American Playwrights News

The Hartt Theatre Division presents Ah, Wilderness! Thursday, December 2 through Saturday, December 4, at 7:30 PM, and Sunday, December 5, at 3:00 PM, in the Kent McCray Theater, in the Mort and Irma Handel Performing Arts Center, 35 Westbourne Parkway, Hartford.

As BroadwayWorld has reported, The New York Philharmonic's SONDHEIM: The Birthday Concert, which took place on March 15-16, 2010 at Avery Fisher Hall, will be broadcast on THIRTEEN'S Great Performances on PBS on Wednesday, November 24 (check local listings). WNET, Channel 13 in New York City, will air the concert at 9:30 p.m. that evening. Today, it has been revealed that the Image Entertainment will release the program DVD and Blu-Ray on November 16, 2010. The concert includes songs and orchestral pieces from Sondheim musical theater favorites such as Company, Follies, A Little Night Music, Sweeney Todd, Merrily We Roll Along, Into the Woods, and Sunday in the Park with George. Today, it has been announced that in addition to the PBS telecast, the concert will be released on DVD in November by Image Entertainment.

Staying true to its roots of bringing provocative, thoughtful and, quite often, conversation-generating plays to Herberger Theatre's Stage West, Actors Theatre opens its 25th anniversary season with Sarah Ruhl's In The Next Room (Or The Vibrator Play), a comedy about marriage, intimacy and electricity, from Oct. 29 through Nov. 14.

Goodman Theatre announces the 12-member cast for Robert Fall's intimate new production of Anton Chekhov's The Seagull (rehearsals begin August 24, tickets go on sale August 13). This 19th century masterpiece is brought to life by a company including Francis Guinan (August: Osage County; The Grapes of Wrath) in his Goodman debut as the retired judge Peter Sorin and Mary Beth Fisher (Rock 'N' Roll; The Year of Magical Thinking) as his sister, Irina Arkadina, a beautiful, selfish actress. Also joining the cast are Janet Ulrich Brooks (Polina); Rebecca Buller (Maid); Cliff Chamberlain (Boris Trigorin, Irina's young lover), Dietrich Gray (Yakov); Stephen Louis Grush (Konstantin Trepliov, Irina's twenty-five year old playwright son); Scott Jaeck (Dr. Eugene Dorn); Kelly O'Sullivan (Masha); Steve Pickering (Ilia Shamrayev, Sorin's estate manager); Demetrios Troy (Simon Medvendenko); and Heather Wood (Nina Zarietchnaya). The Seagull runs October 16 - November 14, 2010 in the Owen Theatre; tickets are $10 - $45. Kirkland & Ellis LLP is the Contributing Sponsor of The Seagull.Artistic Director Robert Falls returns to the work of Anton Chekhov following previous productions of Three Sisters at the Goodman (1995, with a cast including Calista Flockhart, Susan Bruce and Jenny Bacon) and Orchards: Seven American Playwrights Present Stories by Chekhov (1986, adaptations by Maria Irene Fornes, Spalding Gray, John Guare, David Mamet, Wendy Wasserstein, Michael Weller and Samm-Art Williams-The Acting Company/New York, tour with off-Broadway opening).

Artistic New Directions (Artistic Co-Directors, Kristine Niven & Janice L. Goldberg) will present the World Premiere of Jennifer Lane's heart-wrenching psychological drama, 'PSYCHOMACHIA,' as their 26th Anniversary Season's first production, in association with Shetler Studios & Theatres.

convergence-continuum, continues its 2010 Season at the Liminis theatre with the Ohio premiere of Brainpeople, a surreal psychological drama, by Jose Rivera. Brainpeople opens Friday, Oct. 15 and runs at 8 p.m. Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays through Nov. 13 at the Liminis, 2438 Scranton Rd., Cleveland, OH 44113. Tickets are $15 general admission, $12 for students and seniors (65+). For reservations and information call 216-687-0074 or visit www.convergence-continuum.org on the web.

Clubbed Thumb (Maria Striar, Producing Artistic Director; Diana Maxine Konopka, Associate Director) and Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) today announced the launch of SuperLab, an innovative new play development program. A series of collaboratively curated play laboratories, SuperLab will support the creation of bold, risk-taking new works by living American playwrights. Supported by funds granted to Clubbed Thumb by Metlife/Theatre Communications Group's A-ha! Program, created to foster creative thinking and action among its member theaters, these two like-minded companies will join forces to produce a six-play development lab. Clubbed Thumb and Playwrights Horizons, who share a commitment to advancing distinctive new voices, will bridge a gap between downtown and uptown theater sensibilities, methodologies and artist rosters, expanding the range of experience and opportunity for all.

Clubbed Thumb (Maria Striar, Producing Artistic Director; Diana Maxine Konopka, Associate Director) and Playwrights Horizons (Tim Sanford, Artistic Director; Leslie Marcus, Managing Director) today announced the launch of SuperLab, an innovative new play development program. A series of collaboratively curated play laboratories, SuperLab will support the creation of bold, risk-taking new works by living American playwrights. Supported by funds granted to Clubbed Thumb by Metlife/Theatre Communications Group's A-ha! Program, created to foster creative thinking and action among its member theaters, these two like- minded companies will join forces to produce a six-play development lab. Clubbed Thumb and Playwrights Horizons, who share a commitment to advancing distinctive new voices, will bridge a gap between downtown and uptown theater sensibilities, methodologies and artist rosters, expanding the range of experience and opportunity for all.

Transport Group, the winner of a special 2007 Drama Desk Award and a 2007 Obie Award, has announced that its 2010 Gimme A Break! benefit will honor playwright A. R. Gurney and columnist Liz Smith on Monday, December 6 at 6:30pm, at the Asia Society and Museum, 725 Park Avenue at 70th Street.

New York University celebrates the re-opening of the historic Provincetown Playhouse this fall with a series of events that captures the spirit of the original Playwrights' Theater, founded at 133-39 MacDougal Street in 1916.

MTC's New Works Series presents staged readings of works by new and emerging playwrights. Lidless tells the story of Alice, an interrogator at Guantanamo 15 years ago. The beta-blockers she took during her service have left holes in her memories, a fact she welcomes so she can get on with the new life she has created with her husband and daughter. When Bashir, a former detainee dying of liver disease, arrives to confront Alice, she can't remember ever having seen his face. He refuses to let Alice deny her past, demanding shocking payment for the damage she wreaked on his body and soul during their interrogations. Lidless is a story about embracing one's true nature and the quest to re-humanize a world losing sight of its common humanity.

The Lark Play Development Center in collaboration with Mexico's Fund for Culture and Arts (FONCA) is pleased to announce The U.S./Mexico Playwright Exchange Program.

Second Stage Theatre will present the New York premiere of Rajiv Joseph's (Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo) Gruesome Playground Injuries featuring Pablo Schreiber and Jennifer Carpenter in 2011, the New York Times reveals today. Scott Ellis will direct. Preview will begin on January 5, 2011, with an opening night scheduled for January 31, 2011.

The Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust has announced that the 3rd Annual ‘Mimi' Awards will be presented at a ceremony to be held Monday, November 8, 2010 at the Vivian Beaumont Theater at Lincoln Center Theater (150 West 65th Street).

Native Voices at the Autry continues its vital role as the country's only equity theatre company dedicated exclusively to developing the work of Native American playwrights with two readings of esteemed playwright Carolyn Dunn's (Muskogee Creek, Cherokee*)

Abingdon Theatre Company kicks off its 2010-2011 Season with the New York premiere of Reggie Cheong-Leen's award winning play THE NANJING RACE

The newest play by Equivocation playwright Bill Cain, 9 Circles is the riveting story of a young American soldier on trial for his life.

Artistic Director Jasson Minadakis and Producing Director Ryan Rilette announce Marin Theatre Company's 2010-11 season, its most ambitious ever.

The Public Theater (Artistic Director Oskar Eustis; Executive Director Andrew D. Hamingson) announced complete casting today for THE GREAT GAME: AFGHANISTAN, the acclaimed Tricycle Theatre Company production that will be presented in three parts in association with and at NYU Skirball Center from December 1 through December 19 with an official press opening on Tuesday, December 7. Directed by Nicolas Kent and Indhu Rubasingham, THE GREAT GAME: AFGHANISTAN is an ambitious political and theatrical event that was recently nominated for an Olivier Award for Outstanding Achievement.

Native Voices at the Autry continues its vital role as the country's only equity theatre company dedicated exclusively to developing the work of Native American playwrights with two readings of esteemed playwright Carolyn Dunn's (Muskogee Creek, Cherokee*)