Harpo Marx News

At a time when Disney seems to have a monopoly on fairytale musicals, both onstage and on screen, can Rogers and Barer's 1959 musical Once Upon a Mattress hold up to the likes of Frozen, Tangled, and Beauty and the Beast?

Kaufman and Hart's broad satire on the bizarre world of internationally famous critic Alexander Woollcott, here called Sheridan Whiteside (Greg Martin), when his egocentric life collides with the day to day humdrum lives of the Stanley family of Mesalia, Ohio in 1936 is rarely produced due to its large cast of wildly divergent characters and dated humor. Funny it is, exceedingly funny, but only to those who understand the references to the events and people of the 30s. Now, in a finely staged production at Actors Co-op, The Man Who Came to Dinner, like the playwrights' other smash hit You Can't Take It With You, shows just how dull life would be without flagrant eccentricity and staunch individuality.

Irish Arts Center is set to present The Whistling Girl, the U.S. premiere of the collaboration between Dublin-based composer/keyboardist Trevor Knight and jazz singer/actor Honor Heffernan that sets the fabulously mordant words of 20th Century poet/critic/playwright/screenwriter/New York legend Dorothy Parker to song.

Gideon Media (a new venture from Gideon Productions, producers of the critically-acclaimed The Honeycomb Trilogy, Universal Robots, and Viral) in association with Tor Books & Tor Labs will present Steal the Stars, a noir science fiction thriller by Mac Rogers (award-winning writer of the global hit podcast thrillers, The Message and LifeAfter), released as 14 episodes, airing weekly from August 2 - November 1, 2017, and available worldwide on all major podcast distributors including iTunes, Stitcher, and GooglePlay through the Macmillan Podcast Network.

Sarasota Opera announces an expansion of their "HD at the Movie House" series entitled "Classic Moves at the Opera House." Originally designed as a movie house and vaudeville theater, Sarasota Opera is embracing the history of the building by bringing many of the classic films that once played at the theater when they originally premiered.

Gideon Media (a new venture from Gideon Productions, producers of the critically-acclaimed The Honeycomb Trilogy, Universal Robots, and Viral) in association with Tor Books & Tor Labs will present Steal the Stars, a noir science fiction thriller by Mac Rogers (award-winning writer of the global hit podcast thrillers, The Message and LifeAfter), released as 14 episodes, airing weekly from August 2 - November 1, 2017, and available worldwide on all major podcast distributors including iTunes, Stitcher, and GooglePlay through the Macmillan Podcast Network.

Imagine growing up in a world where your neighbors were Tennessee Williams, The Marx Brothers, Alan Jay Lerner, Noel Coward, Arthur Miller, and scores of others. For Michael Colby, he did grow up in such a world because his grandparents owned New York's famous Algonquin Hotel. Now, Michael swings by Shetler to discuss with Rob and Kevin his enviable life as a real life Eloise of The Plaza.

Legendary comedian Harpo Marx and motion picture star Van Johnson are the guests on THE NEW I LOVE LUCY SUPERSTAR SPECIAL, a new one-hour special featuring two colorized back-to-back episodes of the 1950s series, to be broadcast Today, May 19 (9:00-10:00PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

Legendary comedian Harpo Marx and motion picture star Van Johnson are the guests on THE NEW I LOVE LUCY SUPERSTAR SPECIAL, a new one-hour special featuring two colorized back-to-back episodes of the 1950s series, to be broadcast Friday, May 19 (9:00-10:00PM, ET/PT) on the CBS Television Network.

Pulling double duty as both playwright and star, Dan Castellaneta portrays Oscar Levant in his latest new work, FOR PIANO AND HARPO. Levant was a concert pianist, and contemporary of George Gershwin, whose genius gave him entree into the glittering worlds of classical music, Broadway, and Hollywood but whose private demons ultimately undermined his career. The play explores Levant's addictions and mental health issues while committed to a Mt. Sinai psych ward in 1956, on the Jack Paar Show in 1962, and during an extended stay at the home of his friend, Harpo Marx, in 1935.

Actor Dan Castellaneta is a familiar face and voice from TV's The Simpsons and The Tracy Ullman Show. He has written a play entitled For Piano and Harpo that will open on February 10 at the Falcon Theatre in Burbank. In our chat he tells us about his past work, the play and what inspired him to write it. Tell us how For Piano and Harpo came about. Were you intrigued by the relationship between Harpo and Oscar Levant? What a frenzy those two must have created together!

Theater District institution the Actors' Temple celebrates its centennial with an entertainment-packed dinner and show at the Friars Club, 57 East 55th Street, on Monday, March 13, at 6pm.

Debbie Reynolds is, of course, most fondly remembered as a star of musicals on stage and screen - but Reynolds did much more for Hollywood beyond standing in front of its shining lights. She is responsible for saving many of the items we today consider priceless historical artifacts, including an iconic pair of Dorothy's ruby slippers.

'Hard Rain: A Theatrical Protest' offered a workshop view of six new dramatic renderings of the American experience in this time of political turbulence. Commissioned and curated by John Blondell, this festival included short works inspired by the recent election. These early drafts functioned well as “think” pieces, and represent raw, immediate reactions to the cultures clashes lately highlighted by the presidential election.

Jim Jarmusch's new film GIMME DANGER chronicles the story of The Stooges, one of the greatest rock-n-roll bands of all time. The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston screens the documentary at its Brown Auditorium Theater on December 2, 9, 10 and 11. BroadwayWorld has photos from the film inside!

Jim Jarmusch's new film GIMME DANGER chronicles the story of The Stooges, one of the greatest rock-n-roll bands of all time. The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston screens the documentary at its Brown Auditorium Theater on December 9, 10 and 11. BroadwayWorld has photos from the film inside!

Jim Jarmusch's new film GIMME DANGER chronicles the story of The Stooges, one of the greatest rock-n-roll bands of all time. The Museum of Fine Arts, Houston screens the documentary at its Brown Auditorium Theater on December 2, 9, 10 and 11. BroadwayWorld has photos from the film inside!

It's with mixed emotions that on Monday, October 31, The Center and Company of Fools witnessed Denise Simone's last official starring role as Core Company Artist of Company of Fools (but it will certainly not be her last time on the Liberty stage). After 25 years helping to lead Company of Fools, founding member Denise Simone has stepped down from her full-time staff position. Simone is leaving to refocus her professional life away from day-to-day management in favor of more artistically focused projects.

No Time for Comedy is unlike anything you have ever seen, I feel sure. It is funny and clever - much of the dialogue is of Jane Austen caliber - but it joyfully refuses to go any of the places you think it probably might. It is political, and pointed, but never preachy, except to call attention to the motives of those who would preach. It is at once a parody of a witty Broadway comedy of the nineteen-twenties, -thirties, and -forties, and the apotheosis of it; and a part of it also contains a convincing and fairly furious repudiation of itself. For this 1939 play seems well aware that its very style is about to be subsumed by world conflict…

 For those who didn't have the opportunity to meet the cast and crew of East Lynne Theater Company's 'Biography' at the after-show party at Aleathea's Restaurant on September 21, another chance is to be had on Friday, October 7 at an after-show Q&A.  It's a wonderful opportunity for patrons to ask the actors and director such questions as 'why do they do what they do?' and 'how do they do it?'