May Adrales News

What our schoolbooks lack in historical accuracy, art can sometimes pick up the slack by being a reliable, more enthusiastic source to fill in those gaps. This becomes abundantly clear immediately upon experiencing the haunting yet beautifully-dramatized world premiere play LITTLE BLACK SHADOWS, Kemp Powers' captivating new drama under the astute direction of May Adrales, that is now continuing its final set of performances at South Coast Repertory in Costa Mesa through April 29. Visually striking and richly layered, the play piques the audience's curiosity with its riveting storytelling while educating them on a side of American slavery that most probably didn't know too much about before.

The Drama League (Executive Artistic Director Gabriel Stelian-Shanks) has announced the eleven exceptional stage directors who have been selected as the 2018 Directing Fellows of The Drama League Directors Project: Jake Beckhard, Jennifer Chang, Tara Elliott, Kyle Haden, Myeongsik Jason Jang, Kemar Jewel, Seonjae Kim, Margaret Lee, Dennis Yueh-Yeh Li, Ivey Lowe, and Christopher Nuñez. They will be publicly introduced to the professional theatre community during the 84th Annual Drama League Awards, which will be held on Friday, May 18, 2018 at the Marriott Marquis Times Square (1535 Broadway). More information can be found at www.dramaleague.org.

Playwright Kemp Powers knew he'd found something incredible in the personal recollections of former slaves documented by a federal writers project during the Great Depression. Discovering the different voices and views in those first-person histories inspired him to learn more and write Little Black Shadows, which has its world premiere at South Coast Repertory, April 8-29, on the Julianne Argyros Stage. Directed by May Adrales, the show is part of the Pacific Playwrights Festival. Tickets are available now at www.scr.org.  

Artistic Director Braden Abraham today announced Seattle Repertory Theatre's new eight-play 2018/2019 season, which features a sweeping theatrical adaptation of a best-selling novel, a world premiere from a local playwright, a Tony and Grammy Award-winning musical, a thriller direct from London's West End, and more.

 F*It Club, the New York Innovative Award-winning film and theatre company, continues its annual series of short, commissioned world-premiere plays at the IRT Theater as part of their 3B Development Series in Manhattan's West Village with The Spring Fling: Chemistry, seven new short plays by Mario Correa (Tail! Spin!), Jahna Ferron-Smith (Ensemble Studio Theatre's Youngblood), Jon Kern (Modern Terrorism), Dan McCabe (Christina Martinez), Mara Nelson-Greenberg (Do You Feel Anger?), Erica Saleh (Channel Zero, Wisdom of the Crowd) and Amy Staats (Eddie and Dave).

The true selling point of this production is not so much a reimmersion in Orwell's masterpiece as a reminder, if we needed reminding, of the collective nausea that overtakes us in one of those periodic moments when totalitarian assaults on truth, justice and human dignity are winning.

The irreverent new comedy and recent off-Broadway hit Vietgonewill begin performances at TheatreSquared on March 14. Set in 1975 after the Fall of Saigon, this New York Times Critics' Pick is a stranger-than-fiction true love story between two refugees-who find each other on the other side of the world. Qui Nguyen, a playwright and screenwriter for Marvel Studios, deploys hip-hop, fight sequences, and up-to-the-minute pop culture references to tell his own origin story as his parents "meet cute" in the repurposed barracks of a relocation camp in Fort Chaffee, Arkansas.

Artistic Director Blake Robison announced Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park's 2018-2019 season today, which features blockbuster musicals, contemporary comedies, world premieres and some of theatre's leading playwrights and directors.

Art House Productions (Meredith Burns, Executive Director) is proud to announce the spring mainstage theater production of Grace, or The Art of Climbing by L M Feldman. Making its east coast premiere, Grace will be directed by Adin Walker.

F*It Club, the New York Innovative Award-winning film and theatre company, continues its annual series of short, commissioned world-premiere plays at the IRT Theater as part of their 3B Development Series in Manhattan's West Village with The Spring Fling: Chemistry, seven new short plays by Mario Correa (Tail! Spin!), Jahna Ferron-Smith (Ensemble Studio Theatre's Youngblood), Jon Kern (Modern Terrorism), Dan McCabe (Christina Martinez), Mara Nelson-Greenberg (Do You Feel Anger?), Erica Saleh (Channel Zero, Wisdom of the Crowd) and Amy Staats (Eddie and Dave).

Artistic Director Mark Clements and Managing Director Chad Bauman are thrilled to announce Milwaukee Repertory Theater's 65th Anniversary Season which will be the largest season in over a decade featuring 15 productions across four venues with nearly 700 performances including expanded programming in the Stiemke Studio.

Seattle Repertory Theatre reveals a sneak peek at its 2018-2019 season, which will include the Tony and Grammy Award-winning musical from Lin-Manuel Miranda, In The Heights. Set to perform on the Bagley Wright Theatre stage in late 2018, In The Heights was conceived by Lin-Manuel Miranda who also wrote the music and lyrics, with book by Quiara Alegria Hudes.

Brave New World Repertory Theatre, the Brooklyn-based company that first won acclaim with To Kill A Mockingbird staged on the front porches of Victorian Flatbush in 2005, announces a new generation of Brave New Works for BNW's 15th anniversary season.

Bleak. Cold. Apocalyptic. Even before the house lights dimmed, the mood was already dreary. The stage is laden with a mess of concrete, metal, and a visual manifestation of shattered dreams for what would be a rather brain-wrenching, hope-dashing 90 minutes. Of course, that's just what Orwell's novel is meant to convey.

Leading the cast of Animal Farm will be Milwaukee Rep Associate Artists Jonathan Gillard Daly (Man of La Mancha andMousetrap) as Benjamin/Pilkington and Deborah Staples (A Christmas Carol and Harvey) as Clover. Rounding out the cast is Milwaukee native Brendan Titley (Penguin Rep Theatre's Trayf) as Snowball/Minimus, Melvin Abston(Broadway's Sister Act) as Napoleon, Tiffany Rachelle Stewart (Broadway's A Curious Incident of the Dog In The Night-time) as Squealer/Mollie and Stephanie Weeks (Tennessee Shakespeare Company's A Midsummer Night's Dream) as Boxer/Major.

Milwaukee Rep presents ANIMAL FARM, Ian Wooldridge's adaptation of the George Orwell novel, which opened January 9th, and runs through February 11th.

Here is the performance schedule for South Coast Repertory for the four-month period of January-April 2018.

Milwaukee Repertory Theater presents an adaption of the landmark novel, Animal Farm, in the Quadracci Powerhouse beginning January 9 through February 11, 2018. George Orwell's novel, adapted into a play by Ian Wooldridge, transforms this literary classic into a vibrant and moving production that is still resonant today.

Milwaukee Repertory Theater presents an adaption of the landmark novel, Animal Farm, in the Quadracci Powerhouse beginning January 9 through February 11, 2018. George Orwell's novel, adapted into a play by Ian Wooldridge, transforms this literary classic into a vibrant and moving production that is still resonant today.

General ticket sales are underway for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival's (OSF) 83rd season, which begins with the first preview on Feb. 16 and continues through Oct. 28. The 2018 season features four plays by William Shakespeare, a re-imagined classic musical, two West Coast premieres, one U.S. premiere and two world premieres as well as a host of events and opportunities to further engage with the onstage works.