Barrington Stage Company

Barrington Stage Company (BSC) announces extensions for the first four productions of the theatre’s 2021 season: Who Could Ask for Anything More? The Songs of George Gershwin, Chester Bailey, Eleanor and Boca.

How theater is presented this summer continues to expand. TheaterWorks in Hartford, West Hartford’s Playhouse on Park and Ridgefield’s Thrown Stone Theater are exploring what are called “site-specific” productions – where the production’s content has a relationship to the site where it is performed.

Barrington Stage Company (BSC), announces that a second performance has been scheduled for Aaron Tveit Live! In Concert on Monday, July 19 at 8:00pm. The encore performance has been scheduled to accommodate worldwide audience demand after tickets for BSC’s Gala performance of Aaron Tveit Live! on Sunday, July 18 quickly sold out.

Get Your Pink Hands Off Me Sucka and Give Me Back by Daniella De Jesús, is the Grand Prize winner of the 2021 Bonnie and Terry Burman New Play Award. Directed by Taylor Reynolds it will be presented June 4-6, 2021.

Barrington Stage Company has been approved for a $30,000 Grants for Arts Projects from the National Endowment for the Arts. This project will support a World Premiere production of The Supadupa Kid, a new musical based on the children's book of the same name by local Pittsfield author Ty Allan Jackson. 

The annual mid winter 10X10 New Play Festival new play festival is back for its tenth year. This time virtual from Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield. The plays are generally fun. Ones your don't care for are gone in ten minutes and there are nine more to consider. There are always hits and misses and it's fun to participate and debate.

Barrington Stage Company (BSC), is pleased to announce the first round of Spark Grants of $2,500 each to eleven artists with whom Barrington Stage Company has either collaborated with on past work or looks forward to collaborating with in the future. Each recipient was awarded the grant under the single condition that the money be used to spark the artist’s creativity.

 Barrington Stage Company (BSC), announces the 2020 Associate Artists – lighting designer David Lander, director/choreographer Jeffrey Page and actress Alysha Umphress.

Barrington Stage Company will present a free virtual reading of The Supadupa Kid 2: Move, the action/superhero book by Pittsfield-based author Ty Allan Jackson. The reading will feature a cast of local youth and parents from the Berkshires and NY State Capital Region. Julianne Boyd will direct the reading, which will begin streaming free on December 3. 

Berkshire Theatre Group announcees a gift of just over $1 million dollars from the family of the late Mary Anne Gross in honor of her lifetime love of both theatre and the Berkshires

Mark St Germain's Typhoid Mary will be filmed in advance with the cast performing remotely. It will be available to stream on October 30 & 31 at 7:30 pm ET. The ever more timely play premiered at Barrington Stage Company in 2018.

Eleanor, which was filmed earlier this month without an audience at BSC’s Boyd-Quinson Mainstage, will be available to stream on October 3 & 4 at 7:30 pm ET. Tickets ($15) can be ordered from OvationTix and a link will then be sent to the ticket holder within 24 hours of the scheduled performance.

A work in progress, "Eleanor," by Mark St. Germain was commissioned by Florida Studio Theatre in Sarasota. It was given a reading there. Recently it had a reading with another actress, Harriet Harris, for Barrington Stage Company. With two performances in an empty theatre it was viewed by subscription. By phone we discussed the new work and its intriguing character who was superly portrayed by a remarkable actress.

In collaboration with Actor's Equity, Barrington Stage Company and Berkshire Theatre Group have finalized a path forward. Barrington Stage Company is producing Harry Clarke, a one-man show that will employ two Equity members, a performer and a stage manager. It begins performances in August. Berkshire Theatre Group is mounting the musical Godspell, an outdoor production with a cast of about ten and two stage managers.

Out of precaution for actors, creative teams, staff and audiences, Barrington Stage Company will employ best safety practices, including reducing the 520-seat Mainstage to one third of its capacity; increasing the distance between rows and seats; and deep cleaning the theatre after every performance, among other measures. Patrons will be required to wear masks until further notice.

Barrington Stage Company will present two World Premiere musicals and new productions of a Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning musical classic, a Tony Award-winning musical revue, and a Pulitzer Prize-winning play. BSC will also perform outdoors for the first time with free performances of one of the company’s World Premiere musicals and featuring the company’s popular Youth Theatre.

Can there be too much of a good thing? Barrington Stage Company is known for staging classical musicals. But now Ain't Misbehavin has been added to South Pacific. This seems more about the bottomline than balanced programming. The Assembled Parties by Richard Greenberg is the third high season production on the Boyd-Quinson Mainstage. Anna in the Tropics, the Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Nilo Cruz, will highlight the St. Germain Stage.

On a night that was colder than a witch's tit the faithful packed the pews of Zion Lutheran Church in Pittefield. We gathered for the fourth annual Berkshire Theatre Awards. Because the heating system failed baby it was cold inside. But an evening in honor of great theatre proved to be a stellar and heart warming occasion.

Barrington Stage Company has announced three productions for its upcoming 2020 season – the musical masterpiece South Pacific by Richard Rodgers, Oscar Hammerstein II and Joshua Logan and The Assembled Parties by Richard Greenberg on the Boyd-Quinson Mainstage, and Anna in the Tropics, the Pulitzer Prize winning play by Nilo Cruz, on the St. Germain Stage.

As the final production of the 25th season, artistic director, Julianne Boyd, is directing the world premiere of a timely social justice play American Underground by Brent Askari. It postulates a future when all American Muslims are treated as enemies of the state.

Juke box musicals with butkis for plots have become the norm. Kudos to Barrington Stage for its world premiere Fall Springs which actually has a compelling book. But fracking, the musical, oh my goodness! While it has entertaining moments this creation by Peter Sinn Nachtrieb and Niko Tsakalakos is a whacky long shot. It's more than just a town that sinks in the sludge.

In a conference organized by Florida critic, Jay Handelman, 30 members and guests of American Theatre Critics Association attended the biennial of the 30-year-old National Black Theatre Festival. In and around Winston-Salem, North Carolina there were 30 productions. During two insightful panel discussions we met artistic directors from Winston-Salem, Sarasota, Chicago and Houston. It provided a compelling overview of black theatre in America.

Hamlet is tormented to avenge the murder of his father by Gertrude, his mother and her lover Claudius, his uncle. First performed in 1609 they have been scorned by audiences ever since. John Updike's novel Gertrude and Claudius presented their sordid collaboration as a love story. That has been tranformed into a drama directed by Julianne Boyd for Barrington Stage Company. While the production is problematic it is among the best and most intriguing of the many plays of a prolific playwright.

For a change of pace Barrington Stage Company has opted not to give us yet another social justice scolding. Summer escapism with a belly full of laughs is provided by David Ives's Time Flies and Other Comedies. An all star cast of Barington actors are off the leash with total gonzo performances. They are anchored by the comedic genius of Debra Jo Rupp. Just wait till you see her paired with Cary Donaldson. With wings and buggy butts as Mayflys they wll be born, meet, mate, hatch and die all on one hilarious day. And that's just the first of six outrageous skits.

A new play by Jonathan Payne, A Human Being, of a Sort, at Williamstown Theatre Festival is based on an historical event. In 1906 a Congolese Pigmy native, Ota Benga, was brought to New York City, placed in a cage along with monkeys, orangutans and other primates for display in the Bronx Zoo. From this Payne has created a social justice drama that explores racism at the turn of the 20th century.