Theatre
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Eagle Hill Launches Fourth Season
Interview with Director Sean Hunley
By: - Sep 28th, 2011A sit down chat with Eagle Hill's Cultural Center director to discuss the path traveled and the road ahead.
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Brilliant Candide At Huntington Theatre Company
30th Anniversary Begins With Theatrical Electricity
By: - Sep 22nd, 2011Inaugurating its 30th anniversary season, Voltaire's satirical picaresque story with Leonard Bernstein's music has been beautifully presented by the Huntington Theatre Company. This is a full blown show of exquisite pageantry with magnificent singing, musical score, humor, staging and choreography. A true theatrical spectacle, this presentation is a don't miss event.
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Elizabeth Hess in Dust to Dust
Stage Left Studio New York
By: - Sep 21st, 2011Elizabeth Hess first came to the attention of the New York theatre world in the mid-eighties for her portrayal of actress Frances Farmer, in Sebastian Stuart’s incendiary play, The Frances Farmer Story. While the critics panned the play, and the fire department mysteriously closed it – at the time it was rumored to politically be too hot to handle – Hess’s “brave and powerful performance†was singled out by critic Clive Barnes as the evening’s saving grace.
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Big River Runs Through Boston’s Lyric Stage
Going with the Flow of an American Odyssey
By: - Sep 17th, 2011The Lyric Stage Company of Boston opens its season, September 2 through October 8, with a lively and ambitious production of the musical Big River; The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn, based on the novel by Mark Twain with music and lyrics by Roger Miller and book by William Hauptman. On Broadway the musical won seven Tony Awards and ran for 1,005 performances.
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The Mettawee Theater Company at St. John the Divine
Ralph's Lee's Puppet and Mask Designs Star
By: - Sep 12th, 2011Songs of the Ainu aborigines of northern Japan were sung, danced, and acted in the Bishop‘s garden of the Cathedral of St. John the Divine. The polytheist Ainu worshiped Gods by facing east. The Cathedral faces west, but the corner into which the garden is tucked welcomes all forms of worship, and particularly the worshipful appreciation of nature and its treasures.
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The Gershwin’s Porgy and Bess at ART
Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis Sizzle
By: - Sep 02nd, 2011With three women in charge, artistic director, Diane Paulus, playwright, Suzan-Lori Parks and music director/ composer Diedre L. Murry this ART production of The Gershwin's Porgy and Bess at American Repertory Theatre is more about Bess than Porgy. Audra McDonald stars in this revision of an American classic by and for women. Norm Lewis, however, more than holds his own as Porgy and Phillip Boykin as Crown must be seen and heard to be believed. Incredible. This Cambridge smash hit will swarm over Broadway for the Holidays.
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Asher Lev at Barrington Stage Company
A Hasidic Jewish Artist Violates the Second Commandment
By: - Aug 24th, 2011Since the premiere of the play Asher Lev by Adam Posner, in 2009, based on the 1971 novel by Chaim Potok , there have been some 50 regional productions. The playwright is directing the emotionally vibrant work which is drawing capacity audiences and has been extended to September 11 at Barrington Stage Company in Pittsfield.
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Shakespeare & Company Event September 5
17th Annual Studio Festival of Plays
By: - Aug 23rd, 2011Shakespeare & Company’s Artistic Director Tony Simotes announces the titles for its 17th annual Studio Festival of Plays—a mini-marathon of plays never before performed at the Company, running one-day only on Monday, September 5th in Founders’ Theatre. Staged readings begin at 11:00 AM, and continue through to 11:00PM. Company actors and special guest actors will present seven productions throughout the day, in the form of works-in-progress and staged readings.
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Fisching from the Curbstone
Heather Fisch at the Mahaiwe
By: - Aug 22nd, 2011Berkshire performer Heather Fisch mounted her first one-woman show at the Mahaiwe on Thursday August 18th, securing her place as one of the most interesting performers in the Berkshires. She is the moon, the sun, five kinds of woman and a fox in her one woman show.
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Miners Alley Playhouse Presents a Touch of Spring
Glowing in Golden, Colorado
By: - Aug 19th, 2011Sometimes it's a big relief to sit back and laugh at a witty production of a play that's almost pure confection, with just a dash of serious thought. Taylor, who made his name as the creator of Sabrina, provides just such an evening at the Miners Alley Playhouse.
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You Better Sit Down: Tales from My Parents’ Divorce
The Civilians in Residence at Williamstown Theatre Festival
By: - Aug 19th, 2011The Civilians is a multi media group based in Brooklyn. They have a unique working process identifying a topic and then undertaking research through recorded and transcribed interviews. For this all too brief and riveting performance at Williamstown Theatre Festival they explored divorce. Surprisingly, it provided a provocative and entertaining evening of theatre. Including encountering the Mom who inspired the play as a neighbor in the audience. It was intriguing to chat with her before and after the performance. Blurring, yet again, the boundary between life and art.
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Hound of the Baskervilles
Shakespeare & Co. To September 4
By: - Aug 19th, 2011The company's Artistic Director, Tony Simotes directs a smartly paced, goofily funny take on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's famous sleuth and his not-so-brilliant sidekick in this stand out offering at Shakespeare & Company.
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Sam Shepard's A Lie of the Mind
Denver's Paragon Theatre Erupts in Language
By: - Aug 18th, 2011Considered by many one of Shepard's finest plays and a great play of 20th century, A Life of the Mind was brilliantly mounted in Denver, showing us what Ethan Hawke did not in a recent New York production.
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The Game Is a Winner for Barrington Stage
Stunning Musical Set in the 18th Century
By: - Aug 18th, 2011Barrington Stage Company completes its Main Stage season with yet another musical and smash hit. The Game was first produced by Julianne Boyd in 2003. That was before the company found its current home in Pittsfield. The musical written by Amy Powers and David Topchik, with music by Megan Cavallari conveys the mandate of the company to present compelling new works.
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Two Cents on Ten Cents a Dance
Controversy for Williamstown Theatre Festival
By: - Aug 17th, 2011The production of Ten Cents a Dance based on a reworking of Rodgers and Hart by John Doyle is provoking a firestorm of controversy. The musical in which five women sing and play instruments with a male piano player is inspiring praise and scorn from audiences and critics. Everyone emerges from Williamstown Theatre Festival with an opinion. Here are links to positive and negative reviews. Don't miss the chance to wade in on this. See it while you can.
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Fiddler on the Roof for Barrington Stage
Opens June 13, 2012
By: - Aug 16th, 2011Barrington Stage Company, the award-winning theatre in Downtown Pittsfield, MA, under the leadership Artistic Director Julianne Boyd and Managing Director Tristan Wilson, announces it will present the musical Fiddler on the Roof as its 2012 season opener, with production dates from June 13 through July 14, 2012.
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Broadway in the Berkshire at Shakespeare & Company
Benefit Nets $60,000 for Education Program
By: - Aug 16th, 2011The Berkshire smart set has had "galas" up the wazoo. Artistic director, Tony Simotes,and benefit chairperson, Deborah Grausman, had a different idea. On a Monday night when New York theatres are closed many stars turned out for Broadway in the Berkshires at Shakespeare & Company. The musical revue was brilliantly hosted by the witty and charming Chip Zien. The successful event raised $50,000 for the education program.
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Ten Cents a Dance at Williamstown Theatre Festival
Ersatz New Rodgers and Hart Musical by John Doyle
By: - Aug 13th, 2011Tony Award winning playwright and director John Doyle, as well as, WTF artistic director Jenny Gersten are in denial that Ten Cents a Dance, a rehash of work by Rodgers and Hart is a "jukebox musical." But if it walks like a duck and quacks like a duck? This cut and paste job is being passed off as a "an American premiere." You decide.
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Tommy Tune Glides Into the Colonial
Steps in Time
By: - Aug 12th, 2011Seniors were out in force to support one of their own, Tommy Tune, who brought his retrospective Steps in Time to the Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield. With a sparing light touch the nine time Tony winner sang and danced his way down memory lane.
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Dixie Longate's Tupperware Party
A Solution for Tough Times
By: - Aug 12th, 2011This delightful performance at the Denver Center for the Performing Arts suggests to the current adminsitration a possible solution for the dire employment situation in the US. Is Dixie Longate a long term problem solver? Maybe. Probably yes.
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Gogul's Inspector General at the Colorado Shakespeare Festival
Boulder Is Better
By: - Aug 11th, 2011An engaging and delightful production of Gogul's classic was imported from Russia and produced in English against all odds. In Russia it is still controversial to mount this play about corruption and bribery in high places.
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Tina Packer Portrays Molly Ivins
Shakespeare and Company's Red Hot Patriot Tries Hard to Hit the Mark.
By: - Aug 09th, 2011In Shakespeare and Company's production of Red Hot Patriot Tina Packer puts her heart into liberal Texan columnist, Molly Ivin's story. Molly's humor comes through but her spirit slips away in the details.
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In the Mood by Kathleen Clark
World Premiere for Berkshire Theatre Group
By: - Aug 07th, 2011On the Fitzpatrick Main Stage of Berkshire Theatre Group In the Mood, a sophisticated, urbane comedy by Kathleen Clark, is enjoying a slick and elegantly produced world premiere. It runs in Stockbridge through August 13.
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Touch(ed) by Bess Wohl
Nikos Stage of Williamstown Theatre Festival
By: - Aug 05th, 2011Touch(ed) by Bess Wohl had its world premiere at Pioneer Theatre Company in Salt Lake City, Utah, January 8 to 23, 2010. Based on this second production at Williamstown Theatre Festival it is still a work in progress needing an extreme makeover. Don't expect to see this ersatz comedy about mental illness to reach Off Broadway any time soon.
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Kate Maguire of Berkshire Theatre Group
Midsummer Report on the Merger
By: - Jul 30th, 2011Kate Maguire is now half way through her first summer season as the Artistic Director and CEO of Berkshire Theatre Group. Since last November she presided over the merger of her Berkshire Theatre Festival with the Colonial Theatre. There was risk taking when Maguire mounted a brief run of Tommy starring Randy Harrison at the Colonial. We asked what she learned from the experience and how that impacts future planning for making the two theatres and three stages function as a combined entity. Her answers may surprise you.
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