Ed Asner News

 More than 165 films – from Oscar-nominated documentaries to narrative features, narrative short films, documentary short films and animated shorts – will highlight the 25thanniversary Sedona International Film Festival, Feb. 23-March 3.

The 17th Annual Garden State Film Festival (GSFF) will kick off this year's screenings of over 240 independent films from around the globe with THE BIRD CATCHER on Friday evening, March 29th at 8:30 p.m. at the iconic Paramount Theater in Asbury Park. 

Life is changing for Frank and Stella. On the day of Frank's retirement party, this once loving and simple couple find themselves pulled in different directions as the winds of change blow through Joy, Illinois.

The Naples Players (TNP) present the seven-time EMMY Award-winning television icon, Ed Asner in a live audience talk-back on Saturday, March 16, 2019 at 2:00 p.m. at The Naples Players Blackburn Hall. In partnership with Unity Church of Naples, and Fubble Entertainment, Ed Asner is starring in his new comedy stage-play, A Man and His Prostate, bringing awareness to men's health in a comical and poignant show at Unity Church of Naples on Friday, March 15 and Saturday, March 16, 2019 at 7:00 p.m.

New Jersey's most esteemed celebration of independent film, The Garden State Film Festival (GSFF) is excited to announce that they have chosen Linda Krebs and Erin Gomez, as the GSFF's 2019 Educator of the Year recipients. Both women are members and facilitators of the Monmouth County Shore Consortium for the Gifted & Talented (SCG&T), an organization dedicated to providing curriculum-driven enriching opportunities to smaller school districts. This honor is in recognition of their heartfelt devotion to their students and exceptional achievements in education, especially in film and video production as well as in the community. Linda and Erin will receive their awards at the black-tie-optional Awards Banquet at The Berkeley Oceanfront Hotel in Asbury Park on March 31st. The 17th Annual Garden State Film Festival weekend is scheduled for March 28-31, 2019 in Asbury Park.

 The 30th annual Palm Springs International Film Festival (PSIFF) announced that the festival's opening night will be the screening of All is True directed by Kenneth Branagh on Friday, January 4.  The festival will close with Ladies in Black, directed by Bruce Beresford on Sunday, January 13. The Festival will screen 223 films from 78 countries, including 48 premieres (4 World, 13 North American and 31 U.S.) from January 3-14, 2019.  The line-up includes a focus on cinema from France, India and Mexico, Premieres, Talking Pictures, Book to Screen, Special Presentations, FLOS: Foreign Language Oscar Submissions, Gay!La, Local Spotlight, Modern Masters, True Stories, World Cinema Now, a 30-film retrospective of selections from past festivals (free screenings sponsored by Desert Care Network and National Endowment for the Arts), and more.   

There has been a proliferation of jukebox musicals in the past 2 decades. MAMA MIA far and away heads the list of successes. Using the guilty-pleasure pop catalog of ABBA, playwright Catherine Johnson spun a light-as-air family comedy. Somehow this show makes the songs sound like they were written specifically for the story. It's cumulus-cloud fluffy but also downright irresistible.

In the Broadway musical ELF, one of the characters says, 'Lower your expectations and you won't be disappointed.' Perhaps audiences attending the touring production of ELF playing at The Durham Performing Arts Center this week should heed that advice. Based on the 2003 movie, ELF tells the story of Buddy, a human raised by elves in The North Pole. When Buddy learns he is not actually an elf, he sets off on a journey to New York to find his biological father, a surly book publisher who is on Santa's naughty list. The movie featured a stellar cast including Bob Newhart, Ed Asner, James Caan, Zooey Deschanel, and Will Ferrell as Buddy. And according to 'Forbes,' 'Entertainment Weekly' and The British Film Institute, ELF is one of the best Christmas movies of all time. So you might expect that a stage adaptation of ELF would follow suit. Nope. Sadly, the staged version lacks the mojo that made its movie predecessor work.

Delaware Theatre Company is proud to host a special presentation of Jeff Cohen's The Soap Myth. The staged reading, directed by Pamela Berlin, will be performed one night only on January 24 at 7PM. It stars The Mary Tyler Moore Show and Lou Grant's Ed Asner and The Walking Dead and Crazy Ex-Girlfriend's Tovah Feldshuh.

Former Congressman Charles Rangel and Former Mayor David Dinkins stopped by to see the Joe Mantegna directed I'm Not a Comedian…I'm Lenny Bruce, written by and starring Ronnie Marmo as the late iconic free-speech fighter. 

Tuesday night, jazz legend Tony Bennett, in town for the Rockefeller Center Tree Lighting, snuck into the hit Off-Broadway show I'm Not a Comedian…I'm Lenny Bruce, directed by Joe Mantegna and written by and starring Ronnie Marmo.

Brighten up the holiday season with an array of CBS specials:

The international comedy hit My Mother's Italian, My Father's Jewish & I'm in Therapy!, featuring actor and comedian Peter J. Fogel, will be coming back to Stage West at The Herberger Theater Center, 222 E. Monroe, from Dec. 19 through Jan. 20, 2019.

Arthur Balder's American Mirror - Intimations of Immortality, which premieres on Hollywood Boulevard next Sunday November 4th at the Egyptian Theater, Rigler Theater, at 2:30 PM as part of the ARPA International Film Festival documentary lineup, has been nominated for Best Documentary Film. The results of the competitive categories of ARPA International Film Fest will be announced at the Awards Ceremony after the red carpet event on Sunday at 7:30 PM. Among the attendees will be great personalities of the arts and culture like Sylvia Minassian (festival founder), Haig Boyadjian (producer and festival's director), Maral Kazazian, Sonia Keshishian, and celebrities such as Ed Asner, Eduard James Olmos, Sveva Alviti and Natali Qasabian, among others.

The 21st Annual Arpa International Film Festival (Arpa IFF), being held at Hollywood's historic Egyptian Theatre from November 2 to 4, has announced the lineup of 46 films from 17 countries being screened this year. Arpa IFF will once again highlight a diverse range of films that explore themes such as genocide, war, feminism, family dynamics, environmentalism, music, art, adoption, intersectional identities, and LGBTQ issues.

The international comedy hit My Mother's Italian, My Father's Jewish & I'm in Therapy!, featuring actor & comedian Peter J. Fogel, announced it will be coming to Milwaukee's Broadway Theatre Center in the historic Third Ward, October 10-28, 2018.

In honor of the 100th year of Veterans Day and the fifth anniversary of the founding of the Center for American War Letters at Chapman University, the play If All the Sky Were Paper is coming home to Chapman's Musco Center for the Arts stage for a special Veteran's Day performance on Saturday, November 10 at 7:30pm.

Well-ensconced on the UCLA campus, Los Angeles Theatre Works presents audio theatre, or as pre-millennials call it 'radio drama,' a throwback technique of decades-old entertainment enhanced by current day technology. I had the chance to delve into the inner workings of LATW from one of the co-founders herself, Susan Albert Loewenberg.

Ed Asner stars in A Man and His Prostate, a compelling comedy stage-play and true life experience of hilarious magnitude, written by Emmy Award-winner Ed Weinberger.

A playful and poignant fairy tale for all ages, THE DRAGON GRISWYND by Carrie Robbins will have its world premier in the Community Space Theater at The Theater for the New City, Crystal Field (Artistic Director), as part of the 2018 Dream Up Festival, committed to wide-ranging, original theatrical visions. THE DRAGON GRISWYND is based on a story by RD Robbins.