Tonasia Jones News

More than 60 nominations in over two dozen categories of outstanding actors, directors, designers, choreographers, musicians, and productions were announced today by the Boston Theater Critics Association (BTCA) for the 39th Elliot Norton Awards.

From October 29 to November 20, 2021, SpeakEasy Stage Company will present the New England premiere of BLKS, Aziza Barnes' raucous comedy of misbehavior that it is also “serious and sad and profoundly human.” (New York Times).  

The Huntington announces the launch of four additional titles to its series of short audio plays by local playwrights entitled Dream Boston.

I was finally fortunate to chat with two members of different Boston arts boards about the way they engage with their roles. Cheryl D Singleton has been a stalwart member of Boston’s theatre community as an actor, director, improviser, and board member since moving here in 1986.

As organizations convene to release comprehensive anti-racism plans, put out public relations fires as past transgressions come back into focus, and tighten their deadly clutch around maintaining a season subscription model, op eds and interviews circulate as leaders are asked, “what’s next?”

Point: For many theatres, a pandemic has meant that they need to find new ways to create and present productions. While that is certainly easier said than done, at this juncture, recurring themes, practices, and platforms have arisen.

For a long time within their history, Company One has cornered the market in Boston for selecting those cutting-edge new works that are able to effectively spark conversations and juxtaposing them against each other in ways that are both productive and incendiary. Hats off to Director of New Work, Ilana M Brownstein, as well as National New Play Network (NNPN) Producer in Residence, Jasmine Brooks, and the entire administrative staff for selecting, through NNPN, such a well-crafted text for a rolling premiere. Jung, who may be best known in Boston for her equally nuanced play, Cardboard Piano, does not stoop to begin with a message, as seems to be in vogue for playwrights right now. She does not set out to teach us anything in a certain, straightforward lecture subdivided into all-too-interchangeable dialogue. Instead, the genesis of her play seems to center around the hypothetical. As one character explains in a moment of meta-theatricality, the evening is nothing more than a series of 'what if?'s. What if a young boy was adopted from Korea by a a?oenot-future-orienteda?? white couple who have given up on having any biological children of their own? What if, once that couple is able to conceive, the boy is again put up for adoption? What if he is adopted by a lesbian couple, and his adoptive father is not entirely thrilled with the prospect of two women raising a boy? By asking these questions and not providing answers, Jung has effectively done what so many playwrights and their commissioners claim to want. She has created a work with the potential to generate conversations that lead to growth and change. Set against the thorough dramaturgical work one can expect from Company One, the production introduces issues within the idea of transracial adoption, America's systems for adoption, and the thin line between a?oevulnerability and violencea??.

Greater Boston Stage Company, in collaboration with The Front Porch Arts Collective, proudly presents a new take on the classic The Three Musketeers. With a cast of predominately black and brown actors, it's all for one and one for all in this action-packed, humor-filled take on Alexandre Dumas' The Three Musketeers. The Three Musketeers marks our inaugural production in Giving Voice: The Foundation Trust Drama Series.

Greater Boston Stage Company announces Producing Artistic Director Weylin Symes' adaptation of one of the most iconic films ever made, It's A Wonderful Life. When misfortune befalls George Bailey on Christmas Eve, guardian angel Clarence swoops in to remind him of all the good he has done in the lives of those who love him most. A holiday tradition alive onstage, It's A Wonderful Life brings us the timeless message that faith, hope, and family make life truly wonderful. Co-directed by Tonasia Jones and Artistic Associate and Young Company Alum Tyler Rosati, performances run November 29 - December 23, 2018. The Press Opening is Saturday, December 1, 2018 at 3:00pm.

Boston Theater Company, in association with the Boch Center, will present a one night only staged reading of Finish Line: A Documentary Play About the 2013 Boston Marathon at the Calderwood Pavilion on Tuesday, April 17, 2018 at 7:30PM to honor the five year anniversary of the Boston Marathon bombing. The reading is sponsored by the Boston Athletic Association. Tickets are on sale now.

The Nora Theatre Company presents Lauren Gunderson's THE REVOLUTIONISTS, a play which loudly and proudly shows the contribution of four badass women to the story of the French Revolution. The play is set in 1793, but these themes echo too loudly in 2017, reminding us that women must persist to resist, to claim their due.

FINISH LINE, a documentary play about the 2013 Boston Marathon, focuses on the people whose lives were impacted by the bombings, allowing their voices to be heard on the stage of the Boch Center Shubert Theatre. The world premiere production features a dozen actors who represent survivors, runners, doctors, rescuers, and media. Co-creators Joey Frangieh and Lisa Rafferty have taken great care to frame the play as a love letter to the Boston Marathon, the City of Boston, and her people.

Presented by the Boch Center in association with Boston Theater Company, the world premiere of Finish Line: A Documentary Play About the 2013 Boston Marathon opens this week at the Shubert Theatre.

DON'T GIVE UP THE SHIP invokes gender-bending, magical realism, and a real-life war hero, but has trouble staying afloat when the narrative jumps back and forth between two centuries. A pair of good performances in the roles of well-drawn characters aren't enough to keep this ship on course.

Fresh Ink Theatre presents Don't Give Up The Ship by Laura Neill and directed by Joshua Glenn-Kayden, February 10-25, 2017 at the Plaza Blackbox at the Boston Center for the Arts.

The Boston One-Minute Play Festival (#1MPF) returns with a twist: the sixth annual festival will celebrate the works of all women-identified playwrights and directors, as part of 1MPF's National Women's Initiative. Boston joins New York, Minneapolis, Chicago, South Florida, and other cities including an all women-identified cohort of artists this season. The aim of this program is to get a cohort of women-identified theatremakers in the room, uphold the important themes, ideas, conversations, and dialogues that bubble up to the surface, and hold space for valuable community conversations.

The Huntington Theatre Company's annual Summer Workshop will start rehearsals on July 12 and conclude in public readings of three new plays on July 23 and 24, 2016. The workshop allows selected members of the Huntington Playwriting Fellows program two weeks to focus on developing new plays. The workshop and public readings will take place in the South End at the Huntington's Stanford Calderwood Pavilion at the Boston Center for the Arts, 527 Tremont Street, Boston.

Playwright Katori Hall's lively play about seven African-American women awaiting the end of World War II in a Memphis beauty parlor/boarding house shows a slice of life with authenticity, empathy, and humor. Dawn M. Simmons directs an ensemble of wonderful actors, and the design team brings out the flavor of 1945 Memphis.