McDonald News

At the Bal du Paradis, 'La Mome' Pistache presents the Can Can.

Singer/songwriter and five-time Grammy Award winner Michael McDonald's new holiday compilation, Season of Peace: The Christmas Collection, is out now via BMG. The album features McDonald's most beloved Christmas recordings including “White Christmas/Winter Wonderland” (feat. Jonny Lang), “Oh Holy Night,” “Christmas on the Bayou” and “Children Go Where I Send Thee” (feat. Twinkie Clark), as well as a new version of “Winter Wonderland” featuring special guest Jake Shimabukuro. The album art hails from an original painting by McDonald himself; see below for a complete track list.

The Drama League (Executive Artistic Director, Gabriel Stelian-Shanks) has announced the roster of special guest performers for its 35th Annual Benefit Gala: A Musical Celebration of Broadway honoring film, television, theater icon and three-time Tony Award winner Nathan Lane. The black-tie evening, which will also celebrate theater producer Fran Weissler for Visionary Leadership in American Theater, will take place on Monday, November 5, 2018 beginning at 6:30 p.m. in New York City at The Plaza (768 Fifth Avenue). The Gala Co-Chairs are Kathy Henderson, Janet M. Kagan, and Joseph Pizza.

Tonight, Carnegie Hall opened its 2018-2019 season with a sold out gala benefit concert featuring the San Francisco Symphony conducted by Music Director and Carnegie Hall Perspectives artist Michael Tilson Thomas. The program included Gershwin's Cuban Overture and An American in Paris as well as Liszt's Mephisto Waltz No. 1. Mr. Tilson Thomas and the orchestra were joined on this celebratory occasion by renowned sopranos Renee Fleming and Audra McDonald offering vocal selections by Gershwin, Rodgers, Villa-Lobos, Stephen Sondheim, and others.

Pittsburgh CLO is proud to announce the cast of the world premiere of GAME ON , November 9, 2018 - January 27, 2019 at the CLO Cabaret. GAME ON is the second musical to be given a world premiere from Pittsburgh CLO's inaugural SPARK festival, which showcased musicals designed to cultivate the next generation of small-cast shows that will thrive in small venues around the country. GAME ON is written by Pittsburgh CLO alums Marcus Stevens and David Dabbon. Tickets for this hilarious game show extravaganza are now available online at CLOCabaret.com, by phone at 412-456-6666 or in person at the Theater Square Box Office, and start at $31.25.

Peak Performances continues its galvanizing 2018-19 season with Liz Gerring Dance Company's field (October 18-21), the final installment in a trilogy of works Peak Performances has commissioned from the acclaimed choreographer.

Theater stalwart Jamie Du Mont, Lucille Lortel Award winner Leslie Kritzer, writer and theater critic Rob Russo, and Tony Award nominee Jennifer Simard just launched their brand-new Broadway-centric podcast, The Fabulous Invalid.

The life of late legendary producer Craig Zadan will be celebrated by the Educational Theatre Foundation (ETF) - the organization dedicated to supporting theatre arts in schools and nurturing students all over the country - at the organization's annual West Coast gala Thespians Go Hollywood - Honoring the Life and Work of Craig Zadan. The celebration will take place on November 11, 2018 at the Academy of Television Arts & Sciences' headquarters in North Hollywood.  The announcement was made by Robert Greenblatt, Chairman, NBC Entertainment, and Julie Cohen Theobald, President of the Educational Theatre Foundation.

With just over a week until the 2nd annual “Heal The Music Day,” held Friday, October 19, 2018, the Country Music Association has teamed with Music Health Alliance to offer a matching contribution for donations raised within the music industry. CMA will match dollar for dollar donations in support of “Heal The Music Day,” up to $100,000. Every dollar donated equals $30 in life-saving healthcare resources to Heal The Music.

Producer Mark Cortale's sixth annual Broadway @ NOCCA series kicks off on Thursday, November 1, 2018 at 7:30pm when internationally renowned star of opera and musical theatre, Marisol Montalvo, brings her acclaimed new show MAD SCENE to NOCCA's Lupin Hall! Tickets start at $30 and can be purchased at BroadwayNOLA.com or by calling 800-838-3006. Lupin Hall is located on the NOCCA campus at 2800 Chartres Street.

The Bishop Arts Theatre Center (BATC), Oak Cliff's multicultural and multidiscipline center for the arts, opens its 25th Anniversary "Silver Stories" season with the regional premiere of playwright Amy Evan's play The Champion, running October 11th - 28th.

It's been twenty years this week since a homophobic stain was placed on America when a 21 year old young gay man was robbed, brutally beaten, and left for dead tied to a fence for 18 hours outside of Laramie, Wyoming. It will be twenty years to the day on Oct 12th that he died shortly after midnight from that horrible tragedy. Matthew Shepard has become a face for hate crimes, tolerance, and the LGBT community in part to the incredible work the Matthew Shepard Foundation has done over the past two decades to erase hate. 

The producers of the UK & Ireland Tour of Leslie Bricusse's much loved musical Doctor Dolittle, which opens at the Churchill Theatre Bromley on 9 November, with a national press night at the New Theatre Oxford on 17 January 2019, are delighted to announce their support of WWF.

ABC News' “Nightline” averaged 1.231 million Total Viewers, 433,000 Adults 25-54, and 330,000 Adults 18-49, during the week of Oct. 1, 2018, based on Live + Same Day Data from Nielsen Media Research. “Nightline” led CBS' “The Late Late Show with James Corden” (420,000 and 320,000, respectively) in Adults 25-54 (+13,000) and Adults 18-49 (+10,000).

Beck Center for the Arts' annual Spotlight gala will delight and dazzle guests once again at the beautiful and unique Cleveland Grays Armory Museum. The benefit will take place on Saturday, November 10 at 6 p.m. This year's Honorees are Iris November and Rosemary Corcoran, dear friends to each other and to Beck Center. Iris, a longtime supporter and sponsor of Beck Center for the Arts Youth Theater, and Rosemary Corcoran, past board president and advocate of Beck Center will join together, as east meets west to celebrate a common theme of providing art experiences to all people.

Hale Center Theater Orem's ANYTHING GOES crew members, aboard the luxury cruise ship or unseen production stowaways, are first-class. The gifted Jennifer Hill-Barlow as director-choreographer deeply impresses and brings brilliance to this classic gem.

THE GREEN ROOM 42 will present VIVIAN REED in an encore performance of her centennial tribute to entertainment icon Lena Horne on Saturday, October 20 at 7:00 PM. The evening is back by popular demand after the first show at the venue on Horne's birthday this summer. 

The 8th Annual World Choreography Awards (WCA) will be held on October 23 at The Saban Theatre in Beverly Hills. The Choreography Awards, produced and directed by Allen Walls and Cheryl Baxter-Ratliff, are a global awards show celebrating and honoring the best in media choreography. The WCA recognizes choreographic achievement in 8 categories: Motion Picture, Music Video, Commercials, Television Episodic, Television Award Show/Specials, Digital Content, Digital Content Independent and Television Reality Show/Competition.

In autumn, from October 12 - 21, Clocktower Players' Award-Winning Adult Troupe is honored to present THE LARAMIE PROJECT, a deeply moving play about bigotry and tolerance, fear and courage, hate and hope.  Twenty years ago, Matthew Shepard died on October 12, 1998 after being brutally attacked, tied to a fence and left to die in a field outside of Laramie, Wyoming.