Doug Wright News

Florida Repertory Theatre announced the opening of Tru in the Florida Rep Studio Theatre, a devastatingly funny glimpse into the mind of America's icon, Truman Capote. Playing Feb. 22-Mar 17, Tru is a fascinating one-man tour-de-force starring Florida Rep favorite, Mark Chambers, as the controversial author of 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' and 'In Cold Blood.'

Off-Broadway theater company Playwrights Horizons will hold its annual Spring Gala on Monday evening, June 11th at the event space 583 Park Avenue. Titled "The Highest Standard", the evening will celebrate its five Pulitzer Prize-winning productions and honor the creators of these memorable works for the theater. The honorees are James Lapine (Sunday in the Park with George), Bruce Norris (Clybourne Park), Stephen Sondheim (Sunday in the Park with George), Alfred Uhry (Driving Miss Daisy), Wendy Wasserstein (The Heidi Chronicles) and Doug Wright (I Am My Own Wife).

The benefit will feature a segment from the 1976 musical Pacific Overtures revised, with new lyrics, especially for the occasion by its creators librettist John Weidman and composer-lyricist Stephen Sondheim. BroadwayWorld.com is excited to premiere the text from creators John Weidman and Stephen Sondheim.

On Sunday, March 11, the first anniversary of the great Japanese earthquake, Theater Communications Group is organizing performance events nationwide to raise funds for the Japan Playwrights Association to help the Japanese theater community affected by the disaster. The collective event is called: SHINSAI: THEATERS FOR JAPAN.

La Jolla Playhouse just announced that The Nightingale, by the creative team behind the Tony Award-winning musical Spring Awakening: Steven Sater (book and lyrics) and Duncan Sheik (music), directed by Tony Award nominee Moises Kaufman (33 Variations), will be part of the Playhouse's 2012/2013 season. Running in the Sheila and Hughes Potiker Theatre July 10 - August 5, 2012, The Nightingale will be presented as part of the Playhouse's acclaimed Page To Stage Play Development Program.

Patti LuPone, Richard Thomas, Mary Beth Hurt, Jay O. Sanders and Henry Stram will join forces with the previously announced Michi Barral, Cindy Cheung, Joel de la Fuente, Angel Desai, Ann Harada, Jennifer Ikeda, Paul Juhn, Peter Kim, Ken Leung, Li Jun Li, Jennifer Lim, Angela Lin, Paolo Montalban, Olivia Oguma, Jon Norman Schneider, Thom Sesma, Sab Shimono, Jade Wu, Jonny Wo, James Yaegashi and Stacey Yen to raise funds that will go directly to Japanese theater artists devasted by last year's earthquake when they appear in this Sunday's March 11 benefit performances of Shinsai: Theaters for Japan, at the Great Hall at Cooper Union (Seventh Street at Third Avenue).

On March 11, 2012-the one-year anniversary of the devastating earthquake in Japan-American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) will join over 65 theaters across the country in presenting SHINSAI ("great quake" in Japanese), a benefit reading to support fellow theater artists on the other side of the world. Selections will be drawn from a menu of 10-minute plays and songs that were commissioned from major American and Japanese artists, who have donated their work for this one-night only event. Performance takes place at 7 p.m. at The Garret at the American Conservatory Theater. Tickets are $5 and can be ordered online at act-sf.org or by calling 415.749.2228. All proceeds will benefit the Japan Playwrights Association.

Michi Barral, Cindy Cheung, Joel de la Fuente, Angel Desai, Ann Harada, Jennifer Ikeda, Paul Juhn, Peter Kim, Ken Leung, Li Jun Li, Jennifer Lim, Angela Lin, Paolo Montalban, Olivia Oguma, Jon Norman Schneider, Thom Sesma, Sab Shimono, Jade Wu, Jonny Wo, James Yaegashi and Stacey Yen will be featured in Shinsai: Theaters for Japan, a two performance benefit to raise funds that will go directly to Japanese theater artists devastated by last year's great earthquake (Shinsai). Shinsai: Theaters for Japan, will be performed this Sunday, March 11 at 3pm and 8pm at the Great Hall at Cooper Union (Seventh Street at Third Avenue).

New York Theatre Workshop (NYTW) Artistic Director James C. Nicola and Managing Director William Russo have announced that the New York premiere of An Iliad, by Denis O'Hare and Lisa Peterson, based on Homer's Iliad translated by Robert Fagles, directed by Ms. Peterson, will open this week at NYTW, 79 East 4 Street, between Bowery and Second Avenue. Denis O'Hare and Stephen Spinella alternate performances of the play. Mr. O'Hare opens Tuesday, March 6; Mr. Spinella Wednesday, March 7.

5th Avenue Theatre Executive Producer and Artistic Director David Armstrong yesterday announced the seven productions making up the celebrated Seattle musical theater's 2012-13 season. The program features a mix of contemporary musicals and timeless classics, plus Seattle's first peek at some of Broadway's greatest new hits.

American Blues Theater (ABT), Chicago's second oldest Equity Ensemble, will participate in a global benefit for the people of Japan, SHINSAI: Theatre for Japan, Sunday, March 11 at 3 p.m. at the Richard Christiansen Theater in Victory Gardens Biograph Theater, 2433 North Lincoln Ave. Tickets are a suggested donation of $10 with 100% of the proceeds going to SHINSAI. For tickets and more information go to www.americanbluestheater.com or call 312.725.4228.

Florida Repertory Theatre announced the opening of Tru in the Florida Rep Studio Theatre, a devastatingly funny glimpse into the mind of America's icon, Truman Capote. Playing Feb. 22-Mar 17, Tru is a fascinating one-man tour-de-force starring Florida Rep favorite, Mark Chambers, as the controversial author of 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' and 'In Cold Blood.'

According to the New York Times, Playwrights Horizons will present FAR FROM HEAVEN, a new musical with book by Tony Award winner and two-time Pulitzer Prize finalist Richard Greenberg (Take Me Out, Three Days of Rain), music by Tony Award nominee Scott Frankel (Grey Gardens) and lyrics by Tony Award nominee Michael Korie (Grey Gardens, The Grapes of Wrath), in Spring 2013. The show will also play Williamstown Theatre Festival this summer. The musical was adapted from the acclaimed, award-winning 2002 Focus Features/Vulcan Productions motion picture Far From Heaven, written and directed by Todd Haynes.

Florida Repertory Theatre announced the opening of Tru in the Florida Rep Studio Theatre, a devastatingly funny glimpse into the mind of America's icon, Truman Capote. Playing Feb. 22-Mar 17, Tru is a fascinating one-man tour-de-force starring Florida Rep favorite, Mark Chambers, as the controversial author of 'Breakfast at Tiffany's' and 'In Cold Blood.'

A German transvestite walks into a bar in communist occupied East Berlin. No, that's not the build up to some crude joke but the premise of one of the most beautifully written and intriguing plays of this century, "I Am My Own Wife" currently playing at the Seattle Rep. With over 30 characters all played by the incomparable Nick Garrison, what makes author Doug Wright's play even more remarkable is that it's true.