Broadway World - Highly Recommended
"...Jacques Brel IS ALIVE AND WELL AND LIVING IN PARIS receives a first-rate mounting with a cast of powerful singer/actors, backed by a nimble four-piece musical ensemble, and directed and staged with ingenuity of movement that complement the Jacques Brel tales being performed. Although Jacques Brel IS ALIVE AND WELL AND LIVING IN PARIS has no plotline, and the songs have no logical progression in their order, these 24 songs can each provide an entire show's worth of storyline in themselves."
Stage and Cinema - Somewhat Recommended
"...The Odyssey's production is perfectly pleasant, but director Dan Fishbach doesn't put even a toe outside that proverbial box. It's a missed opportunity. He's got some performers that are clearly up to the challenge, who are like race horses frustrated at not being able to give it their all. Anthony Lucca's musical direction, though, is a triumph. The four-piece band is excellent, and Lucca achieves absolute balance between the arrangements and the voices. The performers' enunciation on the tongue-twisty songs is impeccable, and it's also a treat to hear live voices without microphones."
LA Splash - Recommended
"...These are some pretty big shoes to fill, and the Odyssey Theatre has its job cut out as it revives this musical revue for twenty-first century audiences. Brel's songs are clever, insightful, and downright funny as he takes on war, love, broken dreams, being young, and growing old. Nothing is sacred - and Brel even pokes fun at death, funerals, and those senior years. There's a bittersweet quality to his jibes, and sometimes it seems almost embarrassing to chuckle at such politically incorrect observations."
Stage Scene LA - Somewhat Recommended
"...Ultimately, the Odyssey Theatre Ensemble's Jacques Brel Is Alive And Well And Living In Paris may have those unfamiliar with the Belgian legend, particularly younger audiences members, wondering why his songs still get sung four decades after his death, and Brel aficionados longing for voices that might make this crystal clear."
Hollywood Progressive - Highly Recommended
"...Eric Blau and Mort Shuman's 1968 Off-Broadway hit Jacques Brel Is Alive and Well and Living in Paris is now alive and kicking in L.A. at the Odyssey Theatre. The current show consists of four gifted singers/ dancers/actors -Miyuki Miyagi, Susan Kohler, Marc Francoeur and Michael Yapujian - performing on a bare set about two dozen numbers originally created by Belgian singer/songwriter par excellence, Jacques Brel. The quartet is backed by musicians playing bass, percussion, keyboard and guitar."
Total Theater - Recommended
"...Now the Odyssey has revived the revue that won Brel theatrical fame in the USA, with four local singers - Marc Francoeur, Susan Kohler, Miyuki Miyago and Michael Yapujian - admirably handling the vocal chores. As director Dan Fishback said in a program note, Jacques Brel has no linear plot or immediately recognizable cast of characters, which makes it the world's first libretto-less musical. In reality, it's a one-man musical with a cast of four. Two women and two men portray one voice. The words are Brel's, the opinions, insights and razor-sharp wit are Brel's. The show paints a character study of Brel himself, and also a picture of Western civilization in the latter half of the 20th century.""
Culver City News - Recommended
"...While Brel is no longer either alive or living in Paris, his legendary vision of romance, humor and moral conviction endures through his insightful music and lyrics. Just imagine you are listening while sitting at a sidewalk cafe, sipping a glass of delicious French wine, to make the experience complete."
Stage Raw - Not Recommended
"...Director Dan Fishbach may eschew the conventionally irritating French clichés of the sentimental croissant-and-escargot variety. On the other hand, his staging boasts very little personality at all. This crisp, precise production feels like the pleasant sort of entertainment you might find staged in an airport waiting room or a chain hotel's lounge. A bit more Gallic passion might help."
Theatre Notes - Recommended
"...The Odyssey Theatre Ensemble production of "Jacques Brel..." boasts an ensemble of four singer/dancers - Marc Francoeur, Susan Kohler, Miyuki Miyagi and Michael Yapujian - who sing with urgent, powerful emotion songs of love and loss, such as "Fanette" led by Mr. Yapujian, and the searing, tragic multi-lingual lament, "Marieke" rendered with exquisite passion by Ms. Kohler. There is plenty of black comedy in the show as well. Mr. Francoeur scores with "Funeral Tango," a song that features a corpse rising from the coffin to complain about the feckless funeral goers at his wake. There are other songs of giddy gaiety that point up the absurdity of the human condition. Ms. Miyagi, a performer with eye-catching charisma, powers through the wryly upbeat number, "Brussels," right through to the kick-in-the-gut end. And Mssrs. Francoeur and Yapujian have a blast with the satirical song, "The Middle Class" (Les Bourgeois). The show climaxes with an urgent, powerful rendition of Brel's anthem, "If We Only Have Love," a song to stir the soul."
Ticket Holders LA - Highly Recommended
"...I have personally seen Jacques Brel Is... done about 20 times in my life, from large theatre complexes to intimate nightclub venues to converted ice skating rinks to once aboard a cruise ship headed to Mexico. The music is nothing short of amazing and Brel's signature insight, political jabs, razor-sharp wit, and that thinly-veiled inherent optimism he tried so hard to disguise, makes it timeless despite a lack of the usual plotline afforded the standard book musical."
