Ken Howard News

With MARIA STUARDA at the Met, we're back for the second installment of Donizetti's so-called Tudor Trilogy, with ANNA BOLENA (Anne Boleyn) already off to the gallows and ROBERTO DEVEREUX (with Bette Davis and Errol Flynn, it was “Elizabeth and Essex”) still to come. It's the first time the Met is doing all three operas, with the singular soprano Sondra Radvanovsky as Anna, Maria and Elisabetta (in DEVEREUX, next month). Her Anna was grand, but her Maria was even better.

Balloting for this year's Actor® recipients will close at noon tomorrow, Friday, Jan. 29 (PT). The results will be tallied by Integrity Voting Systems, the SAG Awards' official teller, and sealed until the envelopes are opened onstage by the presenters at the 22nd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards® ceremony on Saturday, Jan. 30.

Patricia Arquette, Abraham Attah, Jason Bateman, Bryan Cranston, Taye Diggs, Jon Hamm, Keegan?Michael Key, Diane Lane, Julia Louis?Dreyfus, Helen Mirren, Pedro Pascal, Jeremy Renner and J.K. Simmons will be presenters at the 22nd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards

Six-time Actor® nominee Tony Hale ('Veep,” 'Arrested Development.') will join Vitalie Taittinger, Champagne Taittinger Artistic Director, to open the red carpet for the 22nd Annual Screen Actors Guild Awards

Anthony Mackie, Rachel McAdams, Jason Mitchell, Mark Ruffalo, Susan Sarandon and Kristen Wiig are all set to take center stage when they announce winners in a variety of categories.

Sometimes, the Metropolitan Opera seems like an endless Puccini festival. It's particularly apparent this season, when top dogs LA BOHEME, TOSCA and MADAMA BUTTERFLY are joined by TURANDOT and MANON LESCAUT, which are not second drawer, though certainly less popular than the first three. (Let's see how that descriptor applies to the latter when Jonas Kaufmann steps on stage for the new production of LESCAUT.)

SAG-AFTRA President Ken Howard and SAG Awards® Committee Chair JoBeth Williams will announce the honorees for Outstanding Action Performances by Film and Television Stunt Ensembles

One more BOHEME? Yet another TOSCA? How about BARBIERE redux? Sometimes the standard repertoire of opera companies seems too standard. That's why it was good to hear that the Met was mounting Bizet's LES PECHEURS DE PERLES for the first time in a century, as a showcase for one of its top divas, Diana Damrau with tenor Matthew Polenzani, one of the company's secret treasures.

The Met's acclaimed new production of Bizet's Les Pêcheurs de Perles (The Pearl Fishers), a rarity by the composer of Carmen that has not been staged by the company in a century, will be transmitted on Live in HD for the first time on Saturday, January 16 at 12:55pm ET. Conducted by Gianandrea Noseda and directed by Penny Woolcock, Bizet's sweeping romance tells the story of a beautiful Hindu priestess pursued by rival pearl divers competing for her hand. Diana Damrau leads the cast as the priestess Leïla, opposite Matthew Polenzanias Nadir, Mariusz Kwiecien as Zurga, and Nicolas Testé as the high priest Nourabad. Highlights of the score include 'Au fond du temple saint,' perhaps the best-known duet for two male voices in the operatic repertory.

It is almost Mountain time in Philadelphia! Cold Mountain, the first opera by Philadelphia-based, Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Jennifer Higdon, makes its East Coast Premiere with five performances at the Academy of Music, February 5-14, 2016.

No more carping about out-of-tune singing (for the rest of 2015). No more bemoaning opera directors who don't seem to like the art of opera (for the next five minutes). No more worrying whether traditional opera will go the way of all flesh (for the next few days, at least). It's time to give up on my Scrooge tendencies and be thankful for the gifts that opera gave me, in and around New York this past year, alphabetically speaking.

And- they did it! The Actors and Artists Unite to end Alzheimer's National Team has raised over $150,000 for the Walk to end Alzheimer's since their first walk in 2011!

Tonight, December 2, Verdi's RIGOLETTO returns to the Met with a new cast of principals stepping into the 1960s Las Vegas setting of Michael Mayer's acclaimed production.

On Wednesday, December 2, Verdi's RIGOLETTO returns to the Met with a new cast of principals stepping into the 1960s Las Vegas setting of Michael Mayer's acclaimed production.

The Met's production of Verdi's great opera RIGOLETTO, is often referred to as the 'Ratpack' version--because it is set in the Las Vegas days of Frank Sinatra and his high-living cronies. From its debut, it was a huge success for the company and with good cause. It was brilliantly conceived and sung, even though the title role seemed fuzzier than it usually is in the standard setting. But how would it stand up, season after season, I wondered, when the novelty wore off? The good news is that the production (excitingly designed by Christine Jones) not only remains effective and entertaining, but, in a key way, it is even better than at the premiere nearly three years ago.

Who or what is Lulu, the eponymous character in Alban Berg's landmark opera? Is she saint or sinner? Femme fatale or victim? Put-upon or mistress of her own fate? Whatever else she might be, she is fabulous in the hands of German soprano Marlis Petersen, as the center of William Kentridge's vibrant, thrilling new production at the Met.

The title character in Puccini's TOSCA is the quintessential diva--a grand performer ('goddess' in Italian) who thinks the world revolves around her, particularly when it comers to her lover, painter Mario Cavaradossi. The same might be said for soprano Angela Gheorghiu, who used to be a top attraction at the Met, until cancellations and other prima donna-ish actions saw her fall from favor, despite her fine singing and acting skills. Well, she came back for two performances of her well-traveled (and -received) Floria Tosca and the result was, well, disappointing.

For those of us who love Theatre and the Performing Arts, PBS has been THE HOLY GRAIL, for as long as I can remember.

?Marking the 100th birthday of playwright Arthur Miller, Joan Copeland reminisced about her brother at The Lambs, America's first professional theatrical club, and was the only event in NYC featuring a relative of Miller.

The Met came late to the trio of Donizetti operas about British queens, when it finally mounted ANNA BOLENA mounted for Anna Netrebko in 2011. This was long after Beverly Sills made her deal with the devil, trading her voice for the cover of Time Magazine, by singing Anne Boleyn, Mary Queen of Scots, and Elizabeth I at New York City Opera. The Met is finally getting around to mounting its own take on the operas this season (the so-called Tudor Trilogy) not for Netrebko but for American Sondra Radvanovsky. As Anna, she delivers a thrilling, go-for-broke performance.