The American Conservatory Theatre News

In celebration of Black History Month 2020, Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas honored seven creative visionaries for their contributions in arts and entertainment. The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors presented scrolls to Actress, Choreographer, and Television Director Debbie Allen; Actor Wren Brown; Actor and Artistic Director Ben Guillory; LA Poet Laureate Robin Coste Lewis; Actress, Author, and Activist Sheryl Lee Ralph; Actress Wendy Raquel Robinson; and Lula Washington Dance Theatre Founder and Director Lula Washington.

In what has become an annual ritual, a total of 40 established and emerging composers, lyricists, and librettists will converge on the Goodspeed campus from mid-January through mid-February 2020 to participate in the Johnny Mercer Foundation Writers Colony at Goodspeed Musicals. The writing teams, representing 15 new musicals, will populate the campus, creating a truly exciting environment for discovery and inspiration.

Radial Theater Project and 18th & Union are delighted to announce the cast and creative team for a live stage production of 1984, opening February 21, 2020 at 18th & Union in Seattle's Central District.

Jon Lawrence Rivera, Artistic Director of Playwrights' Arena – the first and oldest theater dedicated to discovering, nurturing, and producing original works written exclusively by Los Angeles playwrights – is thrilled to announce the cast for RED INK by Steven Leigh Morris, which includes Michelle Bonebright-Carter, Tracey A. Leigh, Leo Marks, Christopher Salazar, Jocelyn Towne, and Peter Van Norden.

AARP The Magazine announced today that Annette Bening will receive the 2019 Movies for Grownups Career Achievement Award. Bening – a recipient of two Golden Globes®, a Screen Actors Guild Award® and four-time Academy Award®-nominee – will be honored at the 19th annual Movies for Grownups® (MFG) Awards ceremony on January 11, 2020, in Beverly Hills.

Jazz artist Sylvia Brooks has quite a fascinating background to share with us. In her live concert at Feinstein's Upstairs at Vitello's on October 26 she will sing from her three albums with an eclectic mix of songs. Talk about your album The Arrangement and how it became a breakout in forwarding your career. SB: Before I started to make this album, I was in a bit of a quandary. I knew that I wanted to explore a variety of styles- and really didn't want to only stick with one idea in order to make the album cohesive. I love Latin music, Classic Jazz, Blues and certain pop songs that I have always wanted to record, like the Beatles 'Eleanor Rigby' and Hank Willi

You can't beat City Halla?? but you can try. The Fountain Theatre presents the Los Angeles premiere of the fearless, hilarious Pulitzer Prize, New York Drama Critics Circle and Lucille Lortel award-winning comedy-drama, Between Riverside and Crazy byStephen Adly Guirgis.Guillermo Cienfuegos directs for an Oct. 19 opening, with performances continuing through Dec. 15. Pay-what-you-want previews begin Oct. 16.

The Los Angeles premiere of Lloyd Suh's THE CHINESE LADY launches the Greenway Court Theatre's 2019-2020 season, with opening night September 7, 2019. In a co-production with Artists At Play, THE CHINESE LADY (based on a true story) features Amy Shu (as Afong Moy, the first female Chinese immigrant to come to America) and Trieu Tran (as Atung, Afong's translator/caretaker), under the direction of Rebecca Wear. Playwright Lloyd Suh took a few moments before flying into Los Angeles to answer my questioning queries.

Snow Camp Friends Meeting, Chapel Hill Friends Meeting and Chuck Fager present Heretic -- The Mary Dyer Story September 13, 14 and 15.

Chester Theatre Company (CTC) will present Curve of Departure by Rachel Bonds in the historic Chester Town Hall, 15 Middlefield Road in Chester, MA, from August 8 - 18. The production is directed by Keira Naughton making her CTC debut.

The African-American Shakespeare Company begins its 25th season with an ambitious and varied slate of programming. Established in 1994 by professional theater artists from the American Conservatory Theatre as an alternative to the 'Color Blind Casting' initiative that began in the early 90s, the company flourished by bringing its artists rich cultural heritage to the fore. 

A Contemporary Theatre announces its summer production of The Year of Magical Thinking written by acclaimed reporter, essayist, and literary icon, Joan Didion.

Recently featured in a New York Times project called "Black Writers of Our Time," Philadelphia-based playwright James Ijames is an artist on everyone's A-list. His newest play, Kill Move Paradise, is a new take the Elysium of Greek antiquity. Inspired by recent events, the play is an expressionistic buzz saw through the contemporary myth that 'all lives matter.

Capital Stage presents the Sacramento Premiere of The Other Place by Sharr White. Producing Artistic Director Michael Stevenson will direct the Sacramento Premiere, and will feature local favorites Melinda Parrett and Capital Stage Co-Founder Jonathan Rhys Williams. Performances will run from May 1 through June 2, 2019 with a Press Opening on Saturday, May 4, 2019, at 8 pm.  

Two alumnae of the Franklin School for the Performing Arts (FSPA) are working together once again in New York City on the world premiere of LubDub Theatre Company's A Play for the Living in a Time of Extinction. The new play by Miranda Rose Hall (currently in-development) is a new solo theatre and music performance starring Malouf that grapples with being a human in a time of mass extinction. This project is being developed through an ongoing two-year residency with the Orchard Project's NYC Greenhouse. Both Malouf and Cassidy trained at the Franklin School for the Performing Arts in acting, singing, and dancing, toured with Electric Youth, and performed with the Franklin Performing Arts Company.

DanceHouse will present the world premiere of Kidd Pivot's Revisor, February 20-23, 2019 at 8pm at the Vancouver Playhouse (now sold out). In their third collaboration, Kidd Pivot Artistic Director Crystal Pite and Electric Company Theatre Co-Founder Jonathon Young join forces to create a wildly innovative dance/theatre hybrid, mixing classic farce and the forces of radical change to craft a fizzing concoction that confounds expectations and inverts the official order. The bold physicality of Pite's choreography for eight dancers embodies the eviscerating wit of Young's script, recorded by some of Canada's finest actors.

DanceHouse will present the world premiere of Kidd Pivot's Revisor, February 20-23, 2019 at 8pm at the Vancouver Playhouse (now sold out). In their third collaboration, Kidd Pivot Artistic Director Crystal Pite and Electric Company Theatre Co-Founder Jonathon Young join forces to create a wildly innovative dance/theatre hybrid, mixing classic farce and the forces of radical change to craft a fizzing concoction that confounds expectations and inverts the official order. The bold physicality of Pite's choreography for eight dancers embodies the eviscerating wit of Young's script, recorded by some of Canada's finest actors.

Helicopter parents facing the question of what they want to be when their kids grow up is the focus in the new comedy-drama The Empty Nesters by award-winning playwright Garret Jon Groenveld.  This warm and witty look at a couple who drop their youngest child off at college and then take what may be a life-changing trip to the Skywalk at the Grand Canyon, is helmed by Los Angeles based director Richard Seyd, and stars real-life empty nesters John (JW) Walker and Pamela Gaye Walker, who reunite on stage after a 20 year hiatus. 

The Village Players of Birmingham are kicking off the new year with an uproarious and zany comedy, Inspecting Carol, opening this weekend, January 18th and running through February 3rd in Birmingham. Behind the scenes of a struggling theatre's annual slapdash production of A Christmas Carol, rehearsals are at a standstill. Tim is no longer Tiny, Scrooge wants to do the play in Spanish, and their funding is on hold pending an inspection. When an impossibly bad actor is mistakenly identified as the inspector, the troupe does everything to accommodate his craziest wishes. Mistaken identities lead to side-splitting comedy as opening night draws and it seems only a Christmas miracle will save this production! Ashely Lane is making her directorial debut at The Village Players of Birmingham after directing at the Emerald City Theatre and Farmington High School. Lane was very passionate and excited to discuss with BroadwayWorld Detroit her love of the arts and why Inspecting Carol is such a fun and special show everyone should see. Check out her interview below!

Helicopter parents facing the question of what they want to be when their kids grow up is the focus in the new comedy-drama The Empty Nesters by award-winning playwright Garret Jon Groenveld.  This warm and witty look at a couple who drop their youngest child off at college and then take what may be a life-changing trip to the Skywalk at the Grand Canyon, is helmed by Los Angeles based director Richard Seyd, and stars real-life empty nesters John (JW) Walker and Pamela Gaye Walker, who reunite on stage after a 20 year hiatus.