Tanya Barfield News

After an amazing year of creativity, compromises, collaborations, and (so many) silver linings, The Actors Conservatory announces The Oregon One Act Festival: Two Evenings of short plays featuring the graduating class of 2021 and the work of directors Beth Harper, Dámaso Rodríguez, Lava Alapai, Michael Mendelson, and Samson Syharath.

Last night, the Writers Guild Awards were held, airing for just 90 minutes in two ceremonies held in New York and Los Angeles.

Throughout the history of theatre, the art form has adapted to its current times. In 2020 it was forced to adapt again due to Covid 19. Each theatre company has found its own unique way to adapt. This last summer, Iowa Stage did a one-night reading of a play called 'The Cake,' performed at Des Moines Playhouse's parking lot. Since then, they have adapted by doing a play via zoom and now are adapting again. On March 5, Iowa Stage opened their most recent production for the 2020-2021 virtual season, 'Bright Half Life' by Tanya Barfield.

The full-list of nominees for the 52nd NAACP Image Awards were announced today in a special virtual event on NAACP Image Awards’ Instagram channel hosted by Tony-award winning actress and singer Anika Noni-Rose, actress and singer Chloe Bailey, actress Erika Alexander, actor, dancer, and choreographer Nicco Annan, and actor and singer TC Carson.

Iowa Stage Theatre Company, central Iowa's home for award-winning theater that inspires, enlightens and entertains, is announcing a three-show virtual season in the spring of 2021.

WP THEATER has announced the 15 artists selected for the 2020-2022 WP Lab. The two-year residency begins now and culminates with the biennial WP Pipeline Festival.

My immediate response to this reading of the play, which had its premiere at Tufts University unfortunately canceled, is that I would love to see how it would change were the actors cast actually artists who use they/them pronouns in their lives.

Works & Process, the performing arts series at the Guggenheim, cancels performances from March through May 2020, to be rescheduled at a later date.

Works & Process, the performing arts series at the Guggenheim, will present Federal Hall: The Democracy Project on Sunday, May 3, 2020 at 7:30pm.

The Oregon Shakespeare Festival today announced Branden Jacobs-Jenkins as the 37th and final commissioned artist as part of American Revolutions: the United States History Cycle, OSF's multi-decade program for developing new plays about moments of change in United States history.

Last night, PEN America spotlighted diverse voices and bestowed $330,000 of transformative support to writers and translators at the 2020 PEN America Literary Awards, hosted by Late Night's Seth Meyers at The Town Hall, the biggest venue in the Awards program's 56-year history. The show demonstrated the evolution of the Awards in recent years from a modest auditorium event for winners and their families into a preeminent gathering of writers and publishing luminaries, stars of the stage and screen, and passionate book lovers-or, as Meyers referred to it, 'The Oscars for books.'

Today PEN America announced the major career achievement honors to be presented at the 2020 PEN America Literary Awards.

Queer couples in the greater Boston area: if you are looking for a mushy, warm, romantic gay love story with a backbone and plenty of heartbreak that will make you want to cuddle up with your partner between now and Valentine's Day weekend, you couldn't do much better than Actors' Shakespeare Project's Bright Half Life, playing at the Plaza Theatre at the Boston Center for the Arts. (If you don't already have plans for the 14th, I recommend purchasing tickets to the 8 o'clock performance that evening, which should leave you enough time to get dinner at Buttermilk & Bourbon beforehand. The 65 minute run time leaves ample time for an ice cream at Picco afterward, while still allowing time to catch the T before it shuts down for the night.) When I saw the show, I did not have a significant other with whom I could cuddle (so if the aforementioned evening sounds like your idea of a good time, I'd be delighted to splurge and Dutch treat), but the audience was filled with visibly queer, femme-presenting couples holding each others' hands, snapping their fingers in agreement, and letting out an occasional 'awww' in moments of tenderness.

Shakespeare Project (ASP) continues its 16th season with Bright Half Life by Tanya Barfield, performed at the Plaza Theatre, Boston Center for the Arts, Boston, MA. Performances run January 23, 2020 - February 16, 2020.

Works & Process at the Guggenheim  has announced its spring 2020 season. Since 1984, the performing arts series has championed new works and offered audiences unprecedented access to leading creators. The intimate Frank Lloyd Wright­-designed Peter B. Lewis Theater is the venue for these seventy-minute programs that explorethe creative process through stimulating discussions and riveting performance highlights. One-of-a-kind productions created for the Guggenheim's rotunda offer a unique experience of the landmark museum. Additional information is available at worksandprocess.org.

Primary Stages (Andrew Leynse, Artistic Director; Shane D. Hudson, Executive Director; Casey Childs, Founder) announced today that it will postpone its production of On That Day in Amsterdam, written by Clarence Coo (Beautiful Province (Belle Province -a?"Yale Drama Prize), which was planned to begin previews Friday, November 1 at the Cherry Lane Theatre. Ticketholders can contact their point of purchase for a refund. A new timeline for On That Day in Amsterdam will be determined and announced at a later date.

Evan Yionoulis, Richard Rodgers Director of Juilliard's Drama Division, announced today that Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Marsha Norman will step down as co-director of Juilliard's Lila Acheson Wallace American Playwrights Program at the end of the 2019-20 academic year

Playwrights Horizons today announced that its beloved longtime Artistic Director, Tim Sanford, will step down from the position in July 2020.

Bright Half Life is presented in a totally nonsequential fashion, and at nearly breakneck speed much of the time. We are left to piece together the whole story from dozens of fragments that appear and pass quickly, which can be both exhausting and exhilarating. And not just for us in the audience; this calls for enormous flexibility on the part of the performers too. Moments of ecstasy are juxtaposed with moments of terror, joy and sadness arrive cheek-by-jowl, and certain incidents are repeatedly revisited. The two performers must be emotional quick-change artists, and I found myself amazed watching as Ayesis Clay and Katharine Vary worked their way intrepidly through those changes.

San Francisco Playhouse announced casting for the first production of their 2019/2020 Sandbox Series of World Premieres: The Daughters, written by Patricia Cotter. Jessica Holt will direct the world premiere production, presented at the Creativity Theater.