Angela Birchett News

It's rare to see a show that feels like it could only happen in one place, at one time. Especially at The Kennedy Center, known for the utmost professionalism, temporal tightness and delivery of all its professional shows - you go to The Kennedy Center because you know you're going to see a show where everyone knows exactly what's going to happen and that it's going to be delivered to you as you expected. Which is one of the reasons that Tituss Burgess in Concert on July 27th felt like such a rarity - every second felt like a gift for this audience. In particular, one audience member - Burgess' mother.

The starry all-female lineup is set for the next concert in the year-long Broadway Sings spinoff series, Broadway Sings: Unplugged. On May 20 at 7pm and 9:30pm, The Green Room 42 will present Rihanna: Unplugged, featuring original "unplugged" arrangements of the pop star's hits, orchestrated for an acoustic band.

The Green Room 42 Presents: An Evening With... Series: Doris Day, hosted by 2-time MAC Award Winner Doris Dear. Casting will be announced soon.

Paper Mill Playhouse's production of The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award-winner John Doyle celebrated opening night last night! Check out the photos below.

BroadwayWorld has a first look at Paper Mill Playhouse's The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award-winner John Doyle. The Color Purple is the Tony Award-winning musical revival based upon the novel written by Alice Walker and the Warner Bros./Amblin Entertainment motion picture with a book by Marsha Norman and music and lyrics by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis, and Stephen Bray.

Paper Mill Playhouse is opening their 80th Anniversary season with a stirring musical production of The Color Purple that features brilliant direction and musical staging by Tony Award winner John Doyle with wonderful musical direction by Darryl Archibald. The show has a remarkable, stellar cast whose acting and vocal talents will take your breath away.

BroadwayWorld has a first look at Paper Mill Playhouse's The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award-winner John Doyle. The Color Purple is the Tony Award-winning musical revival based upon the novel written by Alice Walker and the Warner Bros./Amblin Entertainment motion picture with a book by Marsha Norman and music and lyrics by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis, and Stephen Bray.

BroadwayWorld has a first look at Paper Mill Playhouse's The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award-winner John Doyle. The Color Purple is the Tony Award-winning musical revival based upon the novel written by Alice Walker and the Warner Bros.Amblin Entertainment motion picture with a book by Marsha Norman and music and lyrics by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis, and Stephen Bray.

Broadway's Marty Thomas (Xanadu, Wicked, The Secret Garden) debuted his new cabaret show, 'Like It's Golden' in the Green Room 42 on Monday night. 

Paper Mill Playhouse (Mark S. Hoebee-Producing Artistic Director), recipient of the Regional Theatre Tony Award in 2016, launches its 80th milestone season with The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award-winner John Doyle. The Color Purple is the Tony Award-winning musical revival based upon the novel written by Alice Walker and the Warner Bros./Amblin Entertainment motion picture with a book by Marsha Norman and music and lyrics by Brenda Russell, Allee Willis, and Stephen Bray. Cast members from the 2015 Broadway revival lead the Paper Mill Playhouse company, including Adrianna Hicks (Aladdin, Sister Act - Germany) as Celie, Carla R. Stewart (Ghost - National Tour, Rent - Regional) as Shug Avery and Carrie Compere (Holler If You Hear Me, Shrek the Musical - National Tour) as Sofia.

From Broadway (Xanadu, Wicked, Secret Garden) to Hollywood (Grace & Frankie, Two Broke Girls) and around the NY nightlife circuit (Marty Thomas Presents Diva, 2008 Mister Broadway award), Grammy-nominated Marty Thomas is a discoball of performing talent. He returns to the Green Room 42 with his new show "Like It's Golden", a flashy musical journey straight from Marty's personal jukebox, offering songs ranging from blues, to funk, and dazzling pop.

Paper Mill Playhouse has announced casting for The Color Purple, directed by Tony Award winner John Doyle. Cast members from the 2015 Broadway revival lead the Paper Mill Playhouse company, including Adrianna Hicks (Aladdin, Sister Act - Germany) as Celie, Carla R. Stewart (Ghost - National Tour, Rent - Regional) as Shug Avery and Carrie Compere (Holler If You Hear Me,Shrek the Musical - National Tour) as Sofia. 

While its original production, as most Broadway shows go, offered the expected big sets, first-rate costumes, and impressive production values, the 2015 Tony Award-winning revival production of THE COLOR PUPLE---currently slaying audiences for a week-long stop at Orange County's Segerstrom Center for the Arts in Costa Mesa through June 24---is decidedly more subdued and scaled-down by comparison, allowing the songs, the story, and the cast performances to shine on their own merits instead. The resulting show is a powerful, uplifting one, bathed in a loving, spiritual embrace that shines a light on the struggles, the insecurities, the passions, and the tenacity of African-American women living in the early decades of the 20th Century. I can say without hesitation that this revival production is an excellent way to experience this beautiful, touching, and ultimately triumphant musical.

Producers announce the first North American tour and full casting of the Tony Award-winning Broadway revival of THE COLOR PURPLE.  The tour will visit more than 30 cities in its first year on tour, including Seattle, at The Paramount Theatre from June 27 - July 1.

That joyful noise you hear coming from the Hollywood Pantages Theatre this month is the thrilling sound of female empowerment, and it is reverberating like thunder from the heavens in the dynamically robust national tour of THE COLOR PURPLE. Director John Doyle's Tony Award-winning reinvention of the musical - which took Broadway by storm in 2015 - rings like a clarion call to arms for every woman who's ever been violated, abused, or otherwise kept down by a man, and, on opening night, the powerful women leading the cast proved themselves more than capable of leading the charge.

THE COLOR PURPLE, the Tony Award®-winning Broadway revival, will make its L.A. Premiere beginning next week at Hollywood Pantages Theatre, playing three weeks only; May 29 - June 17, 2018. Note: immediately after this L.A. Premiere engagement, the production will play a one week engagement in Costa Mesa at Segerstrom Center for the Arts (June 19 - 24).

Broadway In Chicago and the producers of the Tony Award-winning revival of THE COLOR PURPLE, the truly remarkable musical adapted of Alice Walker's best-selling novel, are delighted to announce that individual tickets for THE COLOR PURPLE will go on sale Friday, May 11. Broadway In Chicago presents THE COLOR PURPLE, directed by Tony winner John Doyle (Sweeney Todd and The Color Purple), at the Auditorium Theatre of Roosevelt University (50 E. Congress Pkwy.) for a limited two-week engagement July 17 - 29, 2018.

The Fabulous Fox Theatre is delighted to announce that the first U.S. National tour of the hit musical THE COLOR PURPLE, will play the Fabulous Fox Theatre from Tuesday, March 20 through Sunday, April 1.

Any truly great piece of theater (or film or art or music or a book) is both timely and timeless, reaching out across many generations and diverse populations to deliver a universal human message that anyone can understand and relate to. You would be hard pressed to find a better example of this than The Color Purple: The Musical, currently making a stop along on its Broadway tour at the Civic Center Music Hall in downtown Oklahoma City.

Dear Readers, it's been quite a year and, hopefully, we've come through it unscathed. God knows we've needed some shows to help us escape and others to make us think. But through it all we've had several shows that have proven to shine as some of the best of the year. Out of all the shows I was fortunate enough to see this year, I've selected a few that stood out. Here are those stand outs, a few honorable mentions and a few special mentions about which I just couldn't help myself but to mention in their own special way.