In 1940s Los Angeles, Stine, a bookish writer of detective stories, struggles to adapt his crime novel into a workable screenplay. As he tries to maintain some integrity in the backstabbing world of Hollywood, his protagonist, a hard-boiled private eye named Stone, fights for survival in a city full of criminals and opportunists. Uniquely, the stories are told in tandem on stage. Stine’s world is in full color, while Stone’s world appears in black and white like any 1940s film noir. As Stine writes the screenplay, the people in his life populate the film’s characters. What results is a winding tale of decadence and homicide with a liberal sprinkling of femmes fatale. With wit, humor, and a fantastic Cy Coleman score, the Tony-Award-winning musical City of Angels captures the snappy dialogue of a Raymond Chandler novel and the glitzy showmanship of classic Hollywood.
