Lorraine Hansberry News

Celebrating the immortal words and trailblazing work of Lorraine Hansberry, The Circle Series will stage a special 50th anniversary reading of her posthumously-compiled work To Be Young, Gifted and Black on Monday, September 30 at 7pm. Produced by Circle in the Square Theatre School (Paul Libin, Present; Susan Frankel, COO), Pigasus Institute, and Rachel Shuey, the staged reading will be held at Broadway's Circle in the Square and is open to the public.

Bay Street Theater & Sag Harbor Center for the Arts announces the film screening of A Raisin in the Sun(1961) on Sunday, October 20 at 2 pm. It is the sixtieth anniversary of the play's first production on Broadway. The film is an adaptation of the play by Lorraine Hansberry. Bay Street Theater will present a live staged version as the 2019 Literature Live! production in November.

Theatre Bay Area, one of the largest regional performing arts service organizations in North America, has announced the finalists of the 2019 TBA Awards. The sixth-annual TBA Awards Celebration will take place on Monday, Nov. 4 at the Herbst Theatre (401 Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco).

Join us at 7:00PM on the evening of September 27th for a feast of gorgeous performances by artists who have worked with JAG in the past and delicious southern home cooking prepared by Piecemeal Pies. Cocktails and dinner begin at 7:00PM at the Newberry Market and performances begin at 8:00PM at Briggs Opera House in White River Junction, VT. 

A Noise Within (ANW) presents the first chronological chapter in Pulitzer Prize winner August Wilson's American Century Cycle, Gem of the Ocean, directed by Gregg T. Daniel. Daniel previously directed ANW's Ovation Award and Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award-nominated production of Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun for the theatre's 2017-2018 season.

a??a??a??a??a??a??a??The Bret Adams and Paul Reisch Foundation is pleased to announce the recipients of their 2019 Idea Awards for Theatre; three grants awarded to adventurous new voices in playwriting and musical theatre, as well the visionary playwrights who have inspired and blazed trails before them.

The National Arts Club (NAC) has selected Inda Craig-Galván as the recipient of the 2019 Kesselring Prize for playwriting. Since 1980, the $25,000 award has been presented to an outstanding playwright deserving of national recognition.

A Noise Within (ANW), California's acclaimed classic repertory theatre company, is proud to present the first chronological chapter in Pulitzer Prize winner August Wilson's American Century Cycle, Gem of the Ocean, directed by Gregg T. Daniel. Daniel previously directed ANW's Ovation Award and Los Angeles Drama Critics Circle Award-nominated production of Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun for the theatre's 2017-2018 season. Gem of the Ocean will run Sept. 22 through Nov. 16, 2019 with press performances on Saturday, Sept. 28 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, Sept. 29 at 2 p.m.

Crowded Fire Theater (CFT), known as a vital home for new play development and production on the West Coast, announced Ard, Keiko Shimosato Carreiro, Everett Elton Bradman, Erin Gilley, and Ashley Smiley as the fourth year IGNITE FUND awardees. The IGNITE FUND awards $10,000 in total annually to support the growth of and enhance the working lives of Bay Area theater designers and technicians through a competitive grant process.

a??a??a??a??a??a??a??Invictus Theatre, a theater company that emerged in November 2017 with an intimate production of OTHELLO and followed it with Shakespeare's comedy LOVE'S LABOUR'S LOST in November 2019, has announced its expansion into a season of two full productions for 2019-20.

Bay Street Theater & Sag Harbor Center for the Arts announces the eleventh year of the Literature Live!program. This year's Literature Live! production will be Lorraine Hansberry's A Raisin in the Sun, directed by Lydia Fort. Bay Street Theater is proud to present this classic work from the American Theater to both its student and public audiences in this, the sixtieth anniversary of the play's first production on Broadway.

The Hangar Theatre Company wraps up its 45th summer season with the Big Play Festival! (BPF!), featuring lightly staged readings of three big plays, all featuring the theme of the American family.

Full casting has been announced for the upcoming Broadway premiere of Slave Play, the acclaimed new work by Jeremy O. Harris, directed by Robert O'Hara.

As BroadwayWorld previously reported, the brand-new Rave Theater Festival is set to launch later this week, running August 9-25, 2019 at Clemente Soto Veléz Cultural and Educational Center (107 Suffolk Street) on the Lower East Side. For its introductory year, Rave Theater Festival has selected a diverse roster of plays, musicals, family-friendly shows, and cross-disciplinary projects.

Crowded Fire Theater (CFT) Christina Anderson returns to Crowded Fire with INKED BABY, the second production in Crowded Fire's 21st season of new and contemporary plays.  Featuring an ensemble cast directed by Crowded Fire Resident Artist Lisa Marie Rollins, INKED BABY introduces a world that is at once both familiar and strange, and questions why we hold on to home even when that land is toxic. 

Aurora Theatre Company opens its dynamic 28th season with the Bay Area Premiere of Ike Holter's  EXIT STRATEGY. Aurora's new Artistic Director Josh Costello will direct this powerful examination of the Chicago public school system. 

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival will open How To Catch Creation, helmed by Incoming Artistic Director Nataki Garrett in her OSF directorial debut, on July 27 in the Thomas Theatre. Preview performances are July 23, 25 and 26, and the play runs through Oct. 26, 2019.

Today, Rebel Theater Company, in association with the NAACP Brooklyn Branch Equity in the Arts and Culture Committee, and Rave Theater Festival, announced Sweet Lorraine, a new play written by Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj and Adam Mace, and conceived and directed by Rajendra Ramoon Maharaj.

BroadwayWorld first reported last month that SLAVE PLAY will come to Broadway this fall. Producers Greg Nobile and Jana Shea of Seaview Productions, Troy Carter, Level Forward, and Nine Stories, founded by Jake Gyllenhaal and Riva Marker, have officially announced that the acclaimed new play by Jeremy O. Harris, directed by Robert O'Hara, will be coming to Broadway's Golden Theatre (252 West 45th Street) this fall. The strictly limited 17-week engagement will begin preview performances Tuesday, September 10, ahead of an official opening night of Sunday, October 6.

Bruce Norris' Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning play, Clybourne Park, opens Friday, June 28. The Lyric Repertory Company (Lyric), part of the Caine College of the Arts at USU, features their third venue of the season-the Black Box Theatre.