Lynn Ahrens News

Karen Akers, international chanteuse and cabaret star, returns for her ninth consecutive spring engagement at the legendary Oak Room at the Algonquin Hotel (59 West 44th Street between 5th & 6th Avenues).

Marin Mazzie and Brian Stokes Mitchell, who starred in Ragtime, have just joined the program as special guest stars and will be performing at a special event at NYPL.

THE LEAGUE OF OFF-BROADWAY THEATRES AND PRODUCERS today announced the nominations for THE 23rd ANNUAL LUCILLE LORTEL AWARDS FOR OUTSTANDING ACHIEVEMENT OFF-BROADWAY, which will be presented on Monday, May 5th at the Union Square Theatre (100 East 17th Street).

Broadway Cares/ Equity Fights AIDS is proud to present a special performance of PAMELA'S FIRST MUSICAL, a new musical with music by Tony Award® winner Cy Coleman, lyrics by Tony Award® winner David Zippel, book by Tony® & Pulitzer Award winner Wendy Wasserstein and directed by Tony Award® nominee Graciela Daniele, on Sunday, May 18 at 3 PM at Town Hall (123 West 43rd Street) with a reception at Sardi's immediately following. Proceeds will benefit BC/EFA and Theatre Development Fund's Open Doors Program, which Wasserstein founded.

Composer Stephen Flaherty (Ragtime, My Favorite Year) attended the opening night performance of A Man Of No Importance at the Bailiwick Repertory Theatre in Chicago last night.

Mitchell Marcus and his Acting up Stage troupe have another winner with their breathtakingly simple staging of A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE at the Berkeley Street Theatre Upstaurs until March 22. Do not miss this one! * * * * * (OUT OF 5)

The ASCAP Foundation is pleased to announce that six new musical works have been selected for presentation at the annual ASCAP Foundation/Disney Musical Theatre Workshop in New York.

Celebrate the genius of Oscar Wilde, the boisterous streets of Dublin and the joys of creating live theatre through this heartfelt story…

The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts delves into its renowned collections for Writing to Character: Songwriters & the Tony Awards, the first exhibition to explore the over 70 Broadway shows that have won Tonys for either Best Musical or Best Score.

Based on the exuberant Broadway musical, Seussical will open March 6 and run through May 10 at The Marriott Theatre for Young Audiences

The deadline for submitting scripts and materials for consideration for the New York Musical Theatre Festival's 2008 Next Link Project - the open-submission program that will select more than half of the three dozen new musicals at the 5th annual NYMF in the fall - has been extended one week to March 7. The 2008 New York Musical Theatre Festival is scheduled to run from September 15 through October 5 at various venues throughout New York City

The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts delves into its renowned collections for Writing to Character: Songwriters & the Tony Awards, the first exhibition to explore the over 70 Broadway shows that have won Tonys for either Best Musical or Best Score.

Ragtime, a brand new concert staging of the epic Tony Award-winning musical and the inaugural production of the Broadway in Concert series at the White Plains Performing Arts Center, performs February 1-3, 2008.

The New York Musical Theatre Festival (NYMF) is pleased to announce the Grand Jury for this year's Next Link Project, the writer-service program whose 18 selections will comprise more than half of the musicals at the fifth annual New York Musical Theatre Festival, September 15 through October 5

The BMI Musical Theatre Workshop is a one-of-a-kind program with the soul purpose of fostering creativity in the art of musical theatre, and to provide the footing for tomorrow's composers and lyricists whose music may one day leap from the page and onto the stage. Tony Award-winning composer and lyricist, Maury Yeston, teaches the Advanced Workshop class and shares some of the remarkable history and opportunities BMI offers.

'Homecoming' is the theme of Barrington Stage Company's 14th Season. The theatre that developed and premiered William Finn and Rachel Sheinkin's The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee on its Stage II in 2004 welcomes home the award-winning Broadway hit to its Mainstage from June 11 through July 12. Long-time BSC director Rob Ruggiero returns to direct Richard Greenberg's The Violet Hour, which will play July 17 through August 2. Julianne Boyd will direct Noel Coward's delicious battle-of-the-sexes comedy Private Lives starring Christopher Innvar from August 7 through 24. Private Lives marks the fifth stage collaboration between Boyd and Innvar.

From January 1 through March 1, NYMF will be accepting open submissions for The Next Link Project, through which 18 subsidized production slots in our 2008 Festival are awarded.