Paul Cook News

When director Paul Cook held auditions for Circle Players' production of Stephen Sondheim's Company, he had no trouble finding a devoted and enthusiastic cast for the show, which opens January 6 at the Keeton Theatre.

After that huge success, BroadwayWorld.com announces two awards presentations for Tennessee theater this year, with awards to be presented for Nashville productions and for Tennessee productions outside Music City USA. You may make nominations throughout the month of October, with voting for the awards starting in November, and the announcement of winners set for Sunday, January 8, during Midwinter's First Night at The Keeton Theatre in Donelson. Details about that event will be announced in the coming weeks.

So, this is how it all started: Cori Laemmel, who despite her many flaws (she's too sweet, too talented and too pretty, not to mention that she is, well, just darling) is one of my favorite theatrical types, calls me up and asks me to come see The Most Amazing Anything of Evertime, the new show she wrote and directed for the first, big-scale, open-to-the-public, onstage production of The Theater Bug, her performing arts training program for younger actors.

Joel Drake Johnson's The Fall to Earth is an atypical, darkly comic - yet at the same time very serious - take on the conventional mother/daughter tale. Now presented in an exceptional new production from Nashville's GroundWorks Theatre, The Fall to Earth stars an extraordinary trio of actresses who bring the disquieting story to life with a sense of camaraderie and trust, delivering as they do a truly compelling experience for theater-goers.

Nashville's Circle Players, now in its 61st season and the oldest community theatre in Middle Tennessee, has scored one of its biggest hits ever with the current production of Jason Robert Brown's 13. Who'd have ever thought that the musical tale of a 13-year-old Jewish boy from NYC who is transplanted to Indiana could be so enormously entertaining or - perhaps more importantly and more significantly - acted and sung so amazingly well? Seriously, who knew?

Paul Cook directs four of Nashville's favorites actors in the upcoming Rhubarb Theater Company production of Terrence McNally's A Perfect Ganesh, April 8-23, at The Darkhorse Theater.

Paul Cook directs four of Nashville's favorites actors in the upcoming Rhubarb Theater Company production of Terrence McNally's A Perfect Ganesh, April 8-23, at The Darkhorse Theater.

Nashville favorite Tyson Laemmel stars as Robbie, 'a cheesy, but lovable New Jersey rocker' in Circle Players' upcoming production of The Wedding Singer, the upbeat romantic musical comedy that debuted on Broadway in 2006 and is based on the 1998 Adam Sandler/Drew Barrymore movie. Starring opposite Laemmel is Laura Thomas Sonn as 'a hopelessly romantic waitress.'

Nashville favorite Tyson Laemmel stars as Robbie, 'a cheesy, but lovable New Jersey rocker' in Circle Players' upcoming production of The Wedding Singer, the upbeat romantic musical comedy that debuted on Broadway in 2006 and is based on the 1998 Adam Sandler/Drew Barrymore movie. Starring opposite Laemmel is Laura Thomas Sonn as 'a hopelessly romantic waitress.'

Nashville favorite Tyson Laemmel stars as Robbie, 'a cheesy, but lovable New Jersey rocker' in Circle Players' upcoming production of The Wedding Singer, the upbeat romantic musical comedy that debuted on Broadway in 2006 and is based on the 1998 Adam Sandler/Drew Barrymore movie. Starring opposite Laemmel is Laura Thomas Sonn as 'a hopelessly romantic waitress.'

Think about it: What if you were watching The King and I and when Anna and the King of Siam started to sing 'Shall We Dance' and they just stood there, it just wouldn't have much of an impact, would it? Or if all those budding chorus members in A Chorus Line just stood around and talked about dancing but never did even the most basic shuffle-ball-change...sounds pretty bleak, doesn't it? That's where choreographers come into the picture; they collaborate with the director, the music director and the cast members to create movement that elevates every musical comedy. Without them, the action remains stagebound and static. A choreographer allows your heart to soar along with the performers onstage, making musical comedy all the more compelling and transformative. These talented men and women created remarkable and memorable work in 2010 as First Night's Top Choreographers...

If theater audiences in Nashville and Middle Tennessee owe a huge debt of gratitude to the directors who helm the year's finest productions, you can only imagine how the actors lucky enough to work with those insightful, creative men and women must be! The Top Ten Directors of 2010 have resumes anyone would be proud to claim as their own and when you consider that they - year after year - excel at what they do, then you cannot help but be impressed by the breadth and depth of their abilities. Frankly, it boggles the mind. These are Nashville's best directors of 2010...

If you find yourself venturing outside of New York, and you want to see some really good musical theater, what should you do? Allow me to suggest a visit to my neck o' the woods: A trip to Nashville might provide you with exactly what you seek. After all, in a city perhaps best known throughout the world as Music City USA, what else could you expect but some exceedingly well-cast, well-produced, well-played and well-sung musical theater? We're lousy with exceptional singers and musicians and, as a result, musical theater is alive and well - and thriving - in Nashville. And here's my list of the Best Musicals of 2010...

Amid threatening weather forecasts and a winter storm bearing down on the South, more than 150 hardy souls gathered to celebrate live theatre in Nashville and Middle Tennessee with the presentation of the BroadwayWorld.com Nashville Theatre Awards and First Night's Top Ten of Twenty-Ten on Sunday night, January 9. Street Theatre Company's new venue at 1933 Elm Hill Pike was the setting for the event that featured performances by Joann Coleman, Ben Van Diepen, Ann Street Kavanaugh, Laura Matula, Michael Kitts and Bakari Jamal King.

Despite portentous warnings of an approaching snowmageddon across the South, more than 150 members of the Nashville and Middle Tennessee theater community gathered at Street Theatre Company in Nashville Sunday night, January 9, for the announcement of the BroadwayWorld.com Nashville Theatre Award winners and the presentation of First Night's Top Ten of Twenty-Ten.

Thanks to a joint production of Nashville's Rhubarb Theater and Pendulum 3, Sedaris' twinbill for Christmas - The Santaland Diaries and Season's Greetings to Our Friends and Family, adapted for the stage by Joe Mantello - gave audiences just the right twist to the season, delivering laughs and evoking deeper thought, thanks to the superb performances of Bob Roberts, as Sedaris' onstage doppelganger, and Trish Crist as the Christmas letter-writing doyenne of the fictional Dunbar family. Directing each other in their halves of the show gave Roberts and Crist the opportunity to show us their dual roles in exemplary fashion.

Everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people.

Everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people.

Everybody on this planet is separated by only six other people.

Auditions for Macabaret, (Director: Pam Atha, Musical Director: Rollie Mains) and Six Degrees of Separation, (Director: Paul Cook) will be held on Saturday, September 11th. Six Degrees auditions will be held from 10-2 and Macabaret auditions from 1-6, with callbacks on Monday and Tuesday.