A profile on Zombie Joe of Zombie Joe’s Underground Theater Group

“I'll say it was creepy, funny, silly, occasionally pretty gross- and at points, pretty terrifying.” “Blood, guts, zombies...what's not to like?” “When the room goes pitch black, you can't hear anything but your heart racing in anticipation of the next horrifying scene.”

My first and only fistfight was with a redhead. I was ten. Suffice it to say, I went to Zombie Joe's latest production with a huge bias in tow.

Love. Lust. Betrayal. Murder! Zombie Joe's Underground's world premiere production of Vanessa Cate's 1940's Film noir-inspired thriller about a relentless private eye's search for the killer of Hollywood's leading lady and the psychological web of deceit he uncovers.

Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre Group Presents

Christmas Thrills and High Adventure

Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre Group
4850 Lankershim Blvd.
North Hollywood, CA 91601

Showing through December 30th
Fridays at 11pm
Reservations (818) 202-4120
TIX: $15
www.ZombieJoes.com

It's that time of year when you untangle the Christmas lights, shop too much, eat too much, and enjoy life too much. I know-- there's no way to enjoy life "too much", but you can get pretty close in the NOHO Arts District. Need a push to get into the Christmas spirit? No problem, just check out Zombie Joe's "Christmas Thrills and High Adventures". It's a Christmas gift you must not miss.

Photo by Zombie Joe

Richard Nathan has wrapped up a delightful package of short holiday plays and songs. This sexy, zany, whacky collection of shorts spans Elizabethan times through sci-fi space travel. Denise Devin has directed (and creatively costumed) another batch of high-octane musical numbers and yule-tide fun.

Katherine Bowman sings "Santa Baby" with the full company in dance mode. Kevin Michael Shiley heads up a "Film Noir"- style detective caper. Zargots the Strong, and Floop the Clever discover the magic of Christmas in a mind-twisting fantasy. If you're up for a rootin'-tootin' western Christmas, Marshall John Stone, Gunman of the West will fill the bill; it's hard to not giggle at a mix of guns and yule-tide comedy. Need your buckle swhashed? "A Pirate Christmas with Captain Broderick Reef" will have you rolling around on the deck with laughs.

The full company provides a real show-stopper: Adam Sandler's outrageous "Chanukah Song" proves that there are many ways to rhyme with "Chanukah"

Of course, no Zombie Joe presentation would seem complete without vampires and werewolfs; and you won't be disappointed with "A Playhouse of the Damned Christmas".

In fact you won't be disappointed by anything during this hour of laugh-filled, cheerful Christmas joy. Arouse your yule-tide spirit at 11pm on Fridays through December 30th. It's a perfect aperitif after an evening out in the NOHO Arts District.

Zombie Joe's Underground is known as one of the most creative and unique theatre companies in Los Angeles. Today, we are interviewing playwright, Robert Riemer and "Zombie," the founder of Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre in North Hollywood's NoHo Arts District.

“The Tempest “ by William Shakespeare at Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre Group.

There are more than 20 theatres on the NohoArstDistrict.com Theatre grid.

More than 80 percent are in a one-square-mile radius in the NoHo Arts District. You can drive around Lankershim and Magnolia and clearly see the playhouses with bright marquees. There are however several other hidden away theatres that you would not know where even there, unless you already knew, or were told by a friend.

Photo by Denise Devin.

What?!? Shakespeare at Zombie Joe's? That's right!

Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre Group presents their fast-paced, high-impact production of Shakespeare's passionate tragedy, about two star-cross'd lovers whose untimely deaths unite their feuding families. Directed by Denise Devin.

FRIDAYS and SATURDAYS @ 8:30p
AUGUST 19 - OCTOBER 8, 2011
ZJU Theatre Group, 4850 Lankershim Blvd., North Hollywood
Reservations: (818) 202- 4120
Tickets: $15

There is nothing "underground" about this production. Zombie Joe's production of William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is a classic theatrical take on this heart-wrenching story. Presented in a mode reminiscent of the small troops of actors that traveled from town to town to perform for the regular folks in the town square, this production has no sets, or fancy lighting. What it does offer is eleven seasoned and very accomplished actors, in beautifully designed costumes, in a minimalist black limbo setting, performing Shakespeare's work with all the intensity and passion you would expect. The show is fast-paced, the eloquent language flowing with poetic meter and quick tempo. Romeo and Juliet's passion is palpable, the love scenes erotic, and the stresses it causes in the two feuding families is vividly presented as the tragedy unfolds. The swordplay was very believable, blood and all, as director Denise Devin saw to it that all the action was as refined as the poetic delivery of the classic language.

Shakespeare is the "holy grail" of acting. The classical music of the theatre. Only the best and most experienced actors can pull this off. They do so here with excellence. This intimate production is perfect for the theatre-goer who wants to "get" Shakespeare.

There is not one moment of boredom or ho-hum here. The fast-paced, tight production does justice to Shakespeare, and proves that Zombie Joe's Group, as wild and crazy as it likes to be, can be serious and masterful as well.

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Fulsome, apron donned moms do it. Cute diapered baby boys do it. Even chaste good nuns do it. Let’s do it! Let’s fall. Let’s fall. Let’s fall.

At once dark, delicious descent into a pageant of gore, and luminous musical romp through the most ignoble archetypes inhabiting our collective image repertoire, playing late nights in the heart of Noho, writer-director Zombie Joe’s, Urban Death, drives the final stake through the heart of the mere notion that anything is or can be sacred - at least not anything ordained as such by the despicable creatures paraded before us in scene after lurid scene, creatures we can only recognize as us.

Zombie Joe's Underground presents their enchantingly gritty new production of playwright Zombie Joe's canon of mini-plays revealing love's wicked delights.  Directed by Jana Wimer and Sebastian Munoz.

Zombie Joe serves up a juicy, flavorful, and macabre mix of seven mini-plays.  This format of perfectly portioned stories, each about the dark side of love, provides a Friday late-night treat for the theatre-goer.   

In this year of the Arab Spring, and with American forces in Iraq and above Libya, it would be tempting for any director to oversell the similarities between the Middle East today and as portrayed in Oscar Wilde's "Salome". In the play, the established order is threatened by the presence of John the Baptist, a humorless, single-minded devotee of someone called Jesus Christ, about whom little is known by the other characters except that he may have turned water into wine.

Robert A. Prior, who directs the current, one-act, one-hour production of "Salome" at Zombie Joe's Underground Theatre Group, has neatly balanced the ancient and the contemporary. The three soldiers, military fatigues draped over their muscular torsos, could pass as extras from "The Hurt Locker". On the other hand, the lead character, wearing a simple grayish blue dress and understated tiara, looks like she might have been a desert-based queen from long ago, and this John the Baptist is notable for his long, stringy black hair and loin cloth. Prior's adroit staging encourages us to hold two thoughts, which are neither in conflict nor a distraction, about politics then and now in that ever-churning part of the world.