Playbill News

Shaw Festival Board Chair Peter Jewett announced today thatSheila Brown, Vivien Dzau, Tim Johnson, Sharon Levite, Eugene Lundrigan and Corinne Rice have joined the Shaw Festival's Board of Trustees. Mr. Jewett also acknowledged retiring board member Marylee O'Neill(2014-2017) for her contributions and service during her tenure.

The Pierre New York, A Taj Hotel's popular new cabaret series continues this month with a very special performance. On Monday February 26th, the hotel will partner once again with award-winning Broadway Sings For Pride creative director Neal Bennington for an exclusive one-night-only show.

BroadwayWorld has teamed up with renowned caricature artist Ken Fallin, a life-long theater enthusiast, who has drawn many Broadway and Off-Broadway productions. Below, check out his latest illustration, featuring Terrence Mann and Will Swenson in JERRY SPRINGER: THE OPERA!

Back by popular demand, The Pierre New York is bringing the best of Broadway to guests and local residents alike with its popular new cabaret series, Broadway At The Pierre.  On Monday, February 26, the hotel is teaming up again with award-winning Broadway Sings For Pride creative director Neal Bennington for a special evening with some of Broadway's brightest stars. 

Eric Carle's iconic creatures crawl from page to stage with the help of a marvelous menagerie of 75 magical puppets.  Colorful and kinetic, this adaptation captures all the charm of Carle's original tales and illustrations, while conveying simple messages about the value of creativity, belonging, and growth.

Phoenix Productions will celebrate their 30th birthday with a unique and exciting evening of musical theatre on Saturday, February 24th at the Count Basie Theatre This one-night-only celebration, dubbed 'The Phoenix 30th Anniversary Gala, Show Much More' features more than 100 Phoenix alumni and a bevy of songs and dances from Phoenix's first 30 years as well as musical numbers from classic and current Broadway hits that could be their next 30 years.

Terrific performances across the board, sprightly direction that keeps the action moving at a quick clip-clop and a no-holds-barred sense of ridiculous theatricality all come together in Center for the Arts' production of Monty Python's Spamalot, the hilarious stage musical based on the irreverent troupe's 1975 film comedy Monty Python and the Holy Grail. With a slate filled with stage favorites - of both the musical and 'straight' variety - still to come in 2018, Murfreesboro's CFTA will likely have a banner year.

With direction/music direction by Paul Naylor, PASSION is tonal correct, and this heavily dramatic work is perhaps the most difficult of Broadway musicals to stage.

Following two sold-out, off-Broadway runs in New York, Out of My Comfort Zone, a new rock musical about self-identity, gender, love, stereotypes, cyber-bullying, and friendship, will premier in London at The Redbridge Drama Centre. Written by husband-and-wife team Ivy Vale (book, lyrics and music) and Rick Reil (music), Out of My Comfort Zone will be presented and staged by The Redbridge Musical Theatre Company for three performances at Redbridge Drama Centre, Churchfields, South Woodford, London, E18 2RB, from March 1-3, 2018.

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival (OSF) announced today that Artistic Director Bill Rauch will leave OSF in August 2019 to assume artistic leadership of The Ronald O. Perelman Center for Performing Arts at the World Trade Center in New York City.

I'll admit it. Before I was a theater geek, I was a TV geek. I grew up watching TV, and my best friends were characters on TV shows. I'm still a TV geek, and I still consider TV characters* my friends. So when I heard that an actor from two of my favorite current shows was doing a play in Minneapolis, I didn't even care what or where the play was. I was going to see Rebecca Bunch's mother / Deanna (who's Deanna?) no matter what. As it turns out, Tovah Feldshuh has some ties to the #TCTheater community, having studied and worked at the University of Minnesota and the Guthrie back in the day. Her brother, playwright/director David Feldshuh, has an even deeper connection, specifically with Illusion Theater, which is premiering his new play DANCING WITH GIANTS. I'm happy to report that not only is Tovah a delight live on stage, but this is also an entertaining, educational, funny, and sobering play. It's obviously a labor of love for the Feldshuh family, and Minneapolis/St. Paul theater-goers are lucky to be able to experience it first.

Opening The Dare Tactics 4th Season, Forget Me Not, music by Joey Contreras, book and lyrics by Kate Thomas, tells the story of a remote coastal town where a whale washes ashore and brings a burst of attention back to the struggling community.

Vanessa Williams, multi-faceted star of Broadway, film, music videos and television, brings her award-winning talents to Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts on Saturday, April 7, at 8 p.m.

In film, television and theatre, a hero prop is any item intended to be held or used by one of the main actors. Examples of hero props might include Shylock's money box, as used by Al Pacino in The Merchant of Veniceat New York's Public Theater; the Red Apple Tobacco tin used in Quentin Tarantino's film Hateful Eight; or the Mendl's chocolate box from the film The Grand Budapest Hotel.

Entertainment marketing agency AKA NYC has appointed Mark Blankenship to the newly-created post of Integrated Content and Community Director. Blankenship joins the agency's team of digital experts and will utilize his unique skills and experience to foster high-level ideation and the delivery of innovative, integrated campaigns for theatrical clients in the digital and social space, and beyond.

BroadwayWorld has learned of exciting news from one of the most promising minds in the industry today. David Hein, one half of the married writing team for Broadway's Tony-winning smash hit musical Come From Away, has written the bonus story for the Annual Amazing Spider-Man comic, on stands Wednesday, February 14.

IAMA Theatre Company has named Brooklyn-based playwright and activist Geraldine Inoa as the first recipient of The Rhimes Unsung Voices Playwriting Commission. The commission, created to support an underrepresented writer of color who has not had a play professionally produced, is sponsored by TV producer/writer Shonda Rhimes (Scandal, How To Get Away With Murder, Grey's Anatomy).

As reported on Broadwayworld.com and elsewhere in December 2017, the New York City Ballet Board of Directors appointed an interim artistic team in the wake of the leave of absence and subsequent resignation of longtime NYCB Ballet Master in Chief Peter Martins following accusations against him of sexual harassment.

Melissa Rain Anderson will direct a reading of Michael Raver's stirring new play, Quiet Electricity as part of Emerging Artists Theatre's New Work Series.

BroadwayWorld has teamed up with renowned caricature artist Ken Fallin, a life-long theater enthusiast, who has drawn many Broadway and Off-Broadway productions. Below, check out his latest illustration, featuring Bernadette Peters in HELLO, DOLLY!