It's 1955, and into a square little town in a square little state rides a guitar-playing roustabout who changes everything and everyone he meets in this hip-swiveling, lip-curling musical fantasy that'll have you jumpin' out of your blue suede shoes with such classics as 'Heartbreak Hotel,' 'Jailhouse Rock,' and 'Don't Be Cruel.'
An outrageous musical comedy that combines musical theater's current 'Mormon-mania' and everyone's love of the Queen of the Musicals herself, Ethel Merman. Mormon missionaries, Aaron and Jacob, on a two-year stint to convert more Latter Day Saints, ring a buzzer that says, 'E.M. Welcome.'
Winner of three TONY Awards, three Outer Critic's Circle Awards, two Lucille Lortel Awards, and two Obie Awards, Urinetown is a hilarious musical satire of the legal system, capitalism, social irresponsibility, populism, bureaucracy, corporate mismanagement, municipal politics and musical theatre itself! Hilariously funny and touchingly honest, Urinetown provides a fresh perspective of one of America's greatest art forms.
South Pacific is a musical composed by Richard Rodgers, with lyrics by Oscar Hammerstein II and book by Hammerstein and Joshua Logan. The plot centers on an American nurse stationed on a South Pacific island during World War II, who falls in love with a middle-aged expatriate French plantation owner but struggles to accept his mixed-race children. A secondary romance, between a U.S. lieutenant and a young Tonkinese woman, explores his fears of the social consequences should he marry his Asian sweetheart. The issue of racial prejudice is candidly explored throughout the musical, most controversially in the lieutenant's song, 'You've Got to Be Carefully Taught'. Supporting characters, including a comic petty officer and the Tonkinese girl's mother, help to tie the stories together.
Seventeen local Columbus Theater's gathered on Monday June 27th, 2016 to perform and support a great cause-Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. Along with production numbers from favorite companies the evening also featured a silent auction of Playbill merchandise and signed Broadway memorabilia from this Broadway season.
Based on the classic swashbuckling tale of vengeance and redemption, The Countess of Monte Cristo tells the story of a young woman betrayed in the name of greed and spite by people she trusted who transforms herself into an agent of self-styled justice and returns to the glitter and intrigue of upper-class Paris twenty years later to carry out her revenge.
Play On! is the hilarious story of a theater group trying desperately to put on a play in spite of maddening interference from a haughty author who keeps revising the script. Through dreadful rehearsals, including a near disastrous dress rehearsal, the audience is treated to a madcap climax to a thoroughly hilarious romp.
Short North Stage held it's first Cabaret Contest Night on Wednesday June 15th in Ethel's Bar. All acts were welcome; singers, dancers, poets, comedians, improv troupes, burlesque- performers of any kind though most people gave vocal performances. Winner was determined based on the audience vote after the conclusion of all the performances. The winner received 50% of the entry fees collected with the balance along with spinning wheel games to raise additional funds for Short North Stage's 'Make Our Garden Grow' campaign working to raise $10,000 for bathroom renovations.
It's 1985. Reagan is backing a culture of ruthless self-interest. The cold war is ending. The ozone layer is melting. New Yorkers are learning how to survive a plague. It's at this tipping point that the great work begins.
Join us for Robin Hood in the park this summer in Westerville! Sword fights, secret identities, love, betrayal, and redemption: history and legend collide in this new tale of Robin Hood. 800 years ago, when the Brothers Huntingdon lost their parents to the treachery of the Plantagenets, their lives took very different paths. When they cross again in Sherwood Forest, they find a maiden on a quest, a queen fighting for freedom, and the King who destroyed their family. Divided by their past and united by a family secret, the brothers' feud puts the fate of England at stake. One brother must choose whether to put law before kin, while the other must choose between being a noble and being an outlaw; which it turns out, might just be in his blood.
The 2016 Columbus Arts Festival was held along the beautiful downtown Riverfront in Columbus, Ohio on June 10, 11 & 12. Along with all the display of work from over 300 nationally acclaimed artists, several stages were set up for performances by local artists, poets, dancers and theatre!
The Ohio Community Theatre Association (OCTA) held its Central Region Festival on Saturday June 4th at Kenyon College, Gambier, Ohio. This is a juried festival where the community theaters perform a portion from one of their shows from the past season. Excerpts were by MTV Arts' The Miracle Worker, Out of the Box Productions' Drinking Habits, Little Theatre Off Broadway's Escanaba in Da Moonlight, Licking County Players' The Taffetas, Alcove Dinner Theatre's Saving Up For Saturday Night, Chillicothe Civic Theatre's Steel Magnolias, and Star Players' The 25th Annual Putnum County Spelling Bee.
Evolution Theatre Company's LOCAL PLAYWRIGHTS FESTIVAL in association with CATCO is Theatre! Presents the world premiere of Sticks & Stones by Cory Skurdal. Winner of the 2014 GCAC / CATCO Playwrights Fellowship Award, this play tells the moving and timely story of the struggles experienced by the transgender community.
A farewell reception was held at the Short North Stage for Geoff Nelson and wife Ann Hall, following Sunday's matinee performance of Ma Rainey's Black Bottom. Geoff and Jon Putnam are cast members of the show, which continues through June 19. More than 60 old and new friends of Geoff and Ann's were there, many from the early days of CATCO, and from Geoff's newly-formed group, A Portable Theatre. Dana Miller, owner of Dana Lee's, provided wonderful hors d'oeuvres; Rick Hole prepared a slide show with lots of photographic memories from Geoff's many directorial and acting productions, and a HUGE cake topped off the fun event.
Not all theatre is designed to be an escape, a refuge from our ordinary lives. Every once-in-a-while a piece comes along that not only entertains us but makes us think. When those two elements come together, you've really got something special.
State of the Art's Production Theater Company presents the award winning Broadway musical 'The 1940's Radio Hour,' by Walton Jones. 'The 1940's Radio Hour' is full of music, dancing, live commercials and old-time sound effects. Centered around a troupe of radio performers, 'The 1940's Radio Hour' presents the final holiday broadcast of the Mutual Manhattan Variety Cavalcade on the New York radio station WOV in December 1942. One part 'A Prairie Home Companion,' and one part USO SHOW, 'The 1940's Radio Hour,' promises to be a fun-filled evening of musical comedy featuring time honored classics, like, 'Love Is Here To Stay,' 'That Old Black Magic,' 'Blues In The Night,' 'The 5 O'Clock Whistle,' and many more!!
production of this searing drama. The play is set in a run-down recording studio in Chicago in 1927. The legendary 'Mother of Blues,' Ma Rainey, is due to arrive to record a new take on a favorite song. Ma uses every trick she can muster to fight her white record producer for control of her music. Hardened by years of ill-treatment and bad deals, she's determined that 'Black Bottom', the song that bears her name, will be recorded her way. But one of her band members, a swaggering young trumpet player, tries to manipulate the producer to record instead his new hip version of the song. A battle ensues. This masterpiece is a riveting portrayal of racism, of the self-hate that racism breeds, and of racial exploitation.
Four Shorts by local playwrights all with a 'LGBTQQIA in Politics' theme:
'Daddy Sang Bass.' 'A Boy Named Sue.' 'I've Been Everywhere.' 'Folsom Prison Blues.' The music of Johnny Cash performed by five actor/musicians explains why we do what we do.
When the formidable and revered war general Othello falls in love with the beautiful Desdemona he marries her, and welcomes the pleasures of a domestic life. Unknown to him, his trusted officer and friend, Iago, outraged for being passed over by Othello for a promotion, engineers an insidious campaign of lies and deceit to convince Othello that his new bride has been unfaithful to him. Othello becomes consumed with suspicions of Desdemona's infidelity. Now he must wage war not only with an unseen enemy, but also his own tragic jealousy.
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