Signature Theatre News

Tony Award-winner Phylicia Rashad will direct the upcoming Signature Theatre (Paige Evans, Artistic Director; James Houghton, Founder) production of Our Lady of 121st Street by Pulitzer Prize-winner Stephen Adly Guirgis. Rashad replaces the previously announced Anne Kauffman, who has departed the production due to scheduling conflicts.

Hartford Stage Artistic Director Darko Tresnjak and Managing Director Michael Stotts announced today the cast and creative team for Agatha Christie's Murder on the Orient Express, which will perform at Hartford Stage Thursday, February 15, through Sunday, March 18.

The Wilma Theater, in association with Evamere Entertainment, presents Stew and Heidi Rodewald's Tony Award-winning musical in this major Philadelphia revival.

This February, The Human Race Theatre Company (HRTC) is heating up the Loft Theatre with the hottest play in the country, Sex with Strangers. Failed novelist Olivia meets Ethan, a celebrated (and much younger) writer made famous by his sexcapade tell-all blog, at a snowbound bed and breakfast, and their mutual attraction quickly gets hot and heavy. As a weekend tryst develops into a long-term romance, their personal and professional lives collide. Ethan seeks legitimacy, dismissing his bad boy reputation as nothing more than an invented character. Olivia has her doubts, but craves the literary fame Ethan can offer her. Ambition, identity and trust are in play when online personals clash with real world expectations in this smart, steamy take on modern love.

Mosaic Theater Company of DCtakes its acclaimedVoices From a Changing Middle East Festival on tour this winter, bringing several of its seminal Festival productions (I SHALL NOT HATE, VIA DOLOROSA, and the recent film adaptation of WRESTLING JERUSALEM) to the University of Oklahoma, Grinnell College, and Eastern Mennonite University for presentations of each project, and culminating in a special evening at the University of Chicago's Logan Center for the Arts where excerpts from all three works will be shared in a single evening. The tour reflects different dimensions of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and the efforts to achieve reckoning and reconciliation through live performance and discussion, in works performed in English, Arabic, and Hebrew (with translated surtitles).

The New Group has announced full casting and creative team for David Rabe's Good for Otto, with Kate Buddeke, Laura Esterman, Nancy Giles, Lily Gladstone, Charlotte Hope, Mark Linn-Baker, Kenny Mellman and Maulik Pancholy joining, as previously announced, F. Murray Abraham, Ed Harris, Amy Madigan, Rileigh McDonald, Rosie O'Donnell and Michael Rabe in this New York premiere directed by Scott Elliott.

The Shakespeare Theatre Company (STC) announces the cast and creative team for Hamlet, directed by STC Artistic Director Michael Kahn and featuring acclaimed actor Michael Urie as the tortured Danish prince. Shakespeare's most celebrated tragedy will run January 16-February 25, 2018 at Sidney Harman Hall.

The Asian American Performers Action Coalition (AAPAC) released its annual report, 'Ethnic Representation on New York City Stages' today for the 2015-16 theatre season. The report detaild the ethnic breakdown of actors on Broadway and at the 16 largest non-profit theatre companies in New York City. The report also tallies numbers for disabled actors. This year's report amasses 10 years of data, tracking hiring practices from the 2006-07 to 2015-16 seasons. It is the only publicly available report of its kind.

BST's 2018 repertory explores war and winning from opposite perspectives. As civil unrest threatens political upheaval, the war hero Coriolanus is driven to defend and then destroy his own country. Shakespeare's last tragedy takes a piercing look at men who cannot leave war behind. Performed as part of the Women's Voices Theater Festival, The Trojan Women Project explores the timeless story of The Trojan Women to illuminate modern women's relationships to sexuality, politics, and violence. This intersectional look at American women asks why our gender isn't enough to unite us and whether we are the losers in the American Dream.

Updated this week! Check out upcoming Equity Auditions from Sunday, January 14, 2018 for both productions in your area and around the country including what/when/where and how to audition!

The Barrow Group Theatre Company, recipient of a Drama Desk and Lucille Lortel Award, continues their 2017-2018 season with the World Premiere of The Thing with Feathers, a play by Scott Organ.

Queens Theatre (Taryn Sacramone, Executive Director) will present Broadway Valentine, a concert-style revue produced by Stephen DeAngelis exclusively for Queens Theatre, located at 14 United Nations Avenue South in Flushing Meadows Corona Park for two performances only on February 17 at 8pm and February 18 at 3pm.

The Left Wing, in association with John Turturro, presents the world premiere production of Brandon Cole's Imperfect Love, a serious comedy in two acts. Directed by Michael Di Jiacomo, Imperfect Love is inspired by the tumultuous life of the great Italian actress Eleonora Duse (1858 1924) and her nine-year love affair with the poet and playwright Gabriele D'Annunzio (1863 1938). The production, which runs January 25 February 18 at The Connelly Theater, features costume and set design by the Academy Award-winning Italian designer Gianni Quaranta (Merchant-Ivory's A Room with a View, Zeffirelli's Romeo and Juliet) and is scheduled to open on February 4. Turturro's 1998 film, Illuminata, which was co-written by Cole and Turturro, was based on Cole's Imperfect Love.

The Old Globe today announced it will present the fifth annual Powers New Voices Festival, a weekend of readings of new American plays by professional playwrights, playing January 12 14, 2018. The festival will kick off today, January 12 at 7:30 p.m. with Voices of the Community: Celebrating Local Playwrights, an evening of work created by San Diego residents through the Globe's arts engagement initiatives Community Voices and coLAB, and will continue with four readings by some of the most exciting voices writing for the American theatre today. The new American play readings commence on Saturday, January 13 at 4:00 p.m. with Laurel Ollstein's They Promised Her the Moon, directed by Giovanna Sardelli (Somewhere, The Whipping Man at the Globe), followed at 7:30 p.m. by Too Heavy for Your Pocket by Jir h Breon Holder, directed by Patricia McGregor (Globe for All's Measure for Measure).The Festival continues on Sunday, January 14 at 3:00 p.m. with The Tale of Despereaux, with book, music, and lyrics by PigPen Theatre Co. (The Old Man and The Old Moon at the Globe), based on the novel by Kate DiCamillo and the Universal Pictures animated motion picture. The Festival will wrap up that evening at 7:30 p.m. with The Great Leap by Lauren Yee, directed by Delicia Turner Sonnenberg (Globe's Skeleton Crew).

Mary Kathryn Nagle's daring new work Sovereignty makes its world premiere at Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater.

Award-winning New York based writer and performer Tim Realbuto, who will star in the upcoming motion picture YES (based on his stage play of the same name), will bring his popular 'Because I Can' concert series to an end at the Triad Theatre on Friday, February 9th, 2018 at 7:00 PM. He premiered his first 'Because I Can' concert at The Metropolitan Room last April and performed part two earlier this month at The Triad. The Metropolitan Room has been the producer of all three 'Because I Can' shows, but the second incarnation and now the third and final one will be performed at The Triad as The Metropolitan Room is in the middle of moving locations.

After a smash run last fall, Playwrights Horizons will present MILES FOR MARY, a new play by The Mad Ones. Directed by Lila Neugebauer, MILES FOR MARY received critical acclaim during its fall 2016 run at The Bushwick Starr.

BroadwayHD announces today that Thom Pain, the Geffen Playhouse's filmed adaptation of its stage production of Will Eno's lauded play Thom Pain (based on nothing) starring Rainn Wilson ('The Office,' founder of Soul Pancake), will be available on BroadwayHD beginning January 11, 2018.

The Eli and Edythe Broad Stage in Santa Monica and Eva Price present Small Mouth Sounds by Drama Desk Award winner Bess Wohl (Pretty Filthy), and directed by Tony Award nominee Rachel Chavkin (Natasha, Pierre & The Great Comet of 1812) for three weeks only, January 11 through 28 with a press opening on January 12.

Spend an evening at the Beacon Bar & Grill, sipping on cocktails and singing your favorite tunes at theatreWashington's monthly showTunes & Cocktails.