As You Like It - 1930 - Broadway Articles Page 15

When it comes to Tony Award snubbing, there are several artistic high crimes and misdemeanors. For instance, Fiorello! winning Best Musical over Gypsy, or the good Music Man besting the better West Side Story. Or how about this awful upset: Two Gentlemen of Verona (the since-forgotten musical) beating both Grease and Follies for the top honor. Perhaps worst of all is this: Even though A FUNNY THING HAPPENED ON THE WAY TO THE FORUM was Stephen Sondheim's first and most successful Broadway show as a composer and lyricist, and even though it would win six of its eight nominated Tony Awards in 1962-1963 (including Best Musical), Mr. Sondheim himself was not even nominated for his lyrics and score. A show that features some of the most beloved comic songs from the early 1960's--'Comedy Tonight,' 'Lovely,' and 'Everybody Ought to Have a Maid'--wasn't even nominated for these iconic numbers. (For the record, Oliver! won that year for Best Score.) Broadway's greatest composer would have to wait almost a decade to receive his first Tony Award.

Live theatre creates a connection with the audience in a way unlike any other medium. Sometimes this connection builds excitement, sometimes it sparks compassion, and on other occasions, it forces you to confront something uncomfortable or difficult to create greater awareness and understanding. The creative team of John Kander and Fred Ebb did this with many of their musicals over their career together. In CABARET they illustrated the rise of Nazi Germany, and in CHICAGO brought attention to the role the media plays in sensationalizing criminals. But in one of their last collaborations together, THE SCOTTSBORO BOYS, Kander and Ebb not only approached a difficult subject matter (9 young African-American men in Alabama falsely accused of rape in the 1930's), but they did so using one of the most distasteful artforms in American history, the minstrel show. So, it is a bold move for West Hartford's Playhouse on Park to offer this difficult production as the final performance in its tenth season.

Written by Solnik, directed by Nikki Reed and presented by Executive Artistic Director Crystal Fields, "Birds of Paradise" is being performed in the East Village for a very limited run. With opening night this past Thursday and running only through July 14th, this show is definitely one I recommend seeing. With a rather clever plot that is as touching as it is on the constant brink of drama, "Birds of Paradise" is now one of my favorite of Solnik's productions.

BroadwayWorld presents a comprehensive weekly roundup of regional stories around our Broadway World, which include videos, editor spotlights, regional reviews and more. This week, we feature Lea Salonga, Ramin Karimloo & Barbra Streisand, The Muny's CINDERELLA and more!

'I tried to tell a simple story about droughts that happen to people, and about faith,' wrote N. Richard Nash (1913-2000) in regards to his own profoundly beautiful play, 'The Rainmaker.'

Did you know that songs by Britney Spears and Amy Winehouse sound great when performed in a French accent and with an accordion? I certainly didn't, and so imagine my surprise when I walked into the theatre at the Mill at Sonning to find Celia Cruwys-Finnigan doing just that. To say it was an unexpected introduction to a production of Noel Coward's Private Lives would be an understatement.

When the world outside is challenging, political tensions are escalating, uncertainty is in the air and pressures are building to the breaking point, what can you do? If you lived in Berlin in the early 1930's you might have found yourself escaping from the rise of Nazism by visiting an avant-garde performance at one of many cabarets in the city. If, instead, it is 2019 and you are also looking for a bit of escapism of your own, you might head to the University of Connecticut to take in the latest production in the CT Repertory Theatre's 2019 Nutmeg Summer Series, CABARET.

BWW Review: CABARET at SF Playhouse is an Eye-Popping, Wonderfully Acted Revival That Is As Relevant Today As When It Premiered in 1966.

Drummer Dave Schoepke will be releasing his first solo drum album titled “Drums On Low” on July 15, 2019. Schoepke is an accomplished North American drummer, who has had the pleasure of working with the legendary Jethro Tull guitarist Martin Barre. Dave toured with Martin's band in 2017 and in 2018 for the “Cruise To The Edge” Tour. He's also been the primary drummer for The Willy Porter Band since 2002, and has loved every second of his time with the band. Dave has toured with Willy Porter on a number of occasions over the years, and has numerous television and radio appearances on his record. The amazing part is that Dave is able to do all of this, and still has time to devote to his own band Tweed. Tweed has been a mainstay touring in Europe for the last few years along with a number of other blues and soul groups. 

Theatre for a New Audience founding artistic director Jeffrey Horowitz, having just received the Lifetime Achievement Award at the 2019 OBIEs, today announces TFANA's 40th anniversary season. The 2019-2020 programming exemplifies what makes TFANA, in the words of the OBIE committee, one of the city's most vital institutions championing adventurous and urgent productions of Shakespeare alongside other writers.

Acclaimed playwright Luis Alfaro talks to BroadwayWorld about revisiting his 'Oedipus El Rey' currently playing at San Francisco's Magic Theatre, how he forged a path for himself in the theater world, his influences along the way, and the role of artists in creating change.

Reaching for the American dream while adjusting to living under prejudice is exposed by Alfred Uhry's 'The Last Night of Ballyhoo' at South City Theatre. This Tony award winning play is a touching, relatable, and revealing look at the cost of acceptance. The story peels back the layers to expose the complicated dynamics of a Jewish American family living in Atlanta in the 1930's.

It was all too quickly over, but the audience would have stayed all night.

Earth, air, water, and fire - every vital element reaches critical risk level in Last Man Club, an engaging, dystopian mood piece from writer/director Randy Sharp at Axis Theater. This tense one-act historical drama blows in with gale force as Sharp and her creative team unearth the allure and agony of manifest destiny compounded by an environmental crisis. We see hope through an apocalyptic lens as tragedy howls outside the door.

This summer Independent Shakespeare Co. (ISC) presents the romantic comedy Twelfth Night at the Griffith Park Free Shakespeare Festival, directed by ISC Co-Founder and Managing Director, David Melville. Twelfth Night will begin previews on Saturday, June 29 at 7pm, will open on Saturday, July 6 at 7pm and perform through Sunday, September 1 at the Old Zoo in Griffith Park.  All ISC summer Shakespeare productions are FREE to the public!  Twelfth Night is the first of two productions being presented at this year's Griffith Park Free Shakespeare Festival. Pericles begins Saturday, July 27 and will run in repertory with Twelfth Night.

Theatre Arlington's 47th season has something for everyone! Executive Producer, Steven D. Morris, is thrilled to announce the line-up for the 2019-2020 season. There will be great musical comedies, a fun new holiday show, wonderful family-friendly children's programming and classic plays that need to be seen again. This season Theatre Arlington will continue to work hard to improve the patron's experience and the quality of every production. The Theatre is excited to announce that they will be hiring more professional Equity actors in each production as well as skilled designers and talented live musicians. That's not all Morris is happy to announce - this season will be the inaugural year for a new Cabaret Series which will bring the metroplex's best singers and musicians to Theatre Arlington to perform in an intimate environment.  If it has been awhile since you've visited downtown Arlington, now is the time to find your way and come home to Theatre Arlington!

It's that time of the week, theater lovers! With the weekend set to kick off at any moment - personally, we like to consider Thursday morning at 12:01 a.m. the official start of the weekend (that's directed primarily to the Dowager Countess of Grantham who quite clearly didn't understand what actually constitutes a 'weekend') - so we are back with a few suggestions of our own to help make your job easier. There are some new shows opening, others which are continuing their runs and still more which will be winding up their slate of performances this weekend!

You won't find a better production of this masterpiece, now celebrating its 40th anniversary.

What makes a Broadway theatre? Technically any venue with 500 seats or more, located along Broadway in New York City's Theatre District is a Broadway theatre, and the art that is produced in these special places is widely considered the highest form of theatrical entertainment in the world. Today, forty-one theatres are technically Broadway houses, each with their own rich history. Below, we're giving you the scoop on the life of every one of them!

It's another busy weekend in Nashville - but when is Music City not packed with events, festivals, affairs? - and we're back with our Critic's Choice recommendations to have you cut through the theatrical flotsam and jetsam and find a cultural opening that's a good fit for your harried lifestyle. Nashville Opera opens its staging of Marc Blitzstein's The Cradle Will Rock at Noah Liff Opera Center, Way Off Broadway Productions unveils its version of Les Liaisons Dangereuses at Music Valley Event Center, Street Theatre Company invites you to the see their staging of Lynn Nottage's Sweat at their new venue on Elm Hill Pike and Nashville Rep continues its celebration of 10 years of The Ingram New Works Festival at Nashville Children's Theatre.

The June 2019 So-fi festival announces that it will be presenting works at The Clemente's Los Kabayitos and Flamboyan Theaters (107 Suffolk St. between Rivington & Delancey) and Westbeth (463 West Street between Bethune and West 12th St) June 6th-23rd 2019.

Dorset Theatre Festival will open the 42nd Season on June 20 with a revival of Noel Coward's PRIVATE LIVES directed by Evan Yionoulis. Casting has also been announced for Wendy MacLeod's SLOW FOOD, the Festival's season closer. Peri Gilpin and Dan Butler, who played Roz Doyle and Bob "Bulldog" Briscoe on the NBC sitcom "Frasier," will star alongside Broadway veteran Greg Stuhr in this new comedy directed by Jackson Gay.

Ute Lemper talks to BroadwayWorld UK about her role in Rendezvous with Marlene, her 'personal homage to that great lady', at the Arcola Theatre

42nd Street, the iconic Broadway masterpiece and winner of the Tony Award for Best Musical in 1980, is tap-dancing its way onto the Charleston Coliseum & Convention Center's Little Theater stage in Charleston, WV from April 26th, 2019 through May 11th, 2019 courtesy of the talented performers and crew of the Charleston Light Opera Guild.