Angelo Parra News

Four local high school students will have their new plays read on May 30 by professional actors as part of the Stephen H. Grant Student Playwrights Festival presented by Penguin Rep Theatre and the Phoenix Theatre Ensemble.

Budding writers in Rockland high schools are being invited to compose and submit 10-minute plays to a competition co-sponsored by two professional theatres, Penguin Rep Theatre and Phoenix Theatre Ensemble, this spring in the newly launched Stephen H. Grant High School Student Playwriting Festival. 

Penguin Rep Theatre announced today the Off-Broadway premiere of Mr. Parker, a new play written by Michael McKeever and directed by Joe Brancato. Performances will begin Wednesday, June 1, 2022, for a limited engagement through June 25, 2022, at Theatre Row – Theatre 1 (410 West 42nd Street). Opening Night is Monday, June 6, 2022, at 7:00PM.

Westchester Collaborative Theater (WCT) is ushering in the holidays with A Three-Course Feast, a trio of staged readings presenting never before seen plays by local playwrights to run the weekend preceding Thanksgiving: Friday, November 22 at 8; Saturday, November 23 at 2 and 8 (talk-back after the matinee); and Sunday, November 24 at 3.

When performances of Michael McKeever's MR. PARKER begin tomorrow (Friday, September 13) at Penguin Rep Theatre in Stony Point, New York, founding artistic director Joe Brancato will celebrate a milestone as a director: his 200th production!

59E59 Theaters (Val Day, Artistic Director; Brian Beirne, Managing Director) is thrilled to add the NYC premiere of AFTER, written by Michael McKeever and directed by Joe Brancato, to the Winter 2018 Season. Produced by Penguin Rep Theatre and InProximity Theatre Company, AFTER begins performances on Tuesday, March 12 for a limited engagement through Sunday, April 14. Press Opening is Sunday, March 17 at 2 PM. The performance schedule is Tuesday - Friday at 7 PM; Saturday at 2 PM & 7 PM; and Sunday at 2 PM. Performances are at 59E59 Theaters (59 East 59th Street, between Park and Madison). Single tickets are $25 - $70 ($49 for 59E59 Members). To purchase tickets, call the 59E59 Box Office at 646-892-7999 or visit www.59e59.org. The running time is 85 minutes, no intermission.

Phoenix Theatre Ensemble, a nonprofit theatre company based in New York City and recently relocated to Nyack, NY, is now in its 15th season and announces a unique-and unpredictable--evening of readings of new commissioned short plays on the subject of greed by three noted Rockland County playwrights, Samuel Harps, Christopher Kyle, and Angelo Parra.

Phoenix Theatre Ensemble, a nonprofit ensemble theatre company now in its 15th season, announces the appointment of Leo Lion as Associate Artistic Director effective January 1, 2019.

Theatre NOVA, Ann Arbor's professional theatre with an exclusive focus on new plays and playwrights, is thrilled to announce an extension of its smash hit "The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith" by Angelo Parra. The show was slated to run through April 22 but has been extended through April 29 due to full houses, glowing audience response, and critical acclaim.

Theatre NOVA, Ann Arbor's professional theatre with an exclusive focus on new plays and playwrights, is thrilled to announce an extension of its smash hit "The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith" by Angelo Parra. The show was slated to run through April 22 but has been extended through April 29 due to full houses, glowing audience response, and critical acclaim.

Theatre NOVA, Ann Arbor's professional theatre with an exclusive focus on new plays and playwrights, presents "The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith" by Angelo Parra.

Theatre NOVA, Ann Arbor's professional theatre with an exclusive focus on new plays and playwrights, presents 'The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith' by Angelo Parra and Miche Braden.

TONGUES Reading Series presents a Staged Reading of AFTERMATH, a play created through the #Pages4PuertoRico collaboration to benefit the INDESTRUCTIBLE Campaign for Hurricane Maria relief efforts on Sunday, December 17, 2017 at 6:00PM at Cherry Lane Theatre, 38 Commerce Street in New York.

The Mosaic Theater Company ignites its third season with a sure hit, a proven crowd-pleaser about the Empress of Blues.

Mosaic Theater Company of DC, the 2017 Helen Hayes Award-winning theatre for Outstanding Emerging Company, will begin its 2017-2018 season with the Off-Broadway hit The Devil's Music: The Life and Blues of Bessie Smith. Written by Angelo Parra and performed by the indomitable Miche Braden (who also directed and arranged the music) and directed by Joe Brancato, this boisterous show featuring thirteen songs tells the story of Bessie Smith's final performance after she and her band are turned away from a whites-only theatre in 1937 Memphis. Previews begin August 24 with a press opening of Monday, August 28, and the show runs through September 24, with a potential extension week through October 1.

Mosaic Theater Company of DC announces its most ambitious and theatrically varied lineup to date with its 2017-18 season. Compelled to respond to changing and challenging times in our country, Season Three grapples with our current political climate, celebrating outspoken heroines (of fluid gender and sexuality) in two new musicals, while embracing documentary inspired reportage, sharp political and social satire, and stirring family drama. 

Joe Brancato was a high school English and drama teacher in 1977 when he peered into an abandoned 1880's hay barn in Stony Point, New York, and visualized his future: a theatre of his own.

Rubicon Theatre Company celebrates Black History Month with THE DEVIL'S MUSIC: THE LIFE AND BLUES OF BESSIE SMITH, starring singer and actress Miche Braden of the original Off-Broadway production (named one of the 10 Best Off-Broadway productions of the year by the N.Y. Daily Times). Described by CBC as a, "bawdy, bluesy, boozy rollicking night out at the theatre," the show follows the life, loves and career of blues and jazz singer Bessie Smith, called the "Empress of the Blues." 

It's been 80 years since Bessie Smith, the celebrated Empress of the Blues, died a lonely death, after an auto accident on a desolate Mississippi road. Contrary to legend, Smith did not bleed to death after being refused admission to a white Southern hospital. That story was related to Down Beat magazine by Columbia Records impresario John Hammond, who later apologized, saying that it was all based on hearsay. But her injuries were severe enough so that when she was taken to the nearest hospital (which happened to be one that accepted blacks), that she was beyond saving, and died at the young age of 43.

Rubicon Theatre Company celebrates Black History Month with THE DEVIL'S MUSIC: THE LIFE AND BLUES OF BESSIE SMITH, starring singer and actress Miche Braden of the original Off-Broadway production (named one of the 10 Best Off-Broadway productions of the year by the N.Y. Daily Times). Described by CBC as a, "bawdy, bluesy, boozy rollicking night out at the theatre," the show follows the life, loves and career of blues and jazz singer Bessie Smith, called the "Empress of the Blues."