Sarah Knapp News

New York, NY - CreateTheater, under the artistic direction of Off-Broadway producer Cate Cammarata in association with The Prism Stage Company, have announced the 2023 New Works Festival Awards from their annual New Works Festival that ran from May 23rd to June 11th at Theater Row.

The Washington Stage Guild will conclude its 2021-2022 season with Memoirs of a Forgotten Man by D.W. Gregory. The play, which had its world premiere at The Contemporary American Theatre Festival in 2018, takes place in the Stalinist Soviet Union, where a man’s inability to forget those whom the government has “erased” becomes increasingly problematic for him and his family.

Broadayworld.com had the pleasure of interviewing D.W. Gregory about her career and 'Memoirs of a Forgotten Man' at NJ Rep.

SHADOWLAND STAGES (Brendan Burke, Producing Artistic Director) today announced completion of casting for MEMOIRS OF A FORGOTTEN MAN by D.W. Gregory - the first production of the theatre's 2019 season.

Seven Angels Theatre in Waterbury brings a nostalgic and hilarious look back the famous husband and wife comedy team of George Burns and Gracie Allen. R. Bruce Connelly and Semina De Laurentis reunite in a sequel to the triumphant 2017 production: GEORGE & GRACIE: THE EARLY YEARS. After sending audiences into hysterical laughter in It Had To Be You (Seven Angels Season '08-09) R. Bruce Connelly (Say Goodnight Gracie) and Semina De Laurentis (the original Sr. Mary Amnesia - Nunsense) reunite on Seven Angels stage to bring to life the unique comedy of George Burns and Gracie Allen in this special equity theatrical event just for Seven Angels. Once again, join George and Gracie, their neighbors Blanche and Harry and other guests in this all new sequel production. GEORGE & GRACIE: PART II is to benefit Seven Angels Theatre educational and HALO Awards programs.

National New Play Network, the country's alliance of professional theaters that collaborate in innovative ways to develop, produce, and extend the life of new plays, celebrates the acclaimed run of its 82nd Rolling World Premiere (RWP): Memoirs of a Forgotten Man by D.W. Gregory. The Roll kicked off at Core Member Contemporary American Theater Festival (Shepherdstown, WV) and runs through July 29. It continues in 2019 at Associate Member Shadowland Stages (Ellenville, NY) June 22 through July 6 and Core Member New Jersey Repertory Company (Long Branch) August 29 through September 29.

Composer Ray Leslee (Standup Shakespeare, Avenue X) and playwright, actor, HBO Def Poet, Brian Dykstra, have teamed up with Musical Director Kimberly Grigsby (Amelie, Spiderman, Spring Awakening) to present a workshop presentation of a new musical based on the comedy by Moliere. The script-in-hand readings will take place Thursday Nov 16th at The Lark Play Development Center and Friday, November 17th at Manhattan Theatre Club Studios. The presentation will be directed by Margarett Perry.

'New theatre work is important because it is more likely to reflect what is actually going on in the world; it can speak to global happenings and events and find ways to digest them and cope with them.' Artistic Director of Maine State Music Theatre Curt Dale Clark is talking about his recent visit to the National Alliance for Musical Theatre (NAMT) Conference and Festival of New Musicals in New York on October 24-28, 2016. Clark, who has been a NAMT Board member for the past two years and currently co-chair of the membership committee, is proud that his theatre company, MSMT, has been a founding member of the organization since its inception thirty-six years ago, and praises 'our continued efforts on its behalf that help cement the relationship between the two not-for-profits.'

Maine State Music Theatre hosted its second talkback in its series, 'A Peek Behind the Curtain,' on July 2, 2014, at the Curtis Memorial Library in Brunswick. The six-person panel moderated by BWW's Carla Maria Verdino-Sullwold, was comprised of Artistic Director Curt Dale Clark, Advisory Board and 'Angel' member Lee Gilman, Costume Rental Supervisor Amy Mussman, and actors James Patterson (Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain), Kathy Voytko (Fannie Chamberlain), and Sam Weber (Tom Chamberlain) explored the experience of creating the revival of Sarah Knapp and Steven M. Alper's musical, Chamberlain A Civil War Romance. The near-capacity crowd at the Morrell Reading Room was treated to a lively exchange among the panel members and audience, laced with the warmth, camaraderie, and obvious affection for the company and the work.

Maine State Music Theatre's second production of the season, a revival of the Knapp-Alper 1996 musical Chamberlain A Civil War Romance, proves to be a grand and glorious theatrical experience, an endeavor of epic proportions that delivers spectacle, emotion, and inspiration in equal measure. Spanning more than fifty years in the life of Brunswick's legendary Civil War hero, Maine governor, and Bowdoin college president, Joshua L. Chamberlain, and focusing on his relationship with his passionate, mercurial wife, Fannie Adams, the musical, in this brilliantly executed new production, directed and choreographed by Marc Robin, offers both epic sweep and touching intimacy. Large in musical and dramatic scale, lavish in production values, and cast with a first rate ensemble of singing-actors, Chamberlain dazzles the ear and eye and warms the heart.

Maine State Music Theatre's (MSMT) production of Chamberlain: A Civil War Romance brings the life of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain to the stage. The story centers on his relationship with his wife, Fannie, and explores the trials and tribulations of a man committed to his family as well as his country.

I sat there alone on the storied crest, till the sun went down as it did before over the misty hills, and the darkness crept up the slopes, till from all earthly sight I was buried as with those before. But oh, what radiant companionship rose around, what steadfast ranks of power, what bearing of heroic souls. Oh, the glory that beamed through those days and nights. Nobody will ever know it here! - I am sorry most of all for that! The proud young valor that rose above the mortal, and then at last was mortal after all.... When she read these lines written by Civil War hero and Maine Legend Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain more than eighteen years ago, lyricist/ book writer Sarah Knapp became convinced that she and her husband composer Steven M. Alper had to write their 'memory play.' The musical, commissioned by Charles Abbott, then Artistic Director of Maine State Music Theatre, became one of the greatest successes in the company's history, selling out before it even opened - ('it was the only show where they were scalping tickets on the lawn,' Knapp recalls). Now almost two decades later, Chamberlain A Civil War Romance will receive its first new production since that world premiere in 1996, once again at the Maine State Music Theatre in Brunswick, the hometown of Chamberlain and his wife Fannie. Speaking with the composer and writer just days before the opening, they shared their palpable excitement at the prospect of this revival.

'Some see her as an instigator and a handful, and others think she was ahead of her time. She was smart, well-read, appreciated literature and poetry, and was a strong woman - not a good thing for the time!' Actress Kathy Voytko is speaking about the latest role which has brought her from Broadway to Brunswick, Maine, where she will portray Fannie Chamberlain in Maine State Music Theatre's second season production of Sarah Knapp and Steven M. Alper's musical, Chamberlain: A Civil War Romance. Voytko is clearly intrigued by the challenge of portraying this fascinating Civil War character whose life and that of her husband, legendary soldier, governor, and Bowdoin president, Joshua L. Chamberlain, was inextricably bound to this coastal Maine town.

Maine State Music Theatre's (MSMT) production of Chamberlain: A Civil War Romance brings the life of Joshua Lawrence Chamberlain to the stage. The story centers on his relationship with his wife, Fannie, and explores the trials and tribulations of a man committed to his family as well as his country.

Subtitled 'An American Musical,' it is in the truest sense the story of striving for the American Dream. Haskell (Max Bisantz) arrives in the small town of Hamilton, in Central Texas shortly after the turn of the century, pushing a banana cart and unable to speak English. Wary at first of the stranger, who also turns out to be a Jew, Milton and Ima (Paul Blankenship and Sarah Knapp) take him in. Milton, the town's banker, partners with Haskell to help build his business, which eventually turns into a dry goods store. When Haskell finally saves enough to bring his wife, Leah (Rita Markova), over from Russia, the friendship is tested, however. Haskell no longer is the observant Jew she married. The new country has changed him. He doesn't wear his hat, keep a Kosher home or observe the Sabbath any more.

Producer Carolyn Rossi Copeland, currently represented Off-Broadway with the hit play Freud's Last Session, has assembled a starry cast for today's (November 14th) special invitational presentation of the original new musical AMAZING GRACE, with music & lyrics by Christopher Smith and book by Mr. Smith & Arthur Giron, at the New 42nd Street Studios.

Producer Carolyn Rossi Copeland, currently represented Off-Broadway with the hit play Freud's Last Session, has assembled a starry cast for the upcoming special invitational presentation of the original new musical AMAZING GRACE, with music & lyrics by Christopher Smith and book by Mr. Smith & Arthur Giron, on Monday, November 14th at the New 42nd Street Studios. This will be only the second public reading of AMAZING GRACE, which has been in development for the past three years. Under the direction of Gabriel Barre, the cast will feature Josh Young (Judas in Broadway's upcoming Jesus Christ Superstar) as John Newton, Laura Michelle Kelly (Olivier Award winner for Mary Poppins), Jeff McCarthy (Urinetown, Side Show), Alan H. Green (Sister Act, Spelling Bee), Chris Hoch (Spamalot, Shrek), and Harriett D. Foy (Mamma Mia!)