A. Jeffrey Schoenberg News

Nominees for the 2014 LA STAGE Alliance Ovation Awards were announced on the evening of Monday, September 22 at Native Voices at the Autry National Center in Los Angeles. The nominations were revealed by past Ovation Award recipients Gigi Bermingham, Brighid Fleming, Parmer Fuller, Jennifer Haley, Brian Kite, Glynn Turman, and John Zalewski, along with LA STAGE Alliance Chief Executive Officer Terence McFarland.

In the summer of 1918, as the Great War rages in Europe, two individuals wage their own battle against injustice in America, risking their lives for the right to marry. Winding up the 2014 Antaeus season of modern classics, Gregg T. Daniel directs a fully partner-cast revival of Wedding Band: A Love/Hate Story in Black and White by Alice Childress. Wedding Band runs Oct. 18 through Dec. 7 at the Antaeus Theater in NoHo, with low-priced previews beginning Oct. 9.

Set in Poland circa 1890, WHITE MARRIAGE is a surreal and erotic coming-of-age fairytale that follows a young girl's poignant emergence into womanhood and frightened resistance to her impending marriage. Two sisters, sensitive Bianca (Kate Dalton) and precocious Pauline (Emily Goss), are on the verge of adulthood. Bianca is betrothed to Benjamin (Austin Rogers) and the preparations for her imminent wedding send the girls into a flurry of excitement and confusion.

When a show moves me like this one did, it's worth raving about. Minus the bombardment of glitz and flash so often shoe-horned into modern day musicals, the remount of Open Fist Theatre Company's James Joyce's THE DEAD is instead that rare production that breathes life into our hearts with its singular connection to our humanity.

Kiss Me Kate/book by Sam & Bella Spewack/music & lyrics by Cole Porter/directed by Richard Israel/Cabrillo Music Theatre, Thousand Oaks/through October 27

You will not find a more impassioned version of Shakespeare's Hamlet than the one Los Angeles Women's Shakespeare Company is currently offering at the Odyssey Theatre. And with the very real possibility that this may be the company's final work comes the necessity of experiencing what these dedicated professionals have created while under the influence of Shakespeare's words.

An all-female, multi-cultural aesthetic offers new insight when Odyssey Theatre Ensemble andLos Angeles Women's Shakespeare Company co-presentHamlet in celebration of LAWSC's 20th anniversary. Featuring a cast of 16 LAWSC favorites and talented newcomers - including producing artistic director and celebrated Shakespearean actressLisa Wolpe in the title role and award-winning film, television and theatrical star Eve Gordon as Gertrude - Hamlet opens for press tonight, Aug. 30 at the Odyssey Theatre in West L.A.

Since 1993, the award-winning Los Angeles Women's Shakespeare Company (LAWSC) has carved out a unique niche in the landscape of L.A. theater. Led by Producing Artistic Director, Lisa Wolpe (pictured right), they examine contemporary issues and cultural perceptions of women through an all-female theatrical lens. In many ways it mirrors the original all-male playing company for whom Shakespeare wrote, at a time when women were not allowed to perform on stage.

An all-female, multi-cultural aesthetic offers new insight when Odyssey Theatre Ensemble andLos Angeles Women's Shakespeare Company co-presentHamlet in celebration of LAWSC's 20th anniversary. Featuring a cast of 16 LAWSC favorites and talented newcomers - including producing artistic director and celebrated Shakespearean actressLisa Wolpe in the title role and award-winning film, television and theatrical star Eve Gordon as Gertrude - Hamlet opens for press on Aug. 30 at the Odyssey Theatre in West L.A.

Triple threat actress/singer/dancer Betty Hutton is perhaps one of the greatest yet lesser known musical film stars of the 40s and 50s. Star of Annie Get Your Gun and The Greatest Show on Earth, Hutton possessed a uniquely energetic style that can be most realistically described as 'manic'. It seems that she was in constant motion, never stopping for an instant and propelling her musical numbers through her electric singing and dancing to new heights of excitement. Diane Vincent was so taken by Robert Osborne's 2000 interview with Hutton on TCM (Turner Classic Movies) that she knew she had to research and put together a show to celebrate the lady's immeasurable talent. And here it is, some 13 years later, the world premiere of Nuttin' But Hutton, a revue in two acts with music both familiar and unfamiliar from all of Hutton's films.

Kitty Warren has worked hard to provide a good life for her daughter. But when Vivie finds out the truth about her mother's profession, sparks fly. The Antaeus Company, L.A.'s multiple award-winning classical theater company, presents Mrs. Warren's Profession, the superbly intelligent-and still shocking- powerhouse of a play by George Bernard Shaw that was banned for eight years on the English stage. Robin Larsen directs the double-cast production now through April 21, 2013. BroadwayWorld has a first look at both casts onstage below!

Kitty Warren has worked hard to provide a good life for her daughter. But when Vivie finds out the truth about her mother's profession, sparks fly. The Antaeus Company, L.A.'s multiple award-winning classical theater company, presents Mrs. Warren's Profession, the superbly intelligent-and still shocking- powerhouse of a play by George Bernard Shaw that was banned for eight years on the English stage. Robin Larsen directs the fully double cast production March 14 through April 21, with low-priced previews beginning tonight, March 7.

Kitty Warren has worked hard to provide a good life for her daughter. But when Vivie finds out the truth about her mother's profession, sparks fly. The Antaeus Company, L.A.'s multiple award-winning classical theater company, presents Mrs. Warren's Profession, the superbly intelligent-and still shocking- powerhouse of a play by George Bernard Shaw that was banned for eight years on the English stage. Robin Larsen directs the fully double cast production March 14 through April 21, with low-priced previews beginning March 7.

Opening a new theater, like Griot Theatre Company, and mounting a first production - Shakespeare no less - is an undertaking that requires unwavering commitment to one's goals, fierce dedication to quality, and an abundance of positive energy to carry you through the bumps in the road.

Playwrights Kaufman and Hart saw the vitality and urgency of comedy within drama when they penned You Can't Take It With You in 1936. It won a Pulitzer for Drama in 1937 and then a Best Picture Oscar for the film version in 1938. Their other big hit The Man Who Came to Dinner in 1939 has a similar theme and tone. In both plays it's wild, zany over-the-top characters and off-kilter incidents that blow the lid off the humdrum existence of the well to do middle class, and to meaningful avail. In Y.C.T.I.W.Y., the wealthy Kirbys are about as unlike the crazy free-living Sycamores as black is to white. Yet, when meshed together, merriment and unexpected happiness abound. With a spectacular cast (double) and brightly paced direction from Gigi Birmingham, Antaeus' Y.C.T.I.W.Y. is a splendid tonic for our depressing economic times and simply a whole lot of fun.

Find out who's really crazy when a couple of lovebirds bring their mismatched families together. The Antaeus Company, L.A.'s multiple award-winning classical theater company, presents You Can't Take It With You, the timeless comedy about love, life and living by George S. Kaufman and Moss Hart. Gigi Bermingham directs the fully double cast production Oct. 18 through Dec. 9, with low-priced previews beginning Oct. 11.

The award-winning Musical Theatre Guild, a company of professional performers who present concert-staged readings of seldom seen musicals, will conclude its 16th season with SHENANDOAH, a production commemorating the 150th Anniversary of the American Civil War. The opening performance will take place on Monday, June 11, 2012 at 7:30 PM at the historic Alex Theatre in Glendale. A second, and final, performance will occur on Sunday, June 17, 2012 at 3:00 PM at the Thousand Oaks Civic Arts Plaza's Scherr Forum.