Heather Alexander News

Currently on stage in the Sarratt Cinema at Vanderbilt University is the Circle Players' production of Bare: A Pop Opera. With a book, music, and lyrics by Jon Hartmere Jr and Damon Intrabartolo, Bare: A Pop Opera touches on so many things that young people are facing in today's world. The Circle Players' production, under the direction of Heather Alexander and with musical direction by Eddie Charlton, is the kind of show that I had so many mixed feelings about at first. The initial setting of the story is that which anyone who doesn't come from wealth can be annoyed by. Set in a Catholic boarding school, every child seems to have a life that most of us have never experienced. What starts to pull you in immediately is the thing that seemingly can't be avoided....the connections between these young people and our own lives. Each has something they are dealing with that seems so much bigger than with what they should have to deal.

Circle Players ends its 64th Season of shows with the edgy and socially relevant rock musical bare, A Pop Opera. The show deals with the gamut of issues faced by teens today-- sexuality, drug abuse, bullying, pregnancy and suicide-set in a religious school. For this production, Circle Players partners with Just Us @ Oasis Center, which provides support for high school students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ). Performances will be today, May 23-June 1, 2014, at Sarratt Cinema on the Vanderbilt University campus.

Circle Players ends its 64th Season of shows with the edgy and socially relevant rock musical bare, A Pop Opera. The show deals with the gamut of issues faced by teens today-- sexuality, drug abuse, bullying, pregnancy and suicide-set in a religious school. For this production, Circle Players partners with Just Us @ Oasis Center, which provides support for high school students who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and questioning (LGBTQ). Performances will be May 23-June 1, 2014, at Sarratt Cinema on the Vanderbilt University campus.

It's Saturday, and that means it's time for BroadwayWorld's 'Saturday Intermission Pics' roundup! Today's photos come from the casts of THE BOOK OF MORMON, KINKY BOOTS, WICKED, THE PHANTOM OF THE OPERA, 50 SHADES, MAMMA MIA, and more!

Most theatre companies don't dare edit the works of William Shakespeare, much less refer to the Bard as 'Ole' Bill' during rehearsals, but the artists at Nashville Stagecraft are doing just that in preparation for their inaugural production: The Mad King Lear, opening March 27th at the 4th Story Theater.

There are few things as reassuring as a familiar story; be it a favorite bedtime story, the story of your first date, or the story you tell your friends about your first date; and for theatre fans in Central Florida, there are few things as familiar as 'I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change' at the Winter Park Playhouse.

Today, the spotlight falls upon the cast and crew of Lakewood Theatre's The Miracle Worker-director Heather Alexander, producer John Carpenter and actresses Amanda Smith (who plays Annie Sullivan) and Zoe Garner (Helen Keller)-which opens this weekend at the theater's venue in Old Hickory, and continues through November 4.

Lakewood Theatre Company, voted "Best Community Theatre Company" in BroadwayWorld.com's 2012 Nashville awards, presents William Gibson's The Miracle Worker beginning Friday, October 19 and running through Sunday, November 4.

Directed by John Carpenter, board president of Lakewood Theatre, in addition to Lauren Moore the cast includes Heather Alexander as odd seamstress Popeye Jackson, Jill Braddock-Watson as former Miss Firecracker Elain Rutledge, Michael Welch as the troubled and charming Delmount Williams, Daniel DeVault and Asa Ambrister sharing the role of Mac Sam, and Laura Lindsey as pageant coordinator Tessy Mahoney.

After that huge success, BroadwayWorld.com announces two awards presentations for Tennessee theater this year, with awards to be presented for Nashville productions and for Tennessee productions outside Music City USA. You may make nominations throughout the month of October, with voting for the awards starting in November, and the announcement of winners set for Sunday, January 8, during Midwinter's First Night at The Keeton Theatre in Donelson. Details about that event will be announced in the coming weeks.

Six of the leading lights of the theater world in Tennessee will be recognized as members of the 2011 Class of First Night Honorees August 27-September 4 as First Night, the Nashville Theatre Honors hosts a series of theatrical events to celebrate their achievements and accomplishments.

First Night: The Honors Gala is set for Sunday, September 4, at the Troutt Theatre at Belmont University, which kicks off at 5:30 p.m. with the Red Carpet Event, hosted by Jennifer Richmond and Trey Palmer, with fashion commentary by Cary Street, Joshua Waldrep and Lisa Garner Harrison. Impresario Johnny Delarocco (aka John Pyka) will produce a special Red Carpet performance by his company just for First Night.

Six of the leading lights of the theater world in Tennessee will be recognized as members of the 2011 Class of First Night Honorees August 27-September 4 as First Night, the Nashville Theatre Honors hosts a series of theatrical events to celebrate their achievements and accomplishments.

If theater audiences in Nashville and Middle Tennessee owe a huge debt of gratitude to the directors who helm the year's finest productions, you can only imagine how the actors lucky enough to work with those insightful, creative men and women must be! The Top Ten Directors of 2010 have resumes anyone would be proud to claim as their own and when you consider that they - year after year - excel at what they do, then you cannot help but be impressed by the breadth and depth of their abilities. Frankly, it boggles the mind. These are Nashville's best directors of 2010...

Mining the depths and heights of their own life experiences to bring to life onstage a plethora of challening and compelling characters, dramatic actresses in Nashville were at the pinnacle of their talents in 2010. Thoroughly captivating their audiences night after night, they put their tremendous talents on display with no-holds-barred performances that have raised the bar for actresses who follow in their wake in the coming seasons. And these ten women gave what we considered to be the most noteworthy performances of the 2010 season...

Nashville theater audiences were treated to a wide range of dramatic offerings in 2010, with the revival of some of the best-known American plays of the past half-century, along with productions of some amazing original works by a group of talented homegrown playwrights, whose subjects ranged from what goes on in the intimate confines of the ladies' room to a murder mystery comedy with a film noir ambience. Clearly, if 2010 is any indication, the new 2011 season now under way is going to be filled with even more surprises and delights.

Despite portentous warnings of an approaching snowmageddon across the South, more than 150 members of the Nashville and Middle Tennessee theater community gathered at Street Theatre Company in Nashville Sunday night, January 9, for the announcement of the BroadwayWorld.com Nashville Theatre Award winners and the presentation of First Night's Top Ten of Twenty-Ten.

Performed by Hillwig's large cast against the backdrop of Jim Manning's beautifully conceived and exquisitely realized set that magically transforms the Keeton's intimate stage into a panoramic view of dustbowl Oklahoma, the fiery Southwest and the lush, verdant fields and orchards of California, The Grapes of Wrath is a visual tour de force that other community theater companies - frankly, any theater company of whatever ilk - should aspire to achieve.