Joel Sandel News

Summer is often a popular time for theaters and festivals across the country to produce free Shakespeare for their cities. Obviously things are different this year, so Main Street Theater is bringing Shakespeare to people in their homes with two virtual offerings.

The creative team has announced the cast of a new musical being produced in Houston. Lady of Agreda plays March 12 - April 5 at City Centre's Queensbury Theatre.

Main Street Theater (MST) will open its 43rd Season with the Regional Premiere of Lauren Gunderson's The Book of Will.  This compelling play tells the tale of how Shakespeare's First Folio came into existence thanks to the loyalty and love of his dear friends, particularly John Heminges and Henry Condell.  "As the Folger Shakespeare Library put it, the First Folio is 'the book that gave us Shakespeare,'" shares Book of Will director and MST Artistic Director Rebecca Greene Udden.  "That being so, it can then be said that Heminges and Condell gave us the book that gave us Shakespeare."  "[THE BOOK OF WILL] serves as homage to those who sacrificed to make the first folio happen and to Shakespeare's magnificent words." - Westword (Denver, CO). 

Main Street Theater (MST) will open its 43rd Season with the Regional Premiere of Lauren Gunderson's The Book of Will.  This compelling play tells the tale of how Shakespeare's First Folio came into existence thanks to the loyalty and love of his dear friends, particularly John Heminges and Henry Condell.  "As the Folger Shakespeare Library put it, the First Folio is 'the book that gave us Shakespeare,'" shares Book of Will director and MST Artistic Director Rebecca Greene Udden.  "That being so, it can then be said that Heminges and Condell gave us the book that gave us Shakespeare."  "[THE BOOK OF WILL] serves as homage to those who sacrificed to make the first folio happen and to Shakespeare's magnificent words." - Westword (Denver, CO). 

Main Street Theater (MST) will open its 43rd Season with the Regional Premiere of Lauren Gunderson's The Book of Will.  This beautiful play tells the tale of how Shakespeare's First Folio came into existence thanks to the loyalty and love of his dear friends.  Gunderson "has peopled the stage with lively, historically based characters... She paints a vivid portrait of the times in language sometimes formal, sometimes poetic and often...contemporary... [THE BOOK OF WILL] serves as homage to those who sacrificed to make the first folio happen and to Shakespeare's magnificent words." - Westword (Denver, CO). 

Regarded as one of the landmark plays of the 20th century, RHINOCEROS is a modern masterpiece that comments on the plight of the human condition, made tolerable only by self-delusion.

Main Street Theater opens its 42nd Season with Enemies by Maxim Gorky, adapted by David Hare.  Enemies tells the story of Russian society in 1905 when the country sat ready for revolution.  Directed by MST Artistic Director Rebecca Greene Udden, this collaboration with the University of Houston School of Theatre and Dance features a cast of 24, 8 of whom are UH students.

MST's popular "Cocktails & Coward" is back for 2 nights only, August 18 & 19 at 7:30pm in Rice Village, 2540 Times Blvd., 77005. The evening features scenes from the comedies of Noel Coward such as Present Laughter, Private Lives, Blithe Spirit, and Fallen Angels and a taste of his hilarious songs such as "Mad Dogs and Englishmen," "Chase Me Charlie," "Has Anybody Seen Our Ship," "I Went to a Marvelous Party," and "Don't Put Your Daughter on the Stage, Mrs. Worthington."

Bayou City Concert Musicals continues its popular cabaret series with Elegant Ellington, at 7:30 p.m., Saturday, May 20; 4:00 p.m., Sunday, May 21; and 7:30 p.m., Monday, May 22, 2107, at the Performance Centre of the Ensemble Theatre, 3535 Main between Holman and Berry Street, in the heart of Midtown.

Copenhagen by Michael Frayn is a play about many things. Certainly it is about physics and the mysterious meeting between Werner Heisenberg and Niels Bohr in 1941. But patriotism and morality/ethics along with friendship and human nature are crucial subjects explored in the play.

Copenhagen by Michael Frayn is a play about many things.  Certainly it is about physics and the mysterious meeting between Werner Heisenberg and Niels Bohr in 1941.  But patriotism and morality/ethics along with friendship and human nature are crucial subjects explored in the play.  What do we owe to our country?  What do we owe to humanity?  What do we owe to each other?

Main Street Theater (MST) continues its 2016 - 2017 MainStage season with Tony Award Winner for Best Play, Copenhagen by Michael Frayn.  The production opens February 11 and runs through March 12 at Main Street Theater - Rice Village, 2540 Times Blvd.  Performances are on Thursdays - Saturdays at 7:30pm and Sundays at 3pm.  Tickets are $36 - $45, depending on date and section, and are on sale via phone at 713.524.6706 or online at MainStreetTheater.com. 

That this work could be adapted at all for the stage, much less a small black box theater, is somewhat remarkable, but Udden and her team of more-than-capable actors and designers have done it proud.

Main Street Theater gives WOLF HALL, a political thriller set in the court of Tudor ruler and serial spouse King Henry VIII, the same grab and intensity of a popcorn flick.

Wolf Hall: Parts I and II, based on the novels by Hilary Mantel and adapted for the Stage by Mike Poulton, is making its Regional Premiere, directed by Rebecca Greene Udden, at Main Street Theater (Rice Village, 2540 Times Blvd., Houston, TX) this fall. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast in action below!

If you're wrestling with the current election, or wondering how we have gotten to this point in America's history, this is a powerful, informed piece. It incorporates the civil rights movement at the time when Martin Luther King was taken from his mission and asks hard questions about what all of that meant back in 1968.

Now in its 40th Anniversary Season, Main Street Theater provides theater experiences for all ages. For ages 3 and up, Shrek the Musical continues on Saturdays and Sundays through July 31. The company also stages RFK: A Portrait of Robert Kennedy and Red Hot Patriot: The Kick-A** Wit of Molly Ivins through August 14.

Right now the world needs a good chuckle at the pious and prissy, and this production answers that divine calling with ease. If you're a devout Catholic or easily offended, maybe this one isn't for you. But if you can appreciate gender bending joined with slapstick camp you've found your salvation.

Celebration Theatre will present the Houston premiere of Charles Busch's raucous and bitingly funny comedy, THE DIVINE SISTER.

Celebration Theatre will present the Houston premiere of Charles Busch's raucous and bitingly funny comedy, THE DIVINE SISTER.