Kirsten Greenidge News

While the stages remain dark during the COVID-19 global pandemic, Milwaukee Rep is rallying its creative resources to bring the world-class theater audiences have come to know and love directly into homes. Over the next few weeks, Milwaukee Rep will bring theater from Our Home to Your Home in several unique ways.

Milwaukee Rep continues From Our Home to Your Home online programming through September thanks to the support of Donald & Donna Baumgartner, Elizabeth Quadracci Harned Family and the donors to the Double-Down for Artists Challenge which raised a total of $109,000 to support Milwaukee Rep's artists that have been severely impacted by COVID-19.

Huntington Theatre Company has announced that it will postpone the start of its 2020-2021 season, cancelling all in-person performances for the remainder of 2020.

HowlRound Theatre Commons has announced it has been awarded a three-year, $1,336,000 grant from The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation to support HowlRound's core programs and the continuation of the National Playwright Residency Program (NPRP), funding thirteen new playwright residencies in nine states.

In collaboration with The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation, HowlRound Theatre Commons established the National Playwright Residency Program (NPRP) in 2013.

The Bret Adams and Paul Reisch Foundation has announced the recipients of their special COVID-19 response grants for playwrights, composers, lyricists and librettists who have had a full professional production cancelled, closed, or indefinitely postponed due to the COVID-19 closures.

Huntington Theatre Company has announced that the world premiere family comedy, Our Daughters, Like Pillars has been rescheduled to be a part of the 2020-2021 Huntington season.

Huntington Theatre Company Managing Director Michael Maso announced today after much careful consideration that due to the evolving circumstances surrounding COVID-19, effective immediately, the Huntington Theatre Company will suspend all public performances and events at both the Huntington Avenue Theatre and the Calderwood Pavilion at the BCA until further notice.

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival today announced Branden Jacobs-Jenkins as the 37th and final commissioned artist as part of American Revolutions: the United States History Cycle, OSF's multi-decade program for developing new plays about moments of change in United States history.

PAGE 73 PRODUCTIONS (Page 73) (Michael Walkup, Artistic Director; Amanda Feldman, Managing Director; Rebecca Yaggy, Director of Development; Liz Jones and Asher Richelli, Founding Directors) announced today that applications are open for the 2021 Page 73 Playwriting Fellowship and the Interstate 73 Writers Group.

Huntington Theatre Company has announced the lineup of their 2020-2021 season of destination theatre that features an incredible range of compelling stories -culturally and artistically diverse - unified by the Huntington's commitment to vital, fresh and inclusive entertainment. From stories deeply rooted in Boston's history to star-studded classics, the next chapter in Huntington history is perhaps, the most exciting yet.

Michelle Aguillon has been working as an actor and director in Boston for over 25 years. Her work has spanned from Company One to the Nora Theatre to the Umbrella Theatre Company in Concord. How does she think the past decade treated Boston theatre? She says, a?oeI am excited to see more diversity in Boston theatre a?" not only in casting but behind the scenes as well, with writers, directors, and designers. We are going to see more stories about 'the other' a?" those who have endured being mostly shut out or ignored, stories rarely told from their point of view.a??

Today PEN America announced the major career achievement honors to be presented at the 2020 PEN America Literary Awards.

In David Mamet's book On Directing Film, he breaks down the way a linear narrative can be conveyed by placing images in direct contrast to each other. a?oeThe dream and the film are the juxtaposition of images in order to answer a question.a?? Certainly, with a majority of the action taking place upstage of a scrim and the fusion of filmed and live material, ArtsEmerson's Detroit Red, an original play by Will Power about Malcolm X's early adult life in Roxbury, leaves one feeling more as though one has watched a movie or woken from a dream than sat through a performance. Recently, I also saw Gloria: A Life, which is playing at the American Repertory Theatre. While I admittedly found the show to be trite and pandering, it obtusely fused projection effects with live performance in a way that felt cheap, gimmicky, and more like a new SnapChat filter than anything else. Contrast that with Ari Herzig's film work for Detroit Red, which snaps the audience effectively between viewpoints in black and white and splays broad images across the haziness of Adam Rigg's nondescript set. The success of the production lies in the success of the filmed elements, which establish a framing device, pinpointing the action to an exact moment in time. Additionally, the projections act as effective abstractions, allowing the actors to waver between realism and poetry as photos of their faces appear as oversized watermarks in space. Lighting designer Alan Edwards equally contributes to the cinematic feel of the piece. Sharp shafts of light slice through open space and act, ingeniously, as the camera lens might in film, focusing our attention on specifics and the relevant details. Aside from a few extraneous hat changes for the three actors who take on all the roles in the piece, between the work of Herzig, Rigg, and Edwards, the performance seems to be a study in the logistics of jump-cuts or cross-fades in real time. Adding to the film-instead-of-theatre feeling in the space, the performance actively roused and engaged the audience, which had a huge swathe of Boston school groups present. The crowd felt comfortable verbalizing responses, in part, because of our physical separation from the action presented to us, and to be able to laugh, cheer, gasp, and grimace in solidarity with those around you is a rare treat.

As we embark on our voyage through the 2020s, it will be exciting to see if Lopez's lofty ambitions become a reality. After all, Boston theatre has just come through a huge decade of change in which our city's pertinence to the theatre world has grown. Let's look at how our relevance as a city has changed in regards to theatre as an art form in the past decade: 

PAGE 73 PRODUCTIONS (Page 73) (Michael Walkup, Artistic Director; Amanda Feldman, Managing Director; Rebecca Yaggy, Director of Development; Liz Jones and Asher Richelli, Founding Directors) has named Emma Goidel the 2020 Page 73 Playwriting Fellow. Selected from over 400 applicants, Goidel will receive a $10,000 award and an additional $10,000 budgeted for developing several new plays over the course of the year.

Huntington Theatre Company has announced the cast and creative team for the world premiere family comedy, Our Daughters, Like Pillars. Obie Award-winning playwright and Boston native Kirsten Greenidge (Luck of the Irish, Milk Like Sugar at the Huntington) joins forces with director Kimberly Senior (Sweat and The Niceties at the Huntington; Disgraced on Broadway) to tell the funny and moving story of one whirlwind weekend in the life of a contemporary black American family. Our Daughters, Like Pillars begins performances at the Calderwood Pavilion at the BCA (527 Tremont Street, Boston) on Friday, March 20, 2020 and will run through Sunday, April 19, 2020. The official press opening night is Wednesday, April 1. Tickets are now available.

Huntington Theatre Company has announced the cast and creative team for the Boston premiere of the Pulitzer Prize-winning drama Sweat.  This a?oebreathtakingly timelya?? (The Wall Street Journal), Tony Award-nominated play by two-time Pulitzer Prize winner Lynn Nottage will be directed by Kimberly Senior (Disgraced on Broadway). Sweat begins performances at the Huntington Avenue Theatre (264 Huntington Avenue, Boston) on Friday, January 31, 2020 and runs through Sunday, February 23, 2020. The official press opening night is Wednesday, February 5, 2020. Tickets are now available.

The Repertory Theatre of St. Louis has announced that it will extend its world premiere run of Feeding Beatrice an additional week, adding seven performances from November 19 to 24 due to popular demand.

What you'll find at the end of a long, foggy hall with ominous flickering lights is the home of Lurie and June Walker. Come on in when you get here. Walk across the creaky kitchen floor and take a seat in one of the old wooden chairs along the walls. Don't mind the noises. Don't worry about those sharp flashes of light. You're safe. You're in a a?oegooda??...