Cary Ginell - Page 5

Director David Krassner brings a deep theatrical resume to his new role as drama director at Agoura High School, which is currently staging 'Rent,' which made its debut nearly a quarter century ago.

Margaret Edson's Pulitzer-Price winning play 'Wit' focusers on Dr. Vivian Bearing, a 50-year-old professor of English who is dying from ovarian cancer. The play examines the dispassionate way cancer patients are treated, with Sindy McKay-Swerdlove delivering a startling and emotional performance as Dr. Bearing.

A typical mismatched wedding between a Jewish bride and a Catholic groom gets turned on its ear when a shocking revelation stuns the wedding party. This unfairly neglected 2015 musical gets new life with a winning performance (in a staged reading) by Musical Theatre Guild at the Alex Theater in Glendale.

Theater veteran Gilles Chiasson, who performed in the original New York Theatre Workshop, Off-Broadway, and Broadway productions of 'Rent' now is in charge of the Performing Arts Education Centers at Agoura and Calabasas High Schools. We talked to him about his experiencing performing in New York with legendary producer Jonathan Larson, in anticipation of Agoura High's upcoming performance of the musical.

Kennedy Caughell gives a heartfelt performance as Carole King in 'Beautiful,' an otherwise flawed musical that does to King's career what most Broadway musicals do to the subjects of jukebox musicals. The musical element of the show, however, overcomes its many deficiencies to result in an overall enjoyable production.

An exclusive interview with Kennedy Caughell, a stunning multi-talented redhead who is currently starring as Carole King in the national touring musical, 'Beautiful: The Carole King Musical' in Thousand Oaks at the Fred Kavli Theatre.

'Shirley Valentine' features Anna Kotula in a one-woman show about a middle-aged Liverpool housewife who seeks a change in her life, and does so in drastic fashion, leaving her husband and home to cavort on a beach in Greece. The result is a reaffirmation of life, one that empowers women and those lamenting the absence of passion in their lives - a timely and wonderful journey to help inaugurate the centennial of the passage of the 19th amendment.

In a 'Twilight Zone' type premise, two people who had a promising romantic relationship years before but cut it off before it could get started encounter their younger selves and try to warn them of the regret they would feel years later. The play is set in the framework of James Joyce's classic novel 'Ulysses,' with Chandra Bond playing an Irish tour guide and Trent Trachtenberg a reluctant tourist she draws into the group. Charming, wistful, and sad, 'Bloomsday' tugs at the heartstrings in all of us who have regretted the 'road not taken.'

American Theatre Guild's national tour of 'Finding Neverland' is a marvel of imaginative production values, excellent acting, and quirky-jerky choreography, making this 'making of Peter Pan' fantasy a joy from start to finish.

A riotous script and a veteran cast who know their way around comedy highlight a bravura production of 'The Man Who Came To Dinner,' Moss Hart and George S. Kaufman's classic 1939 play about a sidelined theater critic, forced to be wheelchair bound in a house in small town Ohio. Jim Beaver, Barry Pearl, and Kay Cole starr in this outrageously funny revival.

'Bandstand' is a show that fell through the cracks, never sustaining the kind of buzz it deserved on Broadway. But a national tour is different from the Great White Way, and the producers of 'Bandstand,' which won a Tony Award two years ago for Best Choreography, is playing to ecstatic audiences in America's heartland. Its story of a group of musicians who return from World War II to form a band, is one of poignancy and real-life struggle. Trumpet player Scott Bell, who is making his debut performance as an actor, talks about getting used to his new acting muscles as well as sharing his stellar musicianship with audiences across the country.

An interview with Josey Montana McCoy (Huck Finn) and David Aron Damane (Jim), stars of Rubicon Theatre Company's current production of 'Big River.' The immersive, atmospheric production has been critically acclaimed by press and audiences alike and has been extended for an additional week, until November 17.

In Part 2 of our interview, Kirby & Beverly Ward talk about how they decided to stage 'Big River' in the round at the Rubicon Theatre Company. The result is a production of intimacy and atmospheric beauty.

An innovative immersive production, in which orchestra musicians step on stage to perform with the cast and an in-the-round configuration, highlights Rubicon Theatre Company's evocative, atmospheric production of 'Big River.' With a score by country music's Roger Miller, 'Big River' won 7 Tonys in 1985. The cast features Broadway veterans Josey Montana McCoy, David Aron Damane, and, in a special appearance, Renn Woods as Alice.

An interview with Beverly and Kirby Ward, producers and directors of the new production of 'Big River' at the Rubicon Theatre Company.

Trent Mills is one of those versatile young actors who can do it all - a 'five-tool' player who can act, sing, dance, do drama, and comedy and do it all well. Mills is starring as Marcellus Washburn in 5-Star Theatricals' production of 'The Music Man,' which plays through Oct. 27 at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza. We talked with Mills about the art of physical comedy and his fresh, new approach to his character.

In 5-Star Theatricals' production of 'The Music Man,' Antonia Vivino and Adam Winer take on the roles of River City teens Zaneeta Shinn (the mayor's 'oldest girl') and Tommy Djilas (the 'wild kid from the wrong side of town'). We interviewed them about their characters' back story and the energetic dancing paces they are put through by choreographer Peggy Hickey.

In Part 2 of our interview with Adam Pascal, Adam talks about two traumatic Broadway experiences: going on with 'Rent' right after the sudden death of Jonathan Larson and having to do 'Aida' two days after the 9/11 tragedies.

Anna Kotula shines as poet Emily Dickinson in William Luce's Tony-winning play, 'The Belle of Amherst.' Kotula plays Dickinson as a young girl and celebrated recluse in a performance that brings alive one of the most brilliant poets in American history. Produced by the Rubicon Theatre Company in Ventura.