Seret Scott News

Crumbs from the Table of Joy - The Crump family is in trouble. Godfrey (Russell Hornsby) is widowed and adrift, and his teen daughters, Ernestine (Deidrie Henry) and Ermina (Tinashe Kajese), have immersed themselves in glamorous illusions of Hollywood to escape the racial prejudice of 1950s Brooklyn.

Arena Stage presents an innovative take on the world's longest-running musical, The Fantasticks by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt. Director Amanda Dehnert (Oregon Shakespeare Festival‘s All's Well That Ends Well and Stratford Shakespeare Festival's Cabaret) and famed set designer Eugene Lee (Tony Award for Broadway's Wicked, Candide, Sweeney Todd) take a spin on this timeless love story by staging it in Rocky Point, an abandoned amusement park in Rhode Island. This whimsical twist on the classic musical is full of buoyant humor, charming music and incredible magic that will thrill audiences of all ages. The Fantasticks runs November 20, 2009 - January 10, 2010 at Arena Stage at the Lincoln Theatre, with an official opening on Friday, November 27, 2009.

OBIE Award winner Russell Hornsby (Jitney, Eddie Sutton on ABC's Lincoln Heights) and LADCC and NAACP Award recipient Charlayne Woodard (Pretty Fire, Neat, In Real Life) star when L.A. Theatre Works records Crumbs from the Table of Joy, a sly coming-of-age comedy by Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage.

Arena Stage presents an innovative take on the world's longest-running musical, The Fantasticks by Tom Jones and Harvey Schmidt. Director Amanda Dehnert (Oregon Shakespeare Festival‘s All's Well That Ends Well and Stratford Shakespeare Festival's Cabaret) and famed set designer Eugene Lee (Tony Award for Broadway's Wicked, Candide, Sweeney Todd) take a spin on this timeless love story by staging it in Rocky Point, an abandoned amusement park in Rhode Island. This whimsical twist on the classic musical is full of buoyant humor, charming music and incredible magic that will thrill audiences of all ages. The Fantasticks runs November 20, 2009 - January 10, 2010 at Arena Stage at the Lincoln Theatre, with an official opening on Friday, November 27, 2009.

NOVEMBER 2009 - FEBRUARY 2010 OCTOBER Oct. 23 - Nov. 22 ? Segerstrom Stage ? West Coast Premiere

The following is SCR's four month calendar for October 2009 ? January 2010.

The Ensemble Studio Theatre and Going to the River have lined up some of the most gifted women playwrights of color - some new, some established - for a three-week presentation of thirteen short plays in a new play series entitled The River Crosses Rivers, a three-week festival of short one-act plays by women of color, September 9 through 27 at the Ensemble Studio Theatre, 549 West 52nd Street.

RFK: The Journey to Justice is a commission led by the University of Notre Dame's DeBartolo Performing Arts Center and co-commissioned by the Clarice Smith Performing Arts Center at the University of Maryland, Stanford Lively Arts at Stanford University, and the Modlin Center for the Arts at the University of Richmond. Additional funds provided by the Susan Raab Simonson Commissioning Project.

The Ensemble Studio Theatre and Going to the River have lined up some of the most gifted women playwrights of color - some new, some established - for a three-week presentation of thirteen short plays in a new play series entitled The River Crosses Rivers, a three-week festival of short one-act plays by women of color, September 9 through 27 at the Ensemble Studio Theatre, 549 West 52nd Street.

South Coast Repertory's Artistic Directors David Emmes and Martin Benson have announced that Doctor Cerberus, a new play by HBO's 'Big Love' and Marvel Comics' 'Spiderman' writer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, will receive its World Premiere during the 2009-10 Season

South Coast Repertory's Artistic Directors David Emmes and Martin Benson have announced that Doctor Cerberus, a new play by HBO's 'Big Love' and Marvel Comics' 'Spiderman' writer Roberto Aguirre-Sacasa, will receive its World Premiere during the 2009-10 Season

South Coast Repertory will open its 2009-2010 season with a celebration of the music of Broadway legend Stephen Sondheim and will shine the spotlight later in the season on the up-and-coming musical theater composer and lyricist, Adam Gwon. The season lineup includes World Premieres by Bathsheba Doran, Julie Marie Myatt and Howard Korder, and a West Coast Premiere by Noah Haidle.

CRUMBS FROM THE TABLE OF JOY begins Monday, March 9, 2009 at 7:00pm, by Lynn Nottage Directed by Seret Scott, with Laura Heisler ( Doris to Darlene, The Mistakes Madeline Made), Sadrina Johnson (The Book of Lambert, Southern Promises), Billy Eugene Jones (A Raisin in the Sun), Brenda Pressley (The First Breeze of Summer, Seven Guitars at Signature, and American Plan at Manhattan Theatre Club), Amina S. Robinson (Mamma Mia!) Commissioned by Second Stage Theatre in 1992

As part of our Emerging Playwrights Reading Series, please join us on Saturday, March 7 th , 2009 at 2:00 PM for the First Annual Douglass Turner Ward Playwriting Award, to be presented by the Negro Ensemble Company to a graduating BFA senior or MFA Graduate from the Rita and Burton Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing, the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU.

CRUMBS FROM THE TABLE OF JOY begins Monday, March 9, 2009 at 7:00pm, by Lynn Nottage Directed by Seret Scott, with Laura Heisler ( Doris to Darlene, The Mistakes Madeline Made), Sadrina Johnson (The Book of Lambert, Southern Promises), Billy Eugene Jones (A Raisin in the Sun), Brenda Pressley (The First Breeze of Summer, Seven Guitars at Signature, and American Plan at Manhattan Theatre Club), Amina S. Robinson (Mamma Mia!) Commissioned by Second Stage Theatre in 1992

As part of our Emerging Playwrights Reading Series, please join us on Saturday, March 7 th , 2009 at 2:00 PM for the First Annual Douglass Turner Ward Playwriting Award, to be presented by the Negro Ensemble Company to a graduating BFA senior or MFA Graduate from the Rita and Burton Goldberg Department of Dramatic Writing, the Tisch School of the Arts at NYU.

McCarter Theatre Center announces the complete cast for Eclipsed, the Spotlight Production of the theater's 3rd Annual In-Festival of new works. Written by Obie Award-winning actress and playwright Danai Gurira and directed by Liesl Tommy, the five-woman play features Pascale Armand, Nikiya Mathis, Keiana Rich?rd, Stacey Sargeant, and April Yvette Thompson. Eclipsed runs on Wednesdays through Sundays from January 26 to February 8, 2009 in The Room in the Berlind Theatre (opening night January 31). Set in war-torn Liberia, Eclipsed offers a chilling, humanizing, and surprisingly funny portrait of transformation and renewal. With wit, compassion, and defiance, this gripping play unearths the wreckage of war and celebrates the women who navigate and survive the most hostile of circumstances. Danai Gurira first introduced excerpts of Eclipsed to McCarter in 2007, followed by a public reading of the work during the 2008 In-Festival. In researching the play, Ms. Gurira traveled to Liberia through a TCG New Generations Grant, which she applied for with McCarter Theatre. Pascale Armand has been seen in New York at Playwrights Horizons and Manhattan Theatre Club and regionally at numerous theaters including Kansas City Rep, Arena Stage, Yale Rep, La Jolla Playhouse, Syracuse Stage, American Repertory Theatre, and Actors Theatre of Louisville.

Signature Theatre Company continues its celebration of the Negro Ensemble Company (NEC) with special presentations of three more plays from the historic NEC repertoire. Curated by NEC Founder Douglas Turner Ward, Signature Associate Artist Ruben Santiago-Hudson and the Signature Theatre Company staff, these plays will be read on stage at the Peter Norton Space (555 West 42nd Street) on select evenings throughout the season. These classic works give greater insight into the history of this vital and groundbreaking company.

News from Broadway and theater in the Baltimore/Washington area

New York Theatre Workshop (NYTW) presents 'Liberty City,' written by Jessica Blank and April Yvette Thompson, performed by Thompson, and directed by Blank; to begin performances Friday, February 15, at NYTW. Opening night is scheduled for Tuesday, March 4 at 7PM. The production will run through Sunday, March 16.