Take Me Out 2003 - Articles Page 7

Barrington Stage Company (BSC), the award-winning theatre in Pittsfield, MA., in the heart of the Berkshires, and under the leadership of Founder/Artistic Director Julianne Boyd, has announced its 2020 season. BSC will present two World Premiere musicals and new productions of a Tony Award and Pulitzer Prize-winning musical classic, a Tony Award-winning musical revue, and a Pulitzer Prize-winning play.

2019 is almost over and we can't help but look ahead to the 2020 Broadway season, which is bound to be filled with countless star-making (and star-preserving) performances. Who should you keep your eye on as the spring season begins and awards season approaches?

Gang Starr is undoubtedly one of the most revered, beloved and influential groups in Hip Hop. Over the course of their distinguished career, they became a cultural institution and a brand you could ultimately trust. The group's “Chain and the Star” logo symbolized power and excellence and it permeated into the cutting-edge music they created. With a handful of indelible classic albums on their resume, DJ Premier and Guru's catalog has not only persevered but mastered the test of time. Simply, Gang Starr did not follow trends, they created them.

The whole world is getting hip to Bobby Rush.  After decades of tearing up the chitlin' circuit on a nightly basis with his sweaty, no-holds-barred funkfests, Bobby has thoroughly broken through to the mainstream. He won a long-overdue 2017 Grammy Award for his spectacular album Porcupine Meat and consistently tours the globe as a headliner. What's more, Bobby's brand-new album Sitting on Top of the Blues on his own Deep Rush imprint (distributed by Thirty Tigers), due out August 16, 2019, promises to further spread the news that this revered legend, well past 80 years of age even if his stratospheric energy level belies the calendar, is bigger and badder and bolder than ever.

The whole world is getting hip to Bobby Rush.  After decades of tearing up the chitlin' circuit on a nightly basis with his sweaty, no-holds-barred funkfests, Bobby has thoroughly broken through to the mainstream. He won a long-overdue 2017 Grammy Award for his spectacular album Porcupine Meat and consistently tours the globe as a headliner. What's more, Bobby's brand-new album Sitting on Top of the Blues on his own Deep Rush imprint (distributed by Thirty Tigers), due out August 16, 2019, promises to further spread the news that this revered legend, well past 80 years of age even if his stratospheric energy level belies the calendar, is bigger and badder and bolder than ever.

Take a magical journey under the sea when Musical Theater West (MTW) brings Disney's The Little Mermaid to the Carpenter Performing Arts Center July 12-28.   

The Rocket Summer's 'mastermind (Billboard),' multi-instrumentalist, producer, songwriter, and performer, Bryce Avary, shares the second single, 'Morning Light,' from his new album, Sweet Shivers, due out this summer, on August 2, 2019. 

The 72nd Annual Tony Awards are this Sunday June 10th at 8/9c hosted by Josh Groban and Sara Bareilles. It's the biggest award show of the Broadway season and it closes out a long awards season for Broadway and Off-Broadway musicals and plays. We can't help but wonder what chances this year's Best Musical and Best Play nominees have of taking home the ultimate prize...

At a talkback after a show at her school, the presenter asked the audience if anyone had experienced a time when something they considered a flaw turned out to be an asset. Jessie Knowles raised her hand and boldly told the audience that her bipolar and schizophrenia actually heightened her creativity and spiritual insight. The room went silent and Jessie noticed that afterward people either treated her differently or avoided her altogether. She realized the lack of understanding people had about mental health…and that she could do something about it.

The 2019 Tony nominees are already winners... literally. For some, this marks their first nomination, but others have already won Tony Awards in seasons past. We took a look at which nominees have won at least a Tony or two (or nine) - amongst them, they've gathered a total of 69 awards!

Sultry heat and Tolstoy's "Anna Karenina" combine to spark rich fantasies and broken dreams, passion and adultery. Open Fist Theatre Company presents Anna In The Tropics, the powerful, poignant and poetic play that garnered the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for then unknown Cuban-American playwright Nilo Cruz. Jon Lawrence Rivera directs, with performances continuing through June 8 at Atwater Village Theatre.

The West End and Broadway musical Song & Dance has taken up a lot of space in my CD collection. In addition to the Original London Cast Recording starring Marti Webb (recorded live at the Palace Theatre in 1982), the 1984 British television broadcast from the stage of recently closed production at the Palace starring Sarah Brightman and the Original Broadway Cast Recording (of just the songs half, no dance music...) starring Bernadette Peters, I'm also including the original 1979 'Tell Me on a Sunday' album starring Marti Webb in her first stab at the material, from which the sung portion of Song & Dance was derived, as well as its 2003 London production starring Denise Van Outen.

Sultry heat and Tolstoy's "Anna Karenina" combine to spark rich fantasies and broken dreams, passion and adultery.Open Fist Theatre Company presentsAnna In The Tropics, the powerful, poignant and poetic play that garnered the 2003 Pulitzer Prize for then unknown Cuban-American playwright Nilo Cruz.Jon Lawrence Rivera directs for a May 3opening at Atwater Village Theatre, where performances will continue through June 8. Pay-what-you-want previews begin April 26.

This week however, the run was canceled at both the Ordway in St. Paul and the National in Washington, DC (no announcement yet by Dallas) with the DC venue's web site noting...

As I'm going through all my Gypsy CDs (yes, to ensure I have them all either on my hard drive or accessible in the cloud, before throwing them out), I'm finding myself weirdly most drawn to Tyne Daly's recording, from her Tony-winning performance in the 1989 revival. The thing is I know Tyne Daly, I mean I know her work. She's been a familiar and distinctive presence on stage and screen for as long as I can remember and I even have a few musical theater recordings featuring her singing, but hers is not a singing voice I live with on a LITERALLY daily basis like, say, Ethel Merman's, Angela Lansbury's, Bette Midler's, Bernadette Peters's or Patti LuPone's. So to me, Tyne Daly's Rose is a unique sound that I can only identify with Tyne Daly's Rose and, therefore, a character. For today, that's the Gypsy I most feel like listening to.

Can opera be a medium for social commentary and change? I've been thinking about this lately--or, more accurately, yet again--since attending a preview of the new Jeanne Tesori-Tazewell Thompson opera, BLUE, which was part of the Guggenheim Museum's fascinating Works & Process series. The performance of excerpts and roundtable with its creators were part of preparations for the work's world premiere this summer at the Glimmerglass Festival.

FOX opens the doors to a brand-new PARADISE HOTEL, the innovative unscripted competition series in which each guest tries to remain in paradise as long as possible. The modernized version of the international hit is executive-produced by SallyAnn Salsano (495 Productions, “Jersey Shore Family Vacation,” “Jersey Shore,” “Floribama Shore,” “The Bachelor”); Becca Walker (“Love Island,” “I'm A Celebrity Get Me Out of Here”); and Celia Taylor (“50 Ways to Kill Your Mammy,” “A League of Your Own, with James Corden,” “An Idiot Abroad”) of Mentorn Media, the original creators of the groundbreaking “Paradise Hotel” format.

It's a whole new year with a whole new slate of fabulous theater coming to Seattle and the surrounding areas. So many exciting shows ready to thrill and astound us, make us laugh and cry. And so, I thought I'd let you in on the Top 10 shows coming up that I'm most excited about (actually 11 since I couldn't narrow it down to 10 but 'Top 10' sounded better) in chronological order.

Zhong-Jing Fang was promoted to soloist at the American Ballet Theatre in 2018, the first Chinese ballerina to be promoted to soloist since Yan Chen in 1993. Almost ten years ago, she tore her posterior tibial tendon in her right foot during a rehearsal. Doctors told her that the chances of her returning to the stage were extremely slim.

Jim Steinman's Bat Out Of Hell - The Musical is hitting the road! The critically acclaimed new musical based on one of the best-selling albums of all time, will launch a nineteen city North American tour at Detroit's Fox Theatre this November following an eagerly anticipated return engagement at Toronto's Ed Mirvish Theatre. Bat Out Of Hell - The Musical is currently playing an extended smash hit engagement in London's West End where it won the 2017 Evening Standard Award for Best Musical.

Following their electrifying early morning performance of their hits 'The Last of The Real Ones,' 'Uma Thurman' and 'My Songs Know What You Did In The Dark (Light Em Up)' in NYC's Central Park for Good Morning America's 'Summer Concert Series' today (watch the full set here, including online exclusives 'Champion' and 'Centuries'), multiplatinum modern alt-rock pioneers Fall Out Boy have announced they will release all seven of their studio albums on vinyl as a lavish box set titled The Complete Studio Albums on September 28 via Island/DCD2/UMe. Spanning the band's storied and wildly successful 15-years-and-counting recording career, the comprehensive collection contains all of Fall Out Boy's best-selling studio albums, starting with the band's 2003 pop-punk debut, Take This To Your Grave, including 2005's career-defining double-platinum hit platter, From Under The Cork Tree, and capping off with their most recent album M A N I A which earned the band their fourth No. 1 record upon release this past January. This must-have on-wax collection also includes 2013's combo Save Rock And Roll (PAX•AM Edition) for the first time ever on 12-inch vinyl. The Complete Studio Albums will be made available in two versions - a standard edition on 180-gram black vinyl, and as a limited-edition, 180-gram clear vinyl collection. View the unboxing video here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Prlrcqdr07k

The 72nd Annual Tony Awards are this Sunday June 10th at 8/9c hosted by Josh Groban and Sara Bareilles. It's the biggest award show of the Broadway season and it closes out a long awards season for Broadway and Off-Broadway musicals and plays. We can't help but wonder what chances this year's Best Musical and Best Play nominees have of taking home the ultimate prize...

Producer Scott Rudin has announced that to accommodate ticket demand, Edward Albee's Three Tall Women will add a ninth performance in its final week of performances. Nominated for six 2018 Tony Awards including Best Revival of a Play, Three Tall Women must close as previously scheduled on Sunday, June 24, with the added 7:00 PM show now the final performance for the ecstatically received production. Tickets are on sale now at Telecharge.com, and at the Golden Theatre box office (252 West 45th Street).

On Day 13 of 30 Days of Tony, we celebrate two-time Tony winner Joe Mantello, who is nominated this year for Best Direction of a Play for his work on Three Tall Women. 

Edward Albee's Three Tall Women will play a special Midnight Performance as a benefit for The Actors Fund. The production, directed by Joe Mantello, opened on Broadway on March 29 to ecstatic reviews. Last week, Mantello's production of The Boys in the Band started previews on Broadway. To celebrate their director and the vital work of The Actors Fund, the entire cast of The Boys in the Band will host the Midnight Performance of Three Tall Women,