Marc Blitzstein News

The Guthrie is pleased to present Frank Theatre's production By the Bog of Cats by Marina Carr, March 13 - April 5 in the Dowling Studio. Single tickets are priced from $18 to $30, with opening night priced at $34. Tickets are now on sale through the Guthrie Box Office at 612.377.2224, toll-free 877.44.STAGE, 612.225.6244 (Group Sales) and online at www.guthrietheater.org. Tickets for a benefit birthday party on March 21, which will celebrate 20 years of Frank Theatre, are available by calling 612.724.3760.

The American Conservatory Theater Master of Fine Arts Program presents Maxim Gorky's Philistines in a fresh new version by Andrew Upton, the co-artistic director of Australia's Sydney Theatre Company and an acclaimed adaptor of Russian plays.

Now that her already legendary run in Gypsy is over, Patti LuPone is set for a number of concert dates throughout the year, in addition to the previously announced dates with Mandy Patinkin for 'An Evening with Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin' she will make a concert stop in Las Vegas at the Orleans Casino & Hotel on June 20th and 21st. She can also be seen (and heard) at the Cincinnati May Festival in Kurt Weil's 'The Seven Deadly Sins', Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra. James Conlon will be the Musical Director for the series of concerts. For her complete schedule visit her official website at, www.pattilupone.net. Patti LuPone swept the 2008 theatre awards winning the Tony, Drama Desk and Outer Critics Circle Awards for Best Actress in a Musical and the Drama League Award for Distinguished Performance for her performance as Rose in the critically-acclaimed new Broadway production of the classic Jule Styne-Stephen Sondheim-Arthur Laurents musical Gypsy, directed by the show's author, Mr. Laurents, currently at the St. James Theatre.

Entertainment Weekly is reporting that Patti LuPone has been cast on 30 Rock to play the mother 'of Judah Friedlander's... well, um, unique Frank'. There's no word on how many episodes LuPone will appear on of the hit show.

The Guthrie is pleased to present Frank Theatre's production of By the Bog of Cats by Marina Carr, March 12 - April 5 in the Dowling Studio. Single tickets are priced from $18 to $30, with opening night priced at $34. Tickets are now on sale through the Guthrie Box Office at 612.377.2224, toll-free 877.44.STAGE, 612.225.6244 (Group Sales) and online at www.guthrietheater.org. Tickets for a benefit birthday party on March 21, which will celebrate 20 years of Frank Theatre, are available by calling 612.724.3760. Set in rural Ireland, By the Bog of Cats mixes the trademark dark humor of the Irish with an uncompromising tale of abandonment and shocking self-sacrifice. Hester Swane (Virginia Burke) is an Irish 'tinker,' a woman born of gypsies, and tied to the bleak landscape of the bog where she has lived her whole life. Her younger lover, Carthage Kilbride (John Catron), with whom she has a daughter, is on the verge of a marriage to another woman that will bring him land, wealth and respect. Refusing to acknowledge that Carthage could ever leave her, Hester grips more tightly and tragically to the life she believes is rightfully hers. In this loose retelling of Euripides' Medea, Marina Carr blends the mythic with the modern, populating the Bog of Cats with misfits, witches, and ghosts. Following the highly successful run of their Ivey Award-winning production of The Pillowman during the Guthrie's 2007-2008 season, Frank returns to the Dowling Studio to bring its fearless, take-no-prisoners style to this bold and uproarious play.

The American Conservatory Theater Master of Fine Arts Program presents Maxim Gorky's Philistines in a fresh new version by Andrew Upton, the co-artistic director of Australia's Sydney Theatre Company and an acclaimed adaptor of Russian plays.

Court Theatre continues its 2008-09 season with the World Premiere translation of Henrik Ibsen's modernist classic The Wild Duck, directed by Artistic Director Charles Newell. The production will run at the MCA Stage at the Museum of Contemporary Art, 220 East Chicago Avenue, January 15 - February 15, 2009.

Court Theatre continues its 2008-09 season with the World Premiere translation of Henrik Ibsen's modernist classic The Wild Duck, directed by Artistic Director Charles Newell. The production will run at the MCA Stage at the Museum of Contemporary Art, 220 East Chicago Avenue, January 15 - February 15, 2009.

Tony Award winning singer and actress Patti LuPone is featured on this week's Associated Press 'On Broadway' podcast. In this interview Jane Waldman reports on LuPone's new CD on Ghostlight Records, 'Patti PuPone at Les Mouches;' a live recording of the legend's 1980 nightclub act that she performed on Saturdays during her run in 'Evita.'

The year was 1980, and Patti LuPone was starring as 'Evita' on Broadway. She was en route to winning the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, and cementing her status as a Broadway star. But there was another Patti LuPone performance taking place -- one that only a comparative handful of people were aware of: Every Saturday night at midnight, for 27 weeks, after performing one of the most demanding roles ever, she made her way to Les Mouches - a legendary nightclub in New York City, to perform a solo concert...This was a one-woman tour de force that -- until now -- only the lucky few who were on hand knew about.

The producers of WEST SIDE STORY have confirmed full casting for the new Broadway production.

In a co-commission with Theatre Royal Bath, ten talented young actors from communities throughout the Bay Area come together for the world premiere of My Life in the Silents by acclaimed playwright Timothy Mason (Dr. Seuss' How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical on Broadway). Designed and directed by A.C.T. Young Conservatory Director Craig Slaight, My Life in the Silents continues the unique international artistic exchange between students from the United States and England. In this playful new comedy set in Hollywood's silent film era, a precocious teenager flees small-town Minnesota to chase her dream of becoming a movie star in Los Angeles-but discovers the road to fame isn't exactly paved with gold.

TimesTalks will present 'Broadway Divas as Gay Icons featuring Patti LuPone' on Monday, Nov 03, 2008 6:30 PM EST at TimesCenter Stage.

A.C.T. Master of Fine Arts Program presents celebrated young playwright and OBIE Award winner Robert O'Hara's Good Breeding, directed by acclaimed director Timothy Douglas, and featuring the A.C.T. M.F.A. Program class of 2009. Sex, murder, revenge-it's all fair game in this extravagant new adaptation of the Greek Oresteia.

American Conservatory Theater (A.C.T.) announced Jean Racine's passionate play Phedre as one of its productions for the 2009-10 season in a first-time coproduction with Canada's prestigious Stratford Shakespeare Festival.

The year was 1980, and Patti LuPone was starring as 'Evita' on Broadway. She was en route to winning the Tony Award for Best Actress in a Musical, and cementing her status as a Broadway star. But there was another Patti LuPone performance taking place -- one that only a comparative handful of people were aware of: Every Saturday night at midnight, for 27 weeks, after performing one of the most demanding roles ever, she made her way to Les Mouches - a legendary nightclub in New York City, to perform a solo concert...This was a one-woman tour de force that -- until now -- only the lucky few who were on hand knew about.

WEST SIDE STORY, the landmark American musical, will return to Broadway in a new production directed by two-time Tony Award winning librettist Arthur Laurents.

Award-winning showbiz entertainers, Corky Hale and Charlotte Rae, will perform in a show emceed by Carl Reiner, with Jeff Lass serving as Music Director. The show, 'A Festive Evening For Westside Center for Independent Living,' is a benefit for WCIL.

Though Julie Wilson was certainly not the first and by all means not the last great singer to have her heart stomped upon by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht's 'Surabaya Johnny,' there is no one I can name more deserving to claim it as their signature song.  (Okay, maybe Lotte Lenya, but you know that's a special case.)  Though for many years now the 83-year-old beloved cabaret star has been singing songs less and less and speaking them more and more, there are few who can match her for painting vivid word pictures and bringing complex dramatic subtext to a lyric.  With pianist Christopher Denny doing a marvelous job of softly supporting her many pauses and tempo changes, Wilson's crushing performance of Marc Blitzstein's translation, played to a pin-drop silent crowd on opening night of her new show at The Metropolitan Room, is an emotionally striking portrayal of a woman who can explode with anger at the mistreatment she endures from her faithless lover while moments later barely control a sob at the admission that she still loves him.  Through the years I've seen Julie Wilson sing 'Surabaya Johnny' many times but her performance that night was the best I've ever seen or heard from anyone.  (And as is typical of her modesty, she actually introduced the song by complimenting Donna Murphy's performance of it on Broadway in LoveMusik.)  She follows it with a devilishly humored 'Mack the Knife' (also Blitzstein's translation) that builds so slowly and precisely that she goes through the entire song twice in order to hit the climax.  I heard no complaints.

PREMIERES, a not-for-profit musical theater development company, proudly announces the world premiere of INNER VOICES: SOLO MUSICALS, three new works created by and starring some of the industry's brightest talents.