When the audience arrives at American Players (APT) Up the Hill Theatre for the opening of William Shakespeare's King Lear, they might believe a presidential press conference will be staged. Green lawn expands into the audience, actors place contemporary white chairs in a distinct pattern and a glass podium greets the audience--and plenty of paparazzi appear to capture the King, the Duke of Gloucester and Duchess of Kent, and Lear's three daughters entering the lawn party. At night under the stars, the royal staging opens when the King appears announcing his 'retirement,' dividing his kingdom to his three progeny. Two dutiful daughters ascend to the podium pronouncing their love, while Cordelia speaks from the back row of chairs, the front of the Up The Hill Theatre. Goneril, Regan and Cordelia were 'dressed to kill', so to speak in sophisticated, fashion worthy coats and the appropriate fascinators, for English royalty, as were the men.This beginning places the audience firmly in a King Lear crafted for the current day, up to the very minute audiences.
Could life be portrayed similar to a steaming cup of tea that eventually grows cool, and finally stone cold? That premise represents one possible physical property of energy, specifically heat, in Tom Stoppard's 1993 play titled Arcadia. At American Players Theatre (APT) Up the Hill stage, Stoppard's contemporary, complex and cunning production poses the duality to life and questions theoretical polar opposites such as order versus chaos. In this absorbing and provocative play where the heat of romantic love interferes with life's scientifically charted course, where the unpredictable and predetermined meet, this APT cast features excellent poetic form when playing what Stoppard also contemplated: 'It is a defect of God's humour that he directs our hearts everywhere but to those who have a right to them.'
In a stellar setting at the Touchstone Theatre in Spring Green, a superb American Players Theatre (APT) cast plays out Samuel Beckett's Endgame. An uncomfortable production to watch on stage, Director Aaron Posner breathes humor and touching life into Beckett's classic one act tragicomedy, a treatise on the end of personal and possibly global life. The desolate, tiny room, which was noted by Beckett himself in the original stage directions to be completely empty, was designed void of any beauty except for a lone terrarium filled with sand and a few artifacts from the lost, viable earth along with loose pages and stacks of books, where Beckett's characters barely survive.
This past week I saw two different musicals that have taken their inspiration from classic Jane Austen novels and, while completely different in size and scale, both have considerable merits. The first is in San Diego where Paul Gordon's to-die-for new musical SENSE AND SENSIBILITY is gracing the stage at The Old Globe.
The Old Globe presents the West Coast premiere of Paul Gordon's delightfully romantic new musical SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, developed with Rick Boynton and presented in association withChicago Shakespeare Theater, where it was commissioned and had its world premiere in April 2015. CST Artistic Director Barbara Gaines returns to the show as director of the Globe production. SENSE AND SENSIBILITY will play now through August 14, 2016 on the Donald and Darlene Shiley Stage in the Old Globe Theatre, part of the Conrad Prebys Theatre Center. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast in action below!
The Old Globe presents the West Coast premiere of Paul Gordon's delightfully romantic new musical SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, developed with Rick Boynton and presented in association with Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where it was commissioned and had its world premiere in April 2015.
The Old Globe presents the West Coast premiere of Paul Gordon's delightfully romantic new musical SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, developed with Rick Boynton and presented in association with Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where it was commissioned and had its world premiere in April 2015.
n a year when the country tries to discern the truth about numerous politician's pasts, presents and futures, Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband attempts to make some sense of blackmail and corruption in the government institutions and individuals who serve their citizens. American Players Theatre takes their audiences Up The Hill for Wilde's summer visual delight. This fascinating production captivates the eye along with the ear dressing the cast in lavish period costumes designed by Matthew J. Lefebvre amid a cream and golden gilded stage, period rooms, courtesy of Scenic Designer Takeshi Kata.
Name one person worth passing through the gates of Hades for while singing a song so sorrowful the stones would weep--A parent? A child? A partner? Perhaps even a true friend? American Players Theatre stages Eurydice, steampunk style in the Touchstone Theatre, recreating Sarah Ruhl's ethereal, surreal play examining love and the lengths someone would travel to serve that love. Based on the Greek myth of lovers Eurydice and musical rock star Orpheus, the child of Calliope and perhaps the God Apollo, Ruhl transforms the myth with a tale in tribute to her own father. Directed by Londoner Tyne Rafaeli, this production acquires a spiritual ambiance drawing the audience into Ruhl's and Rafaeli's underworld where Orpheus searches for Eurydice and literal sobs, tears flowing freely, were heard in the audience on opening day.
Deemed one of the greatest musicals of all time and winner of five Tony Awards including Best Musical, MAN OF LA MANCHA rides into The Marriott Theatre, 10 Marriott Drive, Lincolnshire, running through August 14 with a press opening tonight, June 29 at 8 p.m. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast in action below!
Deemed one of the greatest musicals of all time and winner of five Tony Awards including Best Musical, MAN OF LA MANCHA rides into The Marriott Theatre, 10 Marriott Drive, Lincolnshire, running through August 14 with a press opening on Wednesday, June 29 at 8 p.m. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast in action below!
The Old Globe has announced the complete cast and creative team for the West Coast premiere of Paul Gordon's delightfully romantic new musical SENSE AND SENSIBILITY, developed with Rick Boynton and presented in association with Chicago Shakespeare Theater, where it was commissioned and had its world premiere in April 2015.
Arthur Miller's 1949 Pulitzer Prize winning play Death of a Salesman might be considered by critics the most influential play of the 20th century. American Players Theatre presents a visceral, gut-wrenching production at the Up the Hill Theatre, the scenery drenched in depression glass colored green.: A green bedspread on a tarnished brass bed, a green ice box stands behind a humble green table and four chairs. Envisioned by Scenic Designer Michael Ganio, did he and veteran Director Kenneth Albers infer Willy Loman suffer from depression, was green with envy for his his brother Ben and friend Charley? Or did this particular hue represent the institutional green characterizing hospitals and mental asylums in the '40's and '50's symbolizing the breakdown between a person's memory and reality that Willy and his family struggle with?
Outside the Touchstone Theatre in Spring Green, American Players Theatre (APT) stages an exuberant African Dance accompanied by the thunder of drums and keyboard. The impromptu performance celebrates the legacy of color about to be admired on stage in a production of Carlyle Brown's The African Company Presents Richard III. Set in 1821 New York, the play focuses on actual historical events where a small African-American theater company produced their production of Shakespeare's Richard III on the exact same night the famous Park Theatre owned by Daniel Price opened their production featuring English actor Julius Booth as the deformed king.
Quite refreshing and revitalizing as a summer breeze, American Players Theater (APT) opened their 2016 Up the Hill season in Spring Green with a wild version of William Shakespeare's Comedy of Errors. Directed by the well-known David Frank, this condensed Comedy revisits a slight nod to Lewis Carroll's 'The Adventures of Alice in Wonderland.' The production plays broadly by quoting Shakespeare's verse with a tongue in cheek delivery also heightened by Victorian costumes designed by Fabio Tablini. The imaginative designer envisioned two Dromios which might resemble Tweedle Dum and Tweedle Dee, clothed in wide striped pants, vivid colored jackets and huge straw hats. The story set amid an Ephesus where square marble columns and a great gate placed on the left Up The Hill stage fashioned by Scenic Designer Nayna Ramey, gives Ephesus a rather dream like quality.
Lookingglass Theatre Company continues its 28th Season with Thaddeus and Slocum: A Vaudeville Adventure, written by Ensemble Member Kevin Douglas, and co-directed by Ensemble Member J. Nicole Brooks and Krissy Vanderwarker. Thaddeus and Slocum: A Vaudeville Adventure runs June 1 - August 14, 2016 at Lookingglass Theatre Company, located inside Chicago's historic Water Tower Water Works, 821 N. Michigan Ave. at Pearson. The Press Opening is Saturday, June 11, 2016 at 7:30 p.m.
On the occasion of the 400th Anniversary of Shakespeare's legacy in 2016, Chicago Shakespeare Theater embarks on an epic theatrical endeavor-Artistic Director Barbara Gaines' TUG OF WAR, which distills six Shakespeare histories into two action-packed dramas. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast in action below!
EVITA, one of the most passionate and powerful rock operas in Broadway history, is being presented at The Marriott Theatre (10 Marriott Drive, Lincolnshire), currently in previews an opening April 20 for a run through June 5. BroadwayWorld has a first look at the cast in action below!
