Dear World - 2000 - Chester, CT (Regional) Articles Page 12

BroadwayWorld has learned that The Muny announced today 25 principal cast members for the first season of its second century. Complete company casting will be announced throughout April and May. The 101st season opens on a brand new, state-of-the-art stage with Muny favorite Guys and Dolls followed by the U.S. regional premiere of Kinky Boots. The season continues with 1776, Rodgers + Hammerstein's Cinderella, Footloose and a newly-reimagined Lerner and Loewe's Paint Your Wagon. Season 101 closes with the highly-anticipated Muny debut of Roald Dahl's Matilda.

Emerson College, the nation's premier institution for the arts, communication, and the liberal arts, today announced its honorary degree recipients for 2019. On Sunday, May 12, during Emerson College's 139th Commencement ceremony, the college will honor four award-winning scholars, authors, writers, and filmmakers for their contributions and efforts to highlight diverse stories and voices through their work. Award-winning journalist, speaker and author Soledad O'Brien; award-winning scholar and writer Nell Irvin Painter; Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist, Emmy- nominated filmmaker and theatrical producer Jose Antonio Vargas; and the President of Miami Dade College Eduardo J. Padron will each receive honorary Doctor of Humane Letters degrees. O'Brien will give the commencement address.

The Lightning Thief musical, based on Rick Riordan's book, has been called a cross between Harry Potter and Dear Evan Hansen, which may be one of the reasons why legions of fans are flocking to see the show as it makes away across the country. Initially developed as a one-hour musical in 2014 by Theatreworks USA, a full-length expanded version opened at The Lucille Lortel Theatre in 2017 for a limited run and was nominated for three Drama Desk Awards. Earlier this year, the show launched a national tour. The tour will stop at the Durham Performing Arts Center this week. 'It's a wonderful experience because it stays so true to the book, which is the biggest thing for me and what most fans who come to see the show appreciate,' says Izzy Figueroa. 'It doesn't fall far at all from what you've already read.'

As his production of Richard Hawley and Chris Bush's Standing at the Sky's Edge opens in the Crucible, Artistic Director of Sheffield Theatres, Robert Hastie, announces programming for 2019.

Good morning, BroadwayWorld! Happy Wednesday! Get over the hump with today's top Broadway stories.

GHOSTLIGHT DELUXE, an imprint of Ghostlight Records, has announced the release of For Centennial Reasons: 100 Year Salute to Nat King Cole - the new album from the JOHN PIZZARELLI TRIO - in physical, digital and streaming formats today, Friday, February 8. Following high-profile collaborations with Sir Paul McCartney and Michael McDonald, Pizzarelli returns to his roots to honor his hero, the legendary jazz/pop vocalist and pianist Nat King Cole, whose centennial is being celebrated around the world this year with various concerts, books and recordings. For Centennial Reasons completes an epic trio of Pizzarelli albums saluting Cole, starting with Dear Mr. Cole, which helped put Pizzarelli on the map as an influential jazz guitarist and singer in 1994, and continuing with P.S. Mr. Cole, which cemented his legacy five years later. To order the album, please visit ghostlightrecords.lnk.to/pizzarelli-natkingcole

Following the recent news that a fire had destroyed the entire set of their touring production on New Year's Eve, London Classic Theatre are pleased to announce that the extension of the UK tour of Charlotte Keatley's My Mother Said I Never Should will go ahead as planned. Kathryn Ritchie returns to play Jackie Metcalfe and will be joined by Rebecca Birch (Rosie Metcalfe), Lisa Burrows (Margaret Bradley) and Judith Paris (Doris Partington). Artistic Director of LCT, Michael Cabot, directs the production, which tours to a further 14 venues in 2019. The tour starts at New Theatre Royal Portsmouth on 6 February, with performances in Newtown, Ipswich, Doncaster, Middlesbrough, Richmond, Derby, Poole, Winchester, Worthing, Epsom, Swansea and Oldham before concluding at the Yvonne Arnaud Theatre, Guildford in April. Press night will take place on Wednesday 27 February at Richmond Theatre.

Producers Anita Greenspan and Tony Hawk with Executive producer Adam Zotovich announced today that a new musical adaptation of the 2007 Nick Hornby novel, SLAM, is in development. This new project will feature a book by Tony Award Nominee Kyle Jarrow (SpongeBob SquarePants the Musical) with music and lyrics by Mark Mothersbaugh (prolific film composer, co-founder of new wave band Devo). Pro-skater Tony Hawk, who is featured as a character in the novel, is a producer on the project and is slated to develop skate choreography.

GHOSTLIGHT DELUXE, an imprint of Ghostlight Records, has announced the release of For Centennial Reasons: 100 Year Salute to Nat King Cole - the new album from the JOHN PIZZARELLI TRIO - in physical, digital and streaming formats on Friday, February 8. Following high-profile collaborations with Sir Paul McCartney and Michael McDonald, Pizzarelli returns to his roots to honor his hero, the legendary jazz/pop vocalist and pianist Nat King Cole, whose centennial is being celebrated around the world this year with various concerts, books and recordings. For Centennial Reasons completes an epic trio of Pizzarelli albums saluting Cole, starting with Dear Mr. Cole, which helped put Pizzarelli on the map as an influential jazz guitarist and singer in 1994, and continuing with P.S. Mr. Cole, which cemented his legacy five years later. To pre-order the album, please visit the label HERE.

It's a whole new year with a whole new slate of fabulous theater coming to Seattle and the surrounding areas. So many exciting shows ready to thrill and astound us, make us laugh and cry. And so, I thought I'd let you in on the Top 10 shows coming up that I'm most excited about (actually 11 since I couldn't narrow it down to 10 but 'Top 10' sounded better) in chronological order.

Puddles Pity Party, "the sad clown with the golden voice," will showcase his awe-inspiring vocals and comical candor at Atlanta's Fox Theatre today, December 18 at 7:30 p.m., for his first official holiday show 'Puddles Pity Party & Friends Holiday Jubilee.' A singularly special event, the Holiday Jubilee marks Puddles' first-ever headlining performance at the Fox and promises to be a joyous evening filled with holiday cheer and perhaps even a few tears of nostalgia. Puddles' show will include the implementation of The Fox's custom M.P. Moller pipe organ "Mighty Mo," which is the second-largest theater organ in the world, and a number of soon to be announced special guests that are near and dear to Puddles.

Barrie Kosky's unmusical revival loses more steam on its second outing.

Strike up the band: Riverdale Repertory Company, Riverdale Rising Stars, and Riverdale Junior Rising Stars proudly present THE MUSIC MAN at the Riverdale YM-YWHA. The limited engagement continues through Sunday, November 18, 2018.

Broadway In Chicago today announced their plans to honor the late James M. Nederlander, the legendary Broadway theatre owner and producer, patriarch of Broadway and champion of Chicago's Downtown Theatre District, by renaming the Oriental Theatre as the JAMES M. NEDERLANDER THEATRE. 

Strike up the band: Riverdale Repertory Company, Riverdale Rising Stars, and Riverdale Junior Rising Stars proudly present THE MUSIC MAN JR. at the Riverdale YM-YWHA for a limited engagement of six performances only, from November 10-18, 2018.

You have officially entered pop-punk paradise: a place where the people eat, sleep and breathe the essence of punk culture, channeling their thickly eyelined, rebellious year 2003-selves to walk in the famed footsteps of Avril Lavigne. It is a place where teenage angst and insecurity lend themselves to the formation of the baddest, "punkest" star whom the entire student body respects. This paradise is actually a high school, where the opportunity to rock out like Green day is met with the need to face and understand the person you find yourself to be. The ups and downs of self-discovery are set to a wicked pop-punk sound in this bizarre and brave musical that is Pop Punk High, now in performances at the West Village's iconic (le) poisson rouge.

When I read that Studio Theatre would be presenting playwright Steven Levenson's IF I FORGET I was very excited. Why? Levenson won a Tony Award for his great book for hit musical DEAR EVAN HANSEN. Then I read the play won the Drama Desk Award for Best Off-Broadway play at the Roundabout Theatre in New York (see their informative study guide). Then when I saw what the play was about I really got excited.

Well-ensconced on the UCLA campus, Los Angeles Theatre Works presents audio theatre, or as pre-millennials call it 'radio drama,' a throwback technique of decades-old entertainment enhanced by current day technology. I had the chance to delve into the inner workings of LATW from one of the co-founders herself, Susan Albert Loewenberg.

Berkeley Repertory Theatre presents A Doll's House, Part 2, written by Lucas Hnath and directed by Les Waters, which begins previews on Thursday, September 6 and runs through Sunday, October 21. Individual tickets begin at $30 ($15 if you're under 35) and can be purchased online at berkeleyrep.org or by phone at 510 647-2949 beginning August 12, 2018. Subscription tickets are available now. 

Puddles Pity Party, "the sad clown with the golden voice," will showcase his awe-inspiring vocals and comical candor at Atlanta's Fox Theatre on Tuesday, December 18 at 7:30 p.m., for his first official holiday show 'Puddles Pity Party & Friends Holiday Jubilee.' A singularly special event, the Holiday Jubilee marks Puddles' first-ever headlining performance at the Fox and promises to be a joyous evening filled with holiday cheer and perhaps even a few tears of nostalgia. Puddles' show will include the implementation of The Fox's custom M.P. Moller pipe organ "Mighty Mo," which is the second-largest theater organ in the world, and a number of soon to be announced special guests that are near and dear to Puddles.

Studio Theatre kicks off its 40th Anniversary season by stepping outside its front door as Associate Artistic Director Matt Torney directs Tony Award-winning playwright (Dear Evan Hansen) and Bethesda native Steven Levenson's If I Forget. This observant, political-but-personal family drama set in 2000 centers on the dynamics of a modern Jewish family in DC's Tenleytown neighborhood. Brought together by their elderly father's 75th birthday, the adult children of the Fischer family squabble over what to do with their long-held and now lucrative 14th Street property, igniting debates on religion, politics, and history. The first act opens days after the collapse of the Israel-Palestine Camp David peace talks, and If I Forget considers events of the outside world-and the weight of the turn of a millennium-through a domestic lens, grounding events and issues of the time in personal perspectives, while interrogating what it means to be an American Jew in the twenty-first century.

Berkeley Repertory Theatre today announced final casting for A Doll's House, Part 2, written by Lucas Hnath and directed by Les Waters, which begins previews on Thursday, September 6 and runs through Sunday, October 21. Individual tickets begin at $30 ($15 if you're under 35) and can be purchased online at berkeleyrep.org or by phone at 510 647-2949 beginning August 12, 2018. Subscription tickets are available now. Press night of this first show of Berkeley Rep's 50th anniversary season will be on Thursday, September 13.

The John F. Kennedy Center for the Performing Arts today announced the selection of four Honorees who will receive the 2018 Kennedy Center Honors for lifetime artistic achievements, and a special Honors distinction for a work of art and its co-creators. Recipients to be honored at the 41st annual national celebration of the arts are: singer and actress Cher, composer and pianist Philip Glass, Country music entertainer Reba McEntire, and jazz saxophonist and composer Wayne Shorter. This year, the co-creators of Hamilton-writer and actor Lin-Manuel Miranda, director Thomas Kail, choreographer Andy Blankenbuehler, and music director Alex Lacamoire-will receive a unique Kennedy Center Honors as trailblazing creators of a transformative work that defies category.

Good morning BroadwayWorld! Today's top stories: Ivo van Hove will direct a new staging of West Side Story, and more!