Manhattan Theatre Club News

Veils is a two-woman show featuring actors Fathiya Ritter and Alaji. The design team includes Parmida Ziaei (set/props designer), Sadiqua Iman (costume designer), Johanna Melamed (sound designer), Suzi Tucker (projection designer), Zanna King (lighting designer), Mike Stephens (tech supervisor), and Madison Silva (stage manager).

Lookingglass Theatre Company announces casting for the world premiere of The Steadfast Tin Soldier: A Christmas Pantomime, from the story by Hans Christian Andersen, conceived and directed by Ensemble Member Mary Zimmerman. This family-friendly, holiday show runs November 7, 2018 - January 13, 2019 at Lookingglass Theatre Company, located inside Chicago's historic Water Tower Water Works, 821 N. Michigan Ave. at Pearson. 

Manhattan Theatre Club's world premiere of India Pale Ale, written by Jaclyn Backhaus and directed by Will Davis, and New York premiere of The Niceties, written by Eleanor Burgess and directed by Kimberly Senior, are now playing their final two weeks of performances. Both plays must close on Sunday, November 18th atMTC's New York City Center - Stage I and Stage II (131 West 55th Street).

The Fred Ebb Foundation in association with the Roundabout Theatre Company will present the fourteenth annual Fred Ebb Award for aspiring musical theatre songwriters to Will Reynolds and Eric Price. The award, named in honor of the late award-winning lyricist Fred Ebb, will be presented by Alan Cumming on Monday, November 26th from 6-8pm at a by-invitation-only ceremony in the Penthouse Lounge of The American Airlines Theater.

Ben Lockwood, Rupert Henderson and Oliver Kaderbhai today announce the full cast for the hit Off-Broadway musical Striking 12 from Tony Award-winning Rachel Sheinkin and musical duo Brendan Milburn and Valerie Vigoda. Oliver Kaderbhai directs Declan Bennett (Brendan), Bronte Barbe (The Match Girl), Danielle Kassarate (Narrator), with Kate Robson-Stuart and Leon Scott completing the cast. Inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's The Little Match Girl, Striking 12 will open at the Union Theatre on 3 December, with previews from 28 November and runs until 23 December.

Achingly human, and surprisingly funny! TheFountain Theatre presents the West Coast premiere of Cost of Living, the 2018 Pulitzer Prize-winning play by Martyna Majok. John Vreeke directs for a Nov. 2 opening, with performances continuing through Dec.16.

The Alley Theatre announces the line-up for the 2019 Alley All New Festival, January 18 - January 27, 2019. The fourth annual Festival will feature a world premiere production, readings and workshop performances of five new plays, as well as an Early Draft Preview of a new musical. Festival playwrights include Robert Askins, Hilary Bettis, Glen Berger, Chisa Hutchinson, Claire Kiechel, Don Nguyen, and Lawrence Wright. Special packages are available for the final weekend of the Festival and include prime seating at all presentations, exclusive artist access, and meals between performances. Packages can be booked now at alleytheatre.org/allnew or by calling the Box Office at 713-220-5700. Advance reservations for individual events are recommended and can be made on November 26 at alleytheatre.org. All readings and workshop performances are free and open to the public.

The Broadway production of Harper Lee's To Kill A Mockingbird, a new play by Aaron Sorkin, starring Jeff Daniels as Atticus Finch, begins previews tonight, Thursday, November 1. Get to know the cast below as they begin Broadway performances!

Theatre production company Parity Productions has released its monthly list of Qualifying Productions for December -their popular directory of New York City shows in which the individual creative teams have 50% of the positions filled with cis women and trans and gender nonfconforming (TGNC) artists (directors, designers, and playwrights). 

Manhattan Theatre Club's American premiere of The Nap, written by Olivier Award nominee Richard Bean (One Man, Two Guvnors) and directed by Tony Award winner Daniel Sullivan (Lillian Hellman's The Little Foxes; Rabbit Hole; Proof) is playing its final two weeks of performances. The play must close on Sunday, November 11th at the Samuel J. Friedman Theatre (261 West 47th Street).

The Children, written by British playwright, Lucy Kirkwood, made its debut in November 2016 at the Royal Court (London, UK) and subsequently opened on Broadway a year later at the Manhattan Theatre Club, earning two Tony Award nominations, including Best Play. Now, after a successful run at Canadian Stage last month, directed by Centaur Theatre's Artistic and Executive Director, Eda Holmes, the production makes its Quebec premiere at Centaur from November 6 to 25, 2018.

AUDELCO has announced the nominees for their 2018 'Viv' Awards, honoring Black Theatre in New York City.

Ben Lockwood, Rupert Henderson and Oliver Kaderbhai today announce acclaimed Off-Broadway musical, Striking 12 at the Union Theatre this Christmas. The production, inspired by the short story by Hans Christian Andersen, The Little Match Girl, is directed by Oliver Kaderbhai, opening on 3 December, with previews from 28 November and runs until 23 December.

Theatre Exile opens its 2018/2019 season with Itamar Moses's Completeness. Elliot builds a computer program to help Molly with her research project, and the variables in their evolving relationship shift as rapidly as the terms of their experiment. This incredibly seductive and ridiculously intelligent comedy by 2018 Tony Award-winner Itamar Moses explores the chemistry between smart, damaged people and what happens when they lose control of the science.

New York Stage and Film has announced that Donja R. Love's soft will be the second installation in their NYC Reading Series at Barnard College, held on Monday, October 29th at 7:00pm at the Glicker-Milstein Theater at The Diana Center. Directed by Awoye Timpo, the cast of soft features Gabriel Diego Hernandez, Galen Ryan Kane, Obie and AUDELCO Award winner Russell G. Jones, Andy Lucien, Joshua E. Nelson, Cristina Pitter, Lortel Award nominee Namir Smallwood, Ryan Jamaal Swain, and James Udom.

The Niceties is now playing at MTC's The Studio at Stage II - Harold and Mimi Steinberg New Play Series at New York City Center (131 W. 55th Street).

Manhattan Theatre Club's New York premiere of The Niceties, written by Eleanor Burgess and directed by Kimberly Senior (Disgraced), opened last night, October 25, at The Studio at Stage II - Harold and Mimi Steinberg New Play Series at New York City Center (131 W. 55th Street). Let's see what the critics are saying...

In honor of New York City Center's 75th Anniversary Season, the institution is presenting a program of visual art commissions for the first time in its history. One of three commissioned works, artist and educator Nina Robinson offers her latest project, a series of portraits entitled Home, on display to the public in the through-block passage adjacent to City Center. The exhibition features a variety of artists to whom City Center provides an artistic home including, Victoria Clark, Robert Fairchild, Jake Gyllenhaal, and Brian Stokes Mitchell. Robinson is joined by architect Jorge Otero-Pailos and conceptual artist Lawrence Weiner as part of this special visual art program.

In The Italian in Me, a doe-eyed aspiring actress from Canada - who has been raised on a heaping dose of old-fashioned values & Roman Catholic guilt - upends her life by moving to Italy. With her, she brings a tiny bit of cash and grandiose dreams of working in Italian Cinema. Once in Rome, she quickly discovers that things in the Eternal City are not quite as holy or as romantic as she had imagined. Her days are filled with countless fruitless encounters with perverts, priests, producers and statues of Saints in old churches, to whom she pleads for help. But help does not come. Not even a chance siting of the Pope at St. Peter's brings her any closer to her dream. When all hope seems lost, she meets the cinematic Maestro himself, Federico Fellini at Cinecitta' Studios for what turns out to be a very 'illuminating' encounter, but will it be the 'Dolce Vita' she was searching for?

Theatre Communications Group (TCG), the national organization for theatre, is pleased to announce the recipients of the second and third rounds of the 2018 Edgerton Foundation New Play Awards. The awards, totaling $1,114,000 allow 27 productions extra time for the development and rehearsal of new plays with the entire creative team, hoping to extend the life of the world premiere play after its first run.