Nora Ephron News

The new Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts is holding a Community Day celebration on Sunday, October 27, 2013 from 11:00 a.m. - 3:00 p.m. to celebrate the delivery of the new venue to Beverly Hills and the greater Los Angeles community. The Wallis transforms the Beverly Hills city block, facing Santa Monica Boulevard, between Crescent and Canon Drives, into the first performing arts center to be built in Beverly Hills: a vibrant arts destination and a major cultural and education hub for audiences of every age, with two distinct, elegant buildings: the renovated historic 1934 Italianate-style Beverly Hills Post Office, now the Paula Kent Meehan Historic Building, and a new, contemporary 500-seat, state-of-the-art Bram Goldsmith Theater.

Coming to Town Hall Arts Center for a limited engagement this October courtesy of our friends at Breckenridge Backstage Theatre is Love, Loss and What I Wore, written by Nora Ephron and Delia Ephron, based on the book by Ilene Beckerman. Original New York Production produced by Daryl Roth. Love, Loss and What I Wore is directed by Christopher Willard, Artistic Director of the Backstage Theatre in Breckenridge since 2005.

The Chicago Humanities Festival (CHF) presents the third annual Morry and Dolores Kohl Kaplan Northwestern Day today, Oct. 13 on the Northwestern University campus, and the seventh annual Hyde Park Day on Oct. 20 on the University of Chicago campus. These two annual events kick off the 2013 Fall Festival, which will explore the theme of Animal: What Makes Us Human with 88 events throughout Chicago in October and Nov. 1-10.

On the weekends of October 25th and November 1st, Berkeley Light Opera Company (BLOC) will presentLove, Loss, and What I Wore by Nora and Delia Ephron (based on the book by Ilene Beckerman). This witty and touching play about 'matters of the heart and matters of the closet' (New York Times), uses clothing, accessories, and the memories they trigger to tell funny and often poignant stories that every woman can relate to. The play will be directed byVincent J. Balzano and will feature Lori Ahrens, Leonie Higgins,Stephanie Long, Danielle Marchand, Karen O'Donnell and Lori Roper.

HBO Films presents in association with SAF Films West MUHAMMAD ALI'S GREATEST FIGHT, starring Academy Award(R) winner Christopher Plummer ('Beginners'), Academy Award(R) nominee Frank Langella ('Frost/Nixon') and Benjamin Walker ('Abraham Lincoln: Vampire Hunter'); directed by Academy Award(R) nominee Stephen Frears ('The Queen') from a script by Shawn Slovo ('A World Apart'); and executive produced by Emmy(R) winner Frank Doelger (HBO's 'Game of Thrones' and 'The Gathering Storm'), Emmy(R) winner Tracey Scoffield (HBO's 'The Gathering Storm'), Jonathan Cameron and Stephen Frears.

Tonight, October 4 and October 5 & 6, Principal Pops Conductor Michael Krajewski alongside superstar guest vocalists Capathia Jenkins and Darius de Haas will join the Houston Symphony for an evening of smooth grooves, easy rhythms and timeless top 40 hits.

Subscription tickets for the Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts 2013/2014 Inaugural Season go on sale on Tuesday, October 1 and are available by visiting www.thewallis.org.

Transport Group, the Drama Desk and OBIE award-winning theatre company, has announced that its 2013 Gimme A Break! benefit will honor producer Beth Williams on Monday, December 9 at 6:30pm, at the Asia Society and Museum, 725 Park Avenue at 70th Street.

On October 4, 5 and 6, Principal Pops Conductor Michael Krajewski alongside superstar guest vocalists Capathia Jenkins and Darius de Haas will join the Houston Symphony for an evening of smooth grooves, easy rhythms and timeless top 40 hits. Audiences will hear music from the kings and queens of classic soul, including Aretha Franklin, Tina Turner, James Brown, Roberta Flack, Gladys Knight, Stevie Wonder and Marvin Gaye. With songs like 'Natural Woman,' 'You are Everything,' 'Respect,' 'Signed, Sealed, Delivered, I'm Yours' and 'I Heard it Through the Grapevine,' Jones Hall is sure to be full of rhythm from this iconic musical era. Showcasing local talent, Houston-based vocalists Kam Franklin, Lisa Harris and Lucas Gorham will perform as back-up singers on many of the evening's hit songs.

The Chicago Humanities Festival (CHF) presents the third annual Morry and Dolores Kohl Kaplan Northwestern Day on Oct. 13 on the Northwestern University campus, and the seventh annual Hyde Park Day on Oct. 20 on the University of Chicago campus. These two annual events kick off the 2013 Fall Festival, which will explore the theme of Animal: What Makes Us Human with 88 events throughout Chicago in October and Nov. 1-10.

The season opens with The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee (Music and Lyrics by William Finn, Book by Rachel Sheinkin), a hilarious musical comedy about six young people in the throes of puberty participating in a spelling bee, overseen by adults who barely managed to escape childhood themselves. Performances September 27 - October 20.

New York Theatre Workshop (NYTW) Artistic Director James C. Nicola has announced that Fetch Clay, Make Man, written by Will Power and directed by Des McAnuff, will begin performances tonight, August 23 at NYTW, 79 East 4 Street, between Bowery and Second Avenue. Opening night is set for Thursday, September 12 at 7pm. Fetch Clay, Make Man is scheduled to run through Sunday, October 13; tickets are on sale now.

Two Muses Theatre, a nonprofit, professional theatre based in West Bloomfield, Michigan, will produce six shows beginning in September with something for everyone: a musical comedy, two holiday shows (one geared for family, one a bit more unconventional), a theatre for the young series, a contemporary comedy and a serio-comedy. Three of the shows have exclusively female casts in fitting with Two Muses Theatre's mission to provide opportunities for female professionals in theater.

The Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts announces its Inaugural Season beginning with performances by the Martha Graham Dance Company, which open the 500-seat Goldsmith Theater on November 8 and 9, 2013, followed by the play Parfumerie by Miklos Laszlo, adapted by Edward P. Dowdall and directed by Mark Brokaw, from November 26 to December 22, 2013. The romantic tale Parfumerie inspired the films The Shop Around the Corner, In the Good Old Summertime, and Nora Ephron's You've Got Mail, as well as the Broadway musical She Loves Me. As a special program, an exhibition on perfume entitled Timeless Scents: 1370-2013, a history of iconic fragrances through the ages is being created especially for The Wallis by Chandler Burr, former New York Times scent critic.

LOVE, LOSS, AND WHAT I WORE by Nora and Delia Ephron, has extended through September 15 at the Phoenix Theatre of Indianapolis. Dates of extension: September 5, 6, 7, 8, 12, 13, 14, 15, 2013.

Just a few months ago, Michael Riedel reported that Bette Midler has been approached for a revival, for which she seemingly passed, telling interviewers that she didn't see herself wanting to carry an entire musical for 8 shows a week. Now, it might be Kristin Chenoweth's turn.

'It's not that I always dreamed of being onstage,' says Dallas, Texas, theater critic and playwright Elaine Liner. 'But I'm a storyteller and this is my story.' Liner's one-act solo comedy Sweater Curse: A Yarn about Love debuts at this summer's Edinburgh Festival Fringe at 1:15 p.m. daily, today, August 1-26, at Sweet/Grassmarket International 4 (Venue 18).