Shakespeare & Company News

The United States premiere of the internationally acclaimed new work written and directed by Peter Brook and Marie-Helene Estienne, The Valley of Astonishment, featuring Kathryn Hunter (A Midsummer Night's Dream, Kafka's Monkey), Marcello Magni (Fragments), and Jared McNeill (The Suit), begins previews Sunday, September 14, at 7:30pm for an opening Thursday, September 18,at 7:30pm and a run through Sunday, October 5, at Theatre for a New Audience, Polonsky Shakespeare Center, 262 Ashland Place.

The Crazy Coqs has announced its September 2014 schedule in Piccadilly, London. Details below!

West End star and multi-platinum selling artist Marti Pellow reprises his role of Narrator in Blood Brothers exclusively for Glasgow audiences, starring alongside Maureen Nolan as Mrs Johnstone, November 3-15. Performances are: Mon - Sat eves 7.30pm, Wed & Sat mats 2.30pm.

The Royal Shakespeare Company's production of Roald Dahl's MATILDA the musical will hold a special Gala performance in aid of BBC Children in Need on Tuesday 4 November 2014. The evening will be hosted by BBC Radio 2's Sir Terry Wogan with a special appearance from the charity's mascot, Pudsey. BBC Radio 2 presenters and celebrities will be in attendance alongside members of the public. At least 50% of the proceeds from this performance will benefit the BBC Children in Need Appeal, and its work with disadvantaged children and young people across the UK.

We come into life with a desire to do meaningful things, just as an understudy comes into the theater motivated to produce great thespian art. Yet if the understudy is our avatar, how discouraging is his example! For, as in Rebeck's play, the understudy's task is condemned to nearly certain futility. Particularly so on today's Broadway, where plays are too often packaged as vehicles for screen stars whom the audience pays a large premium to see, in productions with limited runs. The setup is almost guaranteed to incentivize producers to demand that the big screen stars appear at every performance, and to incentivize the stars to do so, affording no opportunity to the understudies.

The premiere reading of Bluebirds by Joe Brondo will be held as part of the John Drew Theater Lab (JDTLab) on Tuesday, September 9 at 7:30pm at the John Drew Theater at Guild Hall in East Hampton, NY. For more information, visit http://www.guildhall.org/events/?id=605&mode=id.

In their third season, the Half Moon Bay Shakespeare Company will present William Shakespeare's beloved comedy, A Midsummer Night's Dream. Opening Labor Day weekend, the company has moved to downtown Half Moon Bay and will present the play in John L. Carter Memorial Park, located just north of the historic and controversial bridge on Main Street. 'The park is a perfect location for outdoor theatre and since the inception of the company, we have wanted to use it for our productions.' said Company Artistic Director and director of the play, Robert Pickett. 'We felt Midsummer would be the best show to open in the park because of the redwood trees and forest setting. The park is a perfect amphitheatre and set far enough away from the street.'

BroadwayWorld.com has exclusively learned that Sherlock Holmes may be headed to the stage in the coming Broadway seasons. Tony Award Nominated producer Antonio R. Marion (Big Fish, Evita) is said to be sheparding the project that is currently in the developmental stages. The production is set to be a brand new version of the beloved stories written by Sir Arthur Conan Doyle that will be presented in the format of a play while a live orchestra underscores the drama and action.

Ustinov Studio, Theatre Royal Bath Autumn has announced casting for there 2014 season, including the three black comedies, including 'Play Strindberg,' 'The Father,' and 'Exit The King.'

The Wilde Awards 2014 Ceremony will be taking place September 22nd and hosted by EncoreMichigan.com.

The world premiere of Alecky Blythe's new play inspired by the 2011 London riots, directed by Joe Hill-Gibbins, LITTLE REVOLUTION, will play the Almeida Theatre. This is Alecky's first new London production after the success of London Road at the National Theatre.

Another new theatre space opens in the Baltimore/Washington area.

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) will welcome Lisa Wolpe, LA Women's Shakespeare Company artistic director and acclaimed Shakespearean drag king, to the Angus Bowmer Theatre on September 1 at 8 p.m. for OSF Presents: Shakespeare and the Alchemy of Gender.

The Welders-Washington's only playwrights' collective devoted exclusively to developing and producing new work-have launched their second production. Not Enuf Lifetimes, a new play by Caleen Sinnette Jennings, opens November 1, 2014 at the Atlas Performing Arts Center. Psalmayene 24 will direct.

The Oxford Shakespeare Company will momentarily depart from Q&As with classical actors like Patrick Stewart, Fiona Shaw, Derek Jacobi and F Murray Abraham, to present acting students an opportunity to talk with Broadway musical star Katie Rose Clarke, who starred as Glinda in Wicked, Clara in Light in the Piazza, and Babe in The Pajama Game.