on the ground for context clues to solve the next puzzle.
“I bet you were not the longest group that has sat,” the show’s co-creator, Jeff Crocker, later tells me when I describe those seven minutes of awkwardness. Jeff is one half of Mister & Mischief, an L.A.-based husband-and-wife duo that has crafted experiences for theme parks, zoos, museums and more. (Jeff’s wife, Andy Crocker, recently created a game-like experience for the Los Angeles Public Library system.) “Escape From Godot” is their first escape room.
“Typically, theater-minded folks, the last thing they’re ever going to do is get up onstage in the middle of the scene,” Jeff says. “That’s a hidden puzzle right there. Are you the person who is bold enough to walk onstage in the middle of a performance in order to make this repetition cease? There’s a lot of weird little social bits like that happening.”
“Escape From Godot” premiered at the Hollywood Fringe Festival in 2018 and has been periodically revived over the years, its latest as part of this months RECON event at the Universal City Hilton, a convention held by escape room aficionado site Room Escape Artist. An initial run of dates through Aug. 25 at Atwater’s Moving Arts Theatre sold out, so “Escape From Godot” has been extended through Sept. 8.
The idea stemmed from Crocker hearing about an escape room in Europe that had taken place throughout a train, a promotional event tied to a film. Joking about potential properties they could base a project on, the Crockers hit on “Waiting for Godot.”
“Andy has a theater degree, and ‘Waiting for Godot’ is classically known as this play where nothing happens,” Jeff says. “To folks who don’t create theater, you hear that as the B-word, boring. It’s a go-to play where people wait for a person who never shows up. There’s more to it than that, and when you see a not-great production of ‘Waiting for Godot,’ it can feel like you want to escape. I’ve seen really great productions of it, and there’s a reason it’s a classic.”
In “Escape From Godot,” puzzles may be hidden in the bowler hats of the performers. Do we ask them to surrender their apparel or wait in the hopes that they will drop them?
Actor Mason Conrad holds a large suitcase while performing in “Escape from Godot.”
Actor Justin Okin looks through the stage play script for lines to give audience members context for the next clue.
Like Beckett’s play, characters in questionable physical shape will appear on the stage, but any sense of compassion is soon overtaken by the desire to solve the next puzzle via the props they‘re carrying. Boxes and baskets with locks may be dropped onstage, their combinations found in the monologues of the actors — Justin Okin as GiGi and Bill Salyers as DoDo, stand-ins for Beckett’s Vladimir and Estragon.
“Escape From Godot” will even nod to other theatrical works. My favorite puzzle turned out to involve a combination lock affixed to a basket, in which uncovering the solution required us to listen to a monologue that alluded to famous cats in history and culture. “Escape From Godot” won’t even start unless guests solve an initial puzzle, one the necessitates we align our tickets with a theater seating chart and find the correct seat. One could opt not to play, as long as others are, and sit and watch, taking in a script that toys with our place and faith in the world, albeit with a reference to the musical “Cats.”
The longer the audience goes without hitting on the right solution, the louder and faster the monologues will become. It creates tension and tests a group to maintain a sense of calm and patience. Nothing gets too hairy; the silliness of the situation dominates the tone.
“Escape from Godot” actors applaud the audience at the end of the play, including, from left, Tiffany Ogburn, Phil Daddario, Mason Conrad, Bill Salyers and Justin Okin.
“We purely set out to fulfill our original delightful idea of having fun from escaping from a notoriously monotonous play, but in doing so, as we started to develop what the puzzles were and the way we wanted the audience to interact, it did start to support the themes of the play while also poking a little fun at it,” Jeff says. “You get the little bits of what Beckett was trying to say about what existence wants to be, what belief in God wants to be, but doing it in a way that is mischievous.”
By the time the show ends, roles have been reversed. Members of the audience have been cast as performers and the actors at times became the audience, trapped with repeating dramatic orations while watching us play. It’s a final message that isn’t too divorced from the Beckett text: We’re all performers, too often waiting for a cue.
Kevin Kline plays actor Richard Bean, and Laura Linney is his sister-in-law Kristen, in American Classic.
David Giesbrecht/MGM+
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David Giesbrecht/MGM+
American Classic is a hidden gem, in more ways than one. It’s hidden because it’s on MGM+, a stand-alone streaming service that, let’s face it, most people don’t have. But MGM+ is available without subscription for a seven-day free trial, on its website or through Prime Video and Roku. And you should find and watch American Classic, because it’s an absolutely charming and wonderful TV jewel.
Charming, in the way it brings small towns and ordinary people to life, as in Northern Exposure. Wonderful, in the way it reflects the joys of local theater productions, as in Slings & Arrows, and the American Playhouse production of Kurt Vonnegut’s Who Am I This Time?
The creators of American Classic are Michael Hoffman and Bob Martin. Martin co-wrote and co-created Slings & Arrows, so that comparison comes easily. And back in the early 1980s, Who Am I This Time? was about people who transformed onstage from ordinary citizens into extraordinary performers. It’s a conceit that works only if you have brilliant actors to bring it to life convincingly. That American Playhouse production had two young actors — Christopher Walken and Susan Sarandon — so yes, it worked. And American Classic, with its mix of veteran and young actors, does, too.
American Classic begins with Kevin Kline, as Shakespearean actor Richard Bean, confronting a New York Times drama critic about his negative opening-night review of Richard’s King Lear. The next day, Richard’s agent, played by Tony Shalhoub, calls Richard in to tell him his tantrum was captured by cellphone and went viral, and that he has to lay low for a while.
Richard returns home to the small town of Millersburg, Pa., where his parents ran a local theater. Almost everyone we meet is a treasure. His father, who has bouts of dementia, is played by Len Cariou, who starred on Broadway in Sweeney Todd. Richard’s brother, Jon, is played by Jon Tenney of The Closer, and his wife, Kristen, is played by the great Laura Linney, from Ozark and John Adams.
Things get even more complicated because the old theater is now a dinner theater, filling its schedule with performances by touring regional companies. Its survival is at risk, so Richard decides to save the theater by mounting a new production of Thornton Wilder’s Our Town, casting the local small-town residents to play … local small-town residents.
Miranda, Richard’s college-bound niece, continues the family theatrical tradition — and Nell Verlaque, the young actress who plays her, has a breakout role here. She’s terrific — funny, touching, totally natural. And when she takes the stage as Emily in Our Town, she’s heart-wrenching. Playwright Wilder is served magnificently here — and so is William Shakespeare, whose works and words Kline tackles in more than one inspirational scene in this series.
I don’t want to reveal too much about the conflicts, and surprises, in American Classic, but please trust me: The more episodes you watch, the better it gets. The characters evolve, and go in unexpected directions and pairings. Kline’s Richard starts out thinking about only himself, but ends up just the opposite. And if, as Shakespeare wrote, the play’s the thing, the thing here is, the plays we see, and the soliloquies we hear, are spellbinding.
And there’s plenty of fun to be had outside the classics in American Classic. The table reads are the most delightful since the ones in Only Murders in the Building. The dinner-table arguments are the most explosive since the ones in The Bear. Some scenes are take-your-breath-away dramatic. Others are infectiously silly, as when Richard works with a cast member forced upon him by the angel of this new Our Town production.
Take the effort to find, and watch, American Classic. It’ll remind you why, when it’s this good, it’s easy to love the theater. And television.
The ritual of meeting up and hanging out at a coffee shop in L.A. is a showcase of style filled with a subtle site-specific tension. Don’t you see it? Comfort battles formality fighting to break free. Hiding out chafes against being perceived. In the end, we make ourselves at home at all costs — and pull a look while doing it.
It’s the morning after a night out. Two friends meet up at Chainsaw in Melrose Hill, the cafe with the flan lattes, crispy arepas and sorbet-colored wall everybody and their mom has been talking about.
Miraculously, the line of people that usually snakes down Melrose yearning for a slice of chef Karla Subero Pittol’s passion lime fruit icebox pie is nonexistent today. Thank God, because the party was sick last night — the DJ mixed Nelly Furtado’s “Promiscuous” into Peaches’ “F— the Pain Away” and the walls were sweating — so making it to the cafe’s front door alone is like wading through viscous, knee-high water. Senses dull and blunt in that special way where it feels like your brain is wearing a weighted vest. The sun, an oppressor. Caffeine needed via IV drip.
The mood: “Don’t look at me,” as they look around furtively, still waking up. “But wait, do. I’m wearing the new Dries Van Noten from head to toe.”
Daniel, left, wears Dries Van Noten mac, henley, pants, oxford shoes, necklace and socks. Sirena wears Dries Van Noten blouse, micro shorts, sneakers, shell charm necklace, cuff and bag and Los Angeles Apparel socks.
If a fit is fire and no one is around to see it, does it make a sound? A certain kind of L.A. coffee shop is (blessedly) one of the few everyday runways we have, followed up by the Los Feliz post office and the Alvarado Car Wash in Echo Park. We come to a coffee shop like Chainsaw for strawberry matchas the color of emeralds and rubies and crackling papas fritas that come with a tamarind barbecue sauce so good it may as well be categorized as a Schedule 1. But we stay for something else.
There is a game we play at the L.A. coffee shop. We’re all in on it — the deniers especially. It can best be summed up by that mood: “Don’t look at me. But wait, do.” Do. Do. Do. Do. We go to a coffee shop to see each other, to be seen. And we pretend we’re not doing it. How cute. Yes, I’m peering at you from behind my hoodie and my sunglasses but the hoodie is a niche L.A. brand and the glasses are vintage designer. I wore them just for you. One time I was sitting at what is to me amazing and to some an insufferable coffee shop in the Arts District where a regular was wearing a headpiece made entirely of plastic sunglasses that covered every inch of his face — at least a foot long in all directions — jangling with every movement he made. Respect, I thought.
Dries Van Noten’s spring/summer 2026 collection feels so right in a place like this. The women’s show, titled “Wavelength,” is about “balancing hard and soft, stiff and fluid, casual and refined, simple and complex,” writes designer Julian Klausner in the show notes. While for the men’s show, titled “A Perfect Day,” Klausner contextualizes: “A man in love, on a stroll at the beach at dawn, after a party. Shirt unbuttoned, sleeves rolled up, the silhouette takes on a new life. I asked myself: What is formal? What is casual? How do these feel?” What is formal or casual? How do you balance hard and soft? The L.A. coffee shop is a container for this spectrum. A dynamic that works because of the tension. A master class in this beautiful dance. There is no more fitting place to wear the SS26 Dries beige tuxedo jacket with heather gray capri sweats and pink satin boxing boots, no better audience for the floor-length striped sheer gown worn with satin sneakers — because even though no one will bat an eye, you trust that your contribution has been clocked and appreciated.
Daniel wears Dries Van Noten coat, shorts, sneakers and socks. Sirena wears Dries Van Noten jacket, micro shorts and sneakers.
Back at Chainsaw the friends drink their iced lattes, they eat their beautiful chocolate milk tres leches in a coupe. They’re revived — buzzing, even; at the glorious point in the caffeinated beverage where everything is beautiful, nothing hurts and at least one of them feels like a creative genius. The longer they stay, the more their style reveals itself. Before they were flexing in a secret way. Now they’re just flexing. Looking back at you looking at them, the contract understood. Doing it for the show. Wait, when did they change? How long have they been here? It doesn’t matter. They have all day. Time ceases to exist in a place like this.
Daniel wears Dries Van Noten tuxedo coat, pants, scarf, sneakers and necklace and Hanes tank top. Sirena wears Dries Van Noten jacket, micro shorts, sneakers and socks.
Creative direction Julissa James
Photography and video direction Alejandra Washington
Styling Keyla Marquez
Hair and makeup Jaime Diaz
Cinematographer Joshua D. Pankiw
1st AC Ruben Plascencia
Gaffer Luis Angel Herrera
Production Mere Studios
Styling assistant Ronben
Production assistant Benjamin Turner
Models Sirena Warren, Daniel Aguilera
Location Chainsaw
Special thanks Kevin Silva and Miguel Maldonado from Next Management
Lifestyle
Nature needs a little help in the inventive Pixar movie ‘Hoppers’ : Pop Culture Happy Hour
Piper Curda as Mabel in Hoppers.
Disney
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In Disney and Pixar’s delightful new film Hoppers, a young woman (Piper Curda) learns a beloved glade is under threat from the town’s slimy mayor (Jon Hamm). But luckily, she discovers that her college professor has developed technology that can let her live as one of the critters she loves – by allowing her mind to “hop” into an animatronic beaver. And it just might just allow her to help save the glade from serious risk of destruction.
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