Mike McShane News

A new batch of Fringe favourites, including Paul Merton, NewsRevue and Wizard Presents, are now on-sale as they get ready to take to Pleasance's stages this summer.

Written over 200 years ago, Mary Shelley's Gothic masterpiece retains all of its power to horrify and fascinate. This original L.A. Theatre Works commission is adapted from Shelley's novel by the BBC's Kate McAll, who wowed audiences with last season's A Room with a View. Celebrated actor Stacy Keach stars in the role of “The Creature,' and Adhir Kalyan (Arrested Development, Rules of Engagement, LATW production of The Hard Problem) is Dr. Victor Frankenstein.

The world premiere of Frankenstein - Written over 200 years ago, Mary Shelley's Gothic masterpiece retains all of its power to horrify and fascinate. This original L.A. Theatre Works commission is adapted from Shelley's novel by the BBC's Kate McAll, who wowed audiences with last season's A Room with a View, and stars celebrated actor Stacy Keach in the role of 'The Creature.'

When you live in a big city with vibrant, diverse neighborhoods, you tend to forget that there are still people and places where residents living out and openly can be threatened or harmed. That very safe and sound bubble is burst in Diana Son's powerful 'Stop Kiss,' an intense and intriguing look at one couple's love and trauma in New York City's West Village in the 1990s.

LAB RESULTS: The Antaeus Playwrights Lab Festival a?" Six new plays by award-winning, mid-career writers get developmental readings over the course of two weekends as part of Antaeus Theatre Company's second annual LAB RESULTS series. Each of the plays was developed in the Antaeus Playwrights Lab, an ongoing program that incubates new works that provide compelling roles for actors and creates a nurturing and supportive artistic community.  Last fall, two plays from the 2018 LAB RESULTS festival, The Abuelas by Stephanie Alison Walker and Eight Nights by Jennifer Maisel, were given critically acclaimed full productions as part of Antaeus' 2019-20 season.

STOP KISS, by the American playwright Diana Son, tells the story of two women, Sara and Callie, who are assaulted on the street after their first kiss. STOP KISS was first produced Off-Broadway in 1998 at The Public Theater in New York City. Kanomé Jones will direct. The play will be performed in the intimate Buena stage at the Pride Arts Center, 4147 N. Broadway. The press opening is Thursday, January 16, 2020, following a preview on Wednesday, January 15.

Full cast and crew have been announced for Pride Films and Plays co-production with The Arc Theatre of STOP KISS, by the American playwright Diana Son. It tells the story of two women, Sara and Callie, who are assaulted on the street after their first kiss.

OFF the TOP! with JASON KRAVITS, the solo, completely improvised musical, flies home to Birdland Theater on December 8th at 7pm. The lights come up, the music starts, and Jason Kravits walks on stage with... nothing. No script, no songs, no story. Over the course of an exhilarating 75 minutes, he keeps you on the edge of your seat by using audience suggestions pulled from a fishbowl (e.g. 'The last text you received,' 'Words to live by,' etc.) to create an entire life story in song, with every bit of it- including every lyric and melody- made up by Jason on the spot! Backed by the most fearless band in the business, OFF the TOP! is music, comedy, improv, cabaret, and magic, all stirred together and poured into a one-man martini glass, creating one intoxicating cocktail of fun!

Full cast and crew have been announced for Pride Films and Plays' production of THE CHRISTMAS FOUNDLING, by Norman Allen. The play is the story of a 10-year old boy who was found as an infant in the California Sierras by two Gold Rush miners one Christmas Eve.

Pride Films and Plays' Jeff-recommended production of  A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE, the Chicago area's first revival in over a decade of the heartwarming musical created by Lynn Ahrens, Stephen Flaherty, and Terrence McNally, has been extended for one additional week due to popular and critical demand. The musical will now close with the 2:30 pm matinee on Sunday, November 17.

Pride Films and Plays will stage the first Chicago production in more than a decade of A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE, the heartwarming musical created by Lynn Ahrens, Stephen Flaherty, and Terrence McNally, the team that wrote RAGTIME and ANASTASIA. A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE is based on a 1994 film starring Albert Finney and features a gorgeous Irish-influenced score.

OFF the TOP! with JASON KRAVITS, the solo, completely improvised musical, flies home to Birdland Theater on December 8th at 7pm.

The 1993 AIDS-themed musical ALL THAT HE WAS that opened on August 12, earning rave reviews and a Jeff recommendation, will extend its run by one week and will now close on Sunday, September 15.

Come on down to the Barn's final production of the 2019 season and watch the blood fly ONE WEEK ONLY August 27 a?" September 1. EVIL DEAD THE MUSICAL takes all the elements of the cult classic films and combines them for one of the craziest, funniest theatrical experiences of all time. It's a bloody comedy start to finish!

Pride Films and Plays has announced that $5 of each ticket sold for each Friday 8pm performance of ALL THAT HE WAS, the Jeff-recommended musical that opened on Monday August 12, will go toward one of four Chicago-area charities that provides services and advocacy for those impacted by HIV/AIDS.

Pride Films and Plays will stage the first Chicago production in more than a decade of A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE, the heartwarming musical created by Lynn Ahrens, Stephen Flaherty, and Terrence McNally, the team that wrote RAGTIME and ANASTASIA. A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE is based on a 1994 film starring Albert Finney as a Dublin bus conductor and features a gorgeous Irish-influenced score. Donterrio Johnson, the Jeff award-winning actor who directed PFP's BUYER AND CELLAR earlier this year and is currently appearing in THE SPITFIRE GRILL with American Blues Theater, will direct. Music direction is by Robert Ollis, who most recently music directed SOUTHERN COMFORT for Pride Films and Plays and was a 2019 Jeff nominee for his music direction of HAYMARKET: A NEW FOLK MUSICAL. Ollis was Music Director for the 2008 production of A MAN OF NO IMPORTANCE, which earned five Jeff Award nominations for Bailiwick Repertory.

Digital arts journal Stage Raw announces the nominees for its fifth annual Stage Raw Theater Awards, to be held Monday night September 9, 2019, at Los Angeles Theatre Center, 514 S. Spring Street. Doors open at 6:30 p.m. The show starts at 7:30 p.m. Tickets will go on sale Wednesday August 7, 2019. The Stage Raw Theater Awards honor the finest work performed on Los Angeles area stages of 99-seats or fewer, and are selected by a jury of Stage Raw critics. This year's awards celebrate work performed between June 1, 2018 and May 31, 2019.

Believe it or not, one of the greatest TV shows of our time recently celebrated its 30th anniversary, and what better way to commemorate than with a live Fringe extravaganza at Underbelly's McEwan Hall - for the full month!

Today (Wed 22 May) EdFest.com, a partnership between Assembly, Gilded Balloon, Pleasance and Underbelly celebrates twelve years of working together, with the launch of its new programme for 2019.

Today Underbelly announces the iconic improvisational comedy show Whose Line Is It Anyway? Live at the Fringe featuring Marcus Brigstocke and Phill Jupitus, alongside original improv legends, as part of its Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2019 line-up.