Do It Again! - 1971 - Off-Broadway Articles Page 20

Morris Park Players Community Theatre (MPP) presents Grease, April 29 & 30, May 6, 13, & 14 at 7:30 pm, and May 1 & 7 at 2:00 pm, the second production at their new home of Thomas Edison High School Auditorium in Northeast Minneapolis.

Today we lost one of the greats: the gentle giant of directors, Sidney Lumet. What a resume! Just to pick seven of perhaps the best known of the bunch, the bunch in question being over 100 titles strong: 12 ANGRY MEN, LONG DAY'S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, SERPICO, DOG DAY AFTERNOON, NETWORK and BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU'RE DEAD - the films spanning fifty years from MEN in 1957 and DEVIL in 2007 - it is clear to see why Lumet was one of the most cherished and celebrated directors in Hollywood, especially known for his tough, gritty New York stories and his pristine stage-to-screen transfers. For an excellent example of the latter (in addition to LONG DAY'S JOURNEY and the others) check out DEATHTRAP - based on Ira Levin's play, the longest-running thriller in Broadway history - featuring Michael Caine in one of his best roles and Christopher Reeve and Dyan Cannon in their finest performances on film. For an example of the former genre, look no further than NETWORK, containing one of the strongest screenplays ever penned, from the fiery and ferocious pen of Paddy Cheyefsky, and Faye Dunaway in her Oscar-winning performance for all the ages. As far as theatrical screenplays on screen, Lumet would be hard-pressed to even come close to the power, prescience and transformative brilliance at the core of the conceit of that film - yet he did just that; with his final, 2007 film no less. I am speaking, of course, of the underrated and riveting BEFORE THE DEVIL KNOWS YOU'RE DEAD starring Philip Seymour Hoffman, Ethan Hawke, Marisa Tomei, with Albert Finney and Rosemary Harris. Taking an original screenplay that could just as well have been written for the stage - shades of 12 ANGRY MEN, DOG DAY AFTERNOON, NETWORK and SERPICO, certainly - Lumet made a bristling, biting brilliant work of staggering craft and ingenuity - all with verve, energy and drive of a man a quarter of his age at the time (80). His films were classics in his own time and, now, in his passing, they are just as timeless - if not more so. With each passing year, new layers of truth, beauty, sadness and soulfulness can be found in the countless frames in the innumerable unforgettable scenes in his many masterpieces.

Timely, relevant, bittersweet, and scathingly funny, The Prisoner of Second Avenue by the prolific Neil Simon gets the all-star treatment at ACT Theatre, April 29-May 29, with director Warner Shook at the helm and a cast that reads like a Who's Who in Seattle Theatre.

The latest in unauthorized gossip and buzz from the heart of Chicago's showtune video bars, and musical theater news from Chicago to Broadway. Next season's musicals from Broadway In Chicago, Porchlight, Northlight, Writers' Theatre and more, plus 'White Noise,' 'Grease,' Alice Ripley, and, yes, more!

The Ordway Center for the Performing Arts today announced the recipients of the 2010 Sally Ordway Irvine Awards. In addition to the traditional awards for Vision, Commitment, Initiative and Education, a new award was given this year to acknowledge extraordinary efforts to expand access to the arts across Minnesota.

The 2011 COLUMN Awards will have blinding star wattage appearing on their stage for this year's gala. Yesterday on a live tele/webcast the 2011 COLUMN Award nominations were announced.

Years before Coppola's Godfather enthralled a nation and decades before "Sopranos" and "Boardwalk Empire" fed viewers' insatiable appetites for serial gangster melodrama, the yakuza (Japanese mafia) were mainstays of the Japanese film industry.

Though Shakespeare's first play, TWO GENTLEMEN OF VERONA, is ungainly and raw at times, many of the devices and plot mechanisms that will soon become the playwright's stock in trade are present in its text. As such, it remains a crude example of an early work by a master still fine tuning his craft. In Galt MacDermot (music), John Guarre (lyrics) and Mel Shapiro's (who polished and 'corrected' the Bard's book) 1971 musical adaptation it becomes a light-hearted and enjoyable introduction to his work, full of the same pluck and irreverence that distinguished MacDermot's Hair, but fully capable of standing on its own merit too. New Line Theatre and director Scott Miller's current production of Two Gentlemen of Verona not only rocks, but it's hilarious as well, aided greatly by the spectacular efforts of an enthusiastic cast and a crack band. I honestly can't recall when I've ever witnessed an audience laugh at and enjoy Shakespeare more; the resident 'Bad Boy of Musical Theatre' has come through again.

The latest in unauthorized gossip and buzz from the heart of Chicago's showtune video bars, and musical theater news from Chicago to Broadway. Bohemian Theatre Ensemble season, a Stephen Schwartz world premiere, Alice Ripley in concert, the Chicago Symphony plays 'West Side Story,' 'Tomorrow Morning,' more.

If you haven't seen a Pinter play...do some research before you head to Center Stage.

The 2011 COLUMN Awards will have blinding star wattage appearing on their stage for this year's gala. Yesterday on a live tele/webcast the 2011 COLUMN Award nominations were announced.

Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater continues its inaugural season this spring with an unparalleled tribute to one of the nation's greatest living playwrights, Edward Albee. The company has mounted a two-month festival featuring 30 events, making nearly every one of his plays available in performance spaces throughout the Mead Center.

Arena Stage at the Mead Center for American Theater continues its inaugural season this spring with an unparalleled tribute to one of the nation's greatest living playwrights, Edward Albee.

If you find yourself venturing outside of New York, and you want to see some really good musical theater, what should you do? Allow me to suggest a visit to my neck o' the woods: A trip to Nashville might provide you with exactly what you seek. After all, in a city perhaps best known throughout the world as Music City USA, what else could you expect but some exceedingly well-cast, well-produced, well-played and well-sung musical theater? We're lousy with exceptional singers and musicians and, as a result, musical theater is alive and well - and thriving - in Nashville. And here's my list of the Best Musicals of 2010...

Music Director Alan Gilbert will conduct the New York Philharmonic in Aaron Jay Kernis's a Voice, a Messenger, a World Premiere-New York Philharmonic Co- Commission with the Big Band Association, featuring Philharmonic Principal Trumpet Philip Smith, and the New York Premiere of Christopher Rouse's Oboe Concerto, with Principal Oboe Liang Wang, Tuesday, December 28, 2010, Wednesday, December 29, and Thursday, December 30, at 7:30 p.m. Also on the program: Vivaldi's Concerto for Four Violins, RV 580, performed by Philharmonic violinists Sheryl Staples, Michelle Kim, Marc Ginsberg, and Lisa Kim; Hindemith's Horn Concerto, played by Principal Horn Philip Myers; and Ravel's Boléro.

Music Director Alan Gilbert will conduct the New York Philharmonic in Aaron Jay Kernis's a Voice, a Messenger, a World Premiere-New York Philharmonic Co- Commission with the Big Band Association, featuring Philharmonic Principal Trumpet Philip Smith, and the New York Premiere of Christopher Rouse's Oboe Concerto, with Principal Oboe Liang Wang, Tuesday, December 28, 2010, Wednesday, December 29, and Thursday, December 30, at 7:30 p.m. Also on the program: Vivaldi's Concerto for Four Violins, RV 580, performed by Philharmonic violinists Sheryl Staples, Michelle Kim, Marc Ginsberg, and Lisa Kim; Hindemith's Horn Concerto, played by Principal Horn Philip Myers; and Ravel's Boléro.

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Music Director Alan Gilbert will conduct the New York Philharmonic in Aaron Jay Kernis's a Voice, a Messenger, a World Premiere-New York Philharmonic Co- Commission with the Big Band Association, featuring Philharmonic Principal Trumpet Philip Smith, and the New York Premiere of Christopher Rouse's Oboe Concerto, with Principal Oboe Liang Wang, Tuesday, December 28, 2010, Wednesday, December 29, and Thursday, December 30, at 7:30 p.m. Also on the program: Vivaldi's Concerto for Four Violins, RV 580, performed by Philharmonic violinists Sheryl Staples, Michelle Kim, Marc Ginsberg, and Lisa Kim; Hindemith's Horn Concerto, played by Principal Horn Philip Myers; and Ravel's Boléro.

Morris Park Players Community Theatre proudly opens its 10-11 season with the Broadway musical monster-hit Annie, November 5, 6, 12, 19, 20 at 7:30 pm and November 13 and 14 at 2:00 pm at their new home of Thomas Edison High School Auditorium.

Morris Park Players Community Theatre proudly opens its 10-11 season with the Broadway musical monster-hit Annie, November 5, 6, 12, 19, 20 at 7:30 pm and November 13 and 14 at 2:00 pm at their new home of Thomas Edison High School Auditorium.