Lucille Lortel News

The Martin E. Segal Theatre Center at the CUNY Graduate Center has announced its Fall 2013 season of public programs. Following the 10th anniversary of the Center's wildly successful PRELUDE Festival (attended by over 2,500 audience members), the season continues with 14 free public programs throughout the Fall, featuring contemporary theatre and performing artists from around the world.

In a joint effort to produce and foster new work, The Living Room, in association with the Kansas City Repertory Theatre, will present a concert reading of Nathan Tysen and the popular Midwest band Joe's Pet Project's new rock theatre piece Stillwater. This exciting new fusion of rock concert and musical theatre will be performed with actors from Kansas City, New York and Chicago, at 7 pm and 10 pm, Sunday, October 20, 2013 at The Living Room 1818 McGee Street in Kansas City, MO.

To commemorate Veterans Day, Westport Country Playhouse's next Script in Hand playreading will be the comedic and moving story of men at war, 'Mr. Roberts' by Thomas Heggen and Joshua Logan, on one-night-only, Monday, November 11, 7 p.m. As an emblem of veteran remembrance, yellow ribbons will be distributed to audience members.

The Civilians, the award-winning New York-based theatre company, announces the members of its 2013-14 R & D Group. The group's emerging and established artists were selected from over one hundred applicants. The R & D Group is comprised of artists from multiple theatrical disciplines. Each artist or creative team will develop an original work over the season. The artists and projects were selected to represent a range of different strategies for making new work from creative inquiry and research. This diversity of approach helps feed a culture of innovation in the group, making the R & D Group an effective lab of experimentation for the field of investigative theater.

Manhattan Theatre Club has announced full casting for the American premiere of Taking Care of Baby by Dennis Kelly and directed by Erica Schmidt. Joining previously announced cast members Reed Birney (Blasted, Our Leading Lady), Kristen Bush (Kin, The Common Pursuit), Tony nominee Amelia Campbell (A Streetcar Named Desire, Our Country's Good) and Margaret Colin (The Columnist, 'Gossip Girl'), are Francois Battiste (Magic/ Bird), Michael Crane (Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson off-Broadway), Ethan Phillips (Golden Age) and Zach Shaffer ('Smash').

The 15th season of Brand:NEW FallFestival of New Work, from October 23 - 27, will feature readings of six remarkably varied new works, including two plays by Aetna New Voices Fellows; a special appearance by Tony Award-winner Priscilla Lopez; a musical-comedy; and an adaptation of one of the most-produced contemporary plays in Europe today, according to Maxwell Williams, Hartford Stage's Associate Artistic Director, and Elizabeth Williamson, Senior Dramaturg and Director of New Play Development.

On Monday October 14 at 7:30pm, Red Bull Theater presents a staged reading of SAMSON AGONISTES by John Milton, featuring Robert Cuccioli, Ron Cephas Jones, Richard Easton, Alfredo Narciso, Dakin Matthews, Roberta Maxwell, Christina Rouner, Robert Stanton and Marc Vietor. The reading will be directed by Michael Sexton.

Theatre Communications Group (TCG) has announced the publication of By the Way, Meet Vera Stark by Lynn Nottage, the Pulitzer Prize-winning author of Ruined. Declared 'one of our finest playwrights' by Time Out New York, Lynn Nottage premiered her newest play at Second Stage Theatre in spring 2011. In the 2013-2014 season, the play will receive productions at seven theaters across the country, including the Alliance Theatre in Atlanta and the Actor's Theatre of Charlotte.

La Jolla Playhouse announces a fifth production for its 2013/14 season: the world premiere of The Tallest Tree, a new play with music written and performed by Daniel Beaty (Emergency, Through the Night), directed by Moises Kaufman (I Am My Own Wife, The Laramie Project). A co-production with Kansas City Repertory Theatre, The Tallest Tree will run in The Playhouse's Sheila and Hughes Potiker Theatre tonight, October 9 - November 3, 2013. The piece is produced in association with Tectonic Theater Project.

Chromolume Theatre has announced its next production, The Musical of Musicals, The Musical! The show has a book by JoAnne Bogart and Eric Rockwell, music by Rockwell, and lyrics by Bogart, and will be directed for Chromolume by Kristin Towers-Rowles. With choreography by Anna Rubin and music direction by Richard Berent, opening is set for Friday, November 8 at 8pm. The Musical of Musicals will play a strictly limited engagement through December 8 only.

To celebrate the 20th Anniversary of the Westport Arts Awards, Westport Country Playhouse is currently presenting a lobby exhibit featuring past Award winners who have been associated with the historic theater, now through October 27.

Atlantic Theater Company presents the World Premiere of WOMEN OR NOTHING, written by Ethan Coen and directed by David Cromer. Performances began Wednesday, August 28, 2013, and the show will end its run today, October 6, 2013.

American Lyric Theater presents the first public libretto reading for the 2013-2014 season as part of its popular series, The Living Libretto, at the National Opera Center on Wednesday, October 16th, 2013. Featuring guest actors from the Broadway and off-Broadway stage, each event is the culminating reading of an extensive libretto workshop conducted for new operas being written by ALT Resident Artists under the auspices of the company's Composer Librettist Development Program.

Theatre Development Fund's (TDF) fun and informative online theatre dictionary, at www.theatredictionary.org, is celebrating the year anniversary of its launch. During this first year the number of theatre terms more than doubled - from 20 to 43, all featuring unique videos as well as written definitions. To mark the occasion, TDF is premiering a new video defining the term 'Commedia dell'arte' starring RuPaul's Drag Race 5th Season winner JINKX MONSOON and MAJOR SCALES, her co-star in the hit NYC Stage production The Vaudevillians (currently at the Laurie Beechman Theatre through November 11).

Dallas Theater Center has announced the regional premiere of Clybourne Park, running in rotating rep with A Raisin in the Sun, to launch the theater's 55th season. Clybourne Park will be directed by DTC Associate Artistic Director Joel Ferrell. Clybourne Park begins with a Pay-What-You-Can performance tonight, October 4 and runs through Sunday, October 27 at the Dee and Charles Wyly Theatre in the AT&T Performing Arts Center.

Classic Stage Company, under the leadership of Artistic Director Brian Kulick and Executive Director Greg Reiner, will present its annual Monday Night Open Rehearsal Series, this year featuring Shakespeare's Julius Caesar. On three Monday evenings - October 21 & 28 and November 4 - different actors and directors will explore the text of Julius Caesar, giving theater-goers the opportunity to become part of the discovery process, and experience different acting approaches and directorial interpretations of one of Shakespeare's boldest tragedies. Here is the line-up for this year's Open Rehearsal series:

Christopher Chen -- a San Francisco-based playwright whose works include THE HUNDRED FLOWERS PROJECT and other plays - is the 2013 recipient of the Paula Vogel Playwriting Award, presented annually by Vineyard Theatre to an emerging playwright of exceptional promise, it has been announced by Douglas Aibel, Vineyard Theatre's Artistic Director and Sarah Stern, Co-Artistic Director.

BAM presents the New York Premiere of A Rite as part of 2013 Next Wave Festival. The collaborative work by Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company and Siti Company deconstructs the legendary score through our current cultural moment. The production runs at the BAM Howard Gilman Opera House (30 Lafayette Ave), tonight, Oct 3-5 at 7:30pm. Tickets start at $20.