Martha Wilkinson News

Looking into the future, you'll find a number of new productions on tap for your entertainment pleasure, thanks to the efforts of theater companies all over Middle Tennessee. Here's our calendar to help you plot your course...

For plenty of fast-paced action, along with some stellar performances by a fresh-faced cast of eager young theatrical triple threats and a coterie of Nashville stage favorites, one need look no further than Disney's Newsies, the latest onstage offering from Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre, the iconic Music City venue that's been entertaining audiences for more than half a century. In its way, The Barn (as it is affectionately known in these parts) and its laudable history ensure that its treatment of the popular musical theater title lend the show's historical basis more than a little gravitas in the making of a stage spectacle.

Today, The Thursday Five(+1) shines the spotlight on four members of the Chaffin's Barn cast of Newsies - David Ridley, Samantha Blake, Natalie Rankin and Kayla Petrille - who took time out from their rigorous regimen of rehearsals to tell our readers more about themselves and to offer their own suggestions for why you should come see their show, which runs through October 22.

Country comedy legend Minnie Pearl is brought to life thanks to Minnie Pearl: All The News From Grinder's Switch, a musical comedy revue making its debut this weekend at Nashville's Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre in a very limited, four performance engagement through September 13. Directed with obvious respect by Joy Tilley Perryman and featuring a top-flight ensemble of tremendously talented actors, the newly created show from Belmont University professor and music historian Don Cusic takes a lovingly nostalgic look at the show business career of Sarah Ophelia Colley Cannon, the Hickman County native who rose to the top ranks of country stardom with the comic creation of her alter ego.

My heart is full for many reasons, not the least of which is that I can say, henceforth, that the last production of Steel Magnolias that I reviewed - this one at The Larry Keeton Theatre in Donelson through Saturday, September 1 - was almost as good as that very first production I saw in Chicago in the summer of 1988. In fact, direct Donna Driver and her cast deliver a reading of Steel Magnolias that is as close to what Robert Harling wrote more than 30 years ago as any I've ever seen.

Nashville's iconic Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre is back and better than ever! After some six months - and 50 or more years since its debut - the newly renovated and gorgeously appointed Chaffin's Barn has reopened with a rousing production of Sister Act, the habit-forming musical that played to sold-out audiences last summer.

Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre, Nashville's iconic professional theater, opens its 2018 season - its 52nd! - with an entertaining, if somewhat overly long, production of Disney's Freaky Friday, the new musical with a starry musical theater pedigree.

With a new year quickly approaching, staff members at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre are already hard at work on the first production of 2018 and recently announced plans to give the old girl an update following a momentous first year of Norma Luther's ownership of the venerable theater. On opening night of the holiday season musical A Wonderful Life, Luther announced that the company currently In its 51st year of bringing professional theater to Nashville will temporarily close its doors to undergo significant renovations to ensure its history continues for at least another half-century.

George Bailey's story is a universal one, so much so that some 70 years after the film treatment of It's A Wonderful Life debuted, the tale of an upstanding citizen faced with failure and ruin, has become one of the most beloved holiday-season tales of all time. But the initial reaction of movie-goers to the film, although not nearly so dire as some cinema historians would have you believe, is considered one of the best-reviewed movies of all time.

Feeling the urge to let your imagination run wild, your spirit to soar or to just leave the world in which you live and go on an adventure? Sounds like a trip to the theater is in order! Luckily, companies all over the Volunteer State have been hard at work, creating new productions to transform and to transport, shows that will entertain you this summer. That's where THE NASHVILLE THEATER CALENDAR comes in handy: Peruse our listings every week to find out what shows you should see!

Feeling the urge to let your imagination run wild, your spirit to soar or to just leave the world in which you live and go on an adventure? Sounds like a trip to the theater is in order! Luckily, companies all over the Volunteer State have been hard at work, creating new productions to transform and to transport, shows that will entertain you this summer. That's where THE NASHVILLE THEATER CALENDAR comes in handy: Peruse our listings every week to find out what shows you should see!

If not for the fact that she is already one on Broadway, it could be said that Rachel Potter's performance in Mamma Mia! - which opened last night at Nashville's historic Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre - was, without doubt or without danger of fulsome exaggeration a "starmaking turn." With a glorious voice and stage presence to spare, Potter's Sophie seized control of the opening night audience from the very first moment she stepped onto the stage, never relinquishing control for one second, even when sharing the stage with the redoubtable Martha Wilkinson, the undisputed queen of musical theatre in Music City.

Feeling the urge to let your imagination run wild, your spirit to soar or to just leave the world in which you live and go on an adventure? Sounds like a trip to the theater is in order! Luckily, companies all over the Volunteer State have been hard at work, creating new productions to transform and to transport, shows that will entertain you this summer. That's where THE NASHVILLE THEATER CALENDAR comes in handy: Peruse our listings every week to find out what shows you should see!

Here's an oft-proven truism, if not a fact, about theater in Nashville: If Martha Wilkinson is the star of a particular show - any show, whether it's Noises Off, Chicago, Little Shop of Horrors, Sister Act (well, you get my drift) - you can rest assured that she will (A) play the role to the hilt, (B) knock your socks off with her timing and delivery and (C) you'll believe that, no matter how many times you've seen a show, any show, it was as if you were seeing it for the first time.

In the coming days, leading up to opening night on Thursday, September 7, members of the cast take on our Mamma Mia 5 questions, to offer up some reasons for you to make sure you're in their audience through October 21. Today's edition features one of Nashville's most popular and in-demand actors, the talented Austin Olive.

Bradley Moore has always had a lot of theatrical projects going on since he settled in Music City a few years back. But ever since Norma Luther became the owner of Nashville's iconic Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre in early 2017 - and he became assistant artistic director - he's only gotten busier. With this summer's first musical hit (Sister Act) to his credit, his resume is growing yet again with the Barn's production of the ABBA megamusical Mamma Mia, which opens next Thursday at the eponymous red barn on Highway 100 in West Nashville.

Feeling the urge to let your imagination run wild, your spirit to soar or to just leave the world in which you live and go on an adventure? Sounds like a trip to the theater is in order! Luckily, companies all over the Volunteer State have been hard at work, creating new productions to transform and to transport, shows that will entertain you this summer. That's where THE NASHVILLE THEATER CALENDAR comes in handy: Peruse our listings every week to find out what shows you should see!

In the coming days, leading up to opening night on Thursday, September 7, members of the cast take on our Mamma Mia 5 questions, to offer up some reasons for you to make sure you're in their audience through October 21. First up, today's edition features Jenna Pryor, Curtis Reed and Heather Hershow.

In the coming days, leading up to opening night on Thursday, September 7, members of the cast take on our Mamma Mia 5 questions, to offer up some reasons for you to make sure you're in their audience through October 21. First up, today's edition features Taylor Novak, Gracie McGraw and Anna Carroll.

In the coming days, leading up to opening night on Thursday, September 7, members of the cast take on our Mamma Mia 5 questions, to offer up some reasons for you to make sure you're in their audience through October 21. First up, today's edition features David Arnold, Greg Frey and Sarah Zanotti.