Up and Doing - 1940 - West End Articles Page 9

The Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall goes retro during April, with shows featuring 1940's Big Bands, 102 Years of Broadway, megahit-makers such as The Beach Boys and Neil Sedaka, and even 'Barbra & Frank' in a fantasy concert that never was.

TrueNorth Cultural Arts has announced the cast for their upcoming production of the updated version of the Maltby and Shire musical, BABY. The cast stars Michael Dempsey as Alan, Natalie Green as Lizzie, Bernadette Hisey as Arlene, David Robeano as Nick Shane Joseph Siniscalchi as Danny, and Maggie Stahl-Floriano as Pam. The musical opens at TrueNorth March 5th and runs through March 21st.

The Best Of The Performing Arts Close To Home Brings You A GREAT VARIETY OF ENTERTAINMENT IS COMING YOUR WAY

International City Theatre opens its 25th, Silver Jubilee Season with the Los Angeles premiere of a new musical about Silver Screen legend Ginger Rogers.

A native of Columbia, South Carolina, Kramer earlier this season directed Circle Players' revival of Noises Off. And as accomplished as he is as a director, he might best be known as an actor, tackling some of the most sought-after roles for some of the area's finest theatre companies. For Boiler Room Theatre, he's played Finch in How to Succeed in Business Without Really Trying, Sparky in Forever Plaid, Harry Witherspoon in Lucky Stiff and Eddie McCuen in The Musical Comedy Murders of 1940.

TrueNorth Cultural Arts has announced the cast for their upcoming production of the updated version of the Maltby and Shire musical, BABY. The cast stars Michael Dempsey as Alan, Natalie Green as Lizzie, Bernadette Hisey as Arlene, David Robeano as Nick Shane Joseph Siniscalchi as Danny, and Maggie Stahl-Floriano as Pam. The musical opens at TrueNorth March 5th and runs through March 21st.

International City Theatre opens its 25th, Silver Jubilee Season with the Los Angeles premiere of a new musical about Silver Screen legend Ginger Rogers.

Cary Hoffman will take his highly acclaimed show My Sinatra, A Musical Memoir About Obsession, to The Triad uptown.

Cary Hoffman will take his highly acclaimed show My Sinatra, A Musical Memoir About Obsession, to The Triad uptown.

Cary Hoffman will take his highly acclaimed show My Sinatra, A Musical Memoir About Obsession, to The Triad uptown.

Sometimes, it can be fun to take holiday traditions and shake them up a bit. The Players Club of Swarthmore Theater is doing just that, with a classic that most people experience every December as one of a myriad of old-time gems that roll across television screens. This year, Frank Capra's classic story about a small-town banker is hitting the stage in a pretty unusual way. It's a Wonderful Life: a Live Radio Play will open just after Thanksgiving and play through the beginning of December.

My Way: A Musical Tribute to Frank Sinatra, By David Grapes and Todd Olson Director/choreographer Glenn Casale. Musical director Chris Schlagel

My Way: A Musical Tribute to Frank Sinatra, By David Grapes and Todd Olson Director/choreographer Glenn Casale. Musical director Chris Schlagel

Sometimes, it can be fun to take holiday traditions and shake them up a bit. The Players Club of Swarthmore Theater is doing just that, with a classic that most people experience every December as one of a myriad of old-time gems that roll across television screens. This year, Frank Capra's classic story about a small-town banker is hitting the stage in a pretty unusual way. It's a Wonderful Life: a Live Radio Play will open just after Thanksgiving and play through the beginning of December.

Sometimes, it can be fun to take holiday traditions and shake them up a bit. The Players Club of Swarthmore Theater is doing just that, with a classic that most people experience every December as one of a myriad of old-time gems that roll across television screens. This year, Frank Capra's classic story about a small-town banker is hitting the stage in a pretty unusual way. It's a Wonderful Life: a Live Radio Play will open just after Thanksgiving and play through the beginning of December.

'Men like women with character,' is the sisterly advice a muddied, snarling, grief-stricken and murderously-crazed Elektra gives to pretty little Chrysothemis in Ann Carson's wildly clever adaptation of the ancient Greek story of bloody family doings titled An Oresteia. Growled in all seriousness by the fabulously bitter Annika Boras, the line got a huge laugh the afternoon I caught Classic Stage Company's crackling good premiere production; the swiftest five hours of theatre I've enjoyed in a long, long time.

In case this is your first time reading one of my reviews of a Broadway revival of a classic musical, allow me introduce you to my personal prejudice. I completely abhor the now very common practice of revising the book and messing with the score of any musical theatre piece after the authors are deceased. If a composer, bookwriter or lyricist is around to approve of changes, that's swell, but all too often their estates will allow anything from the sparse, but significant, tweaks to South Pacific to the wholesale revisions of The Pajama Game and The Music Man. Even more deplorable is the practice of letting these changes go uncredited, as was done in the three examples just cited, giving audiences no clue that what they are watching is not wholly the musical the original authors wrote.

Set in French Guiana, a region where on Christmas Eve the temperature has graciously dropped to 104 degrees, three amiable convicts are employed as roofers above the Ducotel's general store. The roof winds up being the least of the family's troubles.

Frank Sinatra may have been born in Hoboken, New Jersey, but the Chairman of the Board always held a special place in his heart for the city that never sleeps -- 'The Apple,' as he called it. From a surprise appearance with Tommy Dorsey in 1955 to a 1990 concert at Radio City Music Hall, 'SINATRA: NEW YORK' follows the singer onstage at various iconic New York City venues, living out one of his most famous lines: 'If I can make it there, I'll make it anywhere.' The five-disc boxed set (4-CD/1-DVD) of previously unreleased live performances will be available November 3, at all retail outlets, including www.Sinatra.com, for a suggested list price of $79.99 (physical) and $34.99 (digital).

EVN Productions and Old Timey Productions, in association with The ATTIC Theatre and Film Center will present the World Premiere of 'NIGHTS OF NOIR!' - 'Marked For Love' & 'Of Dicks And Dames,' an evening of two 40's themed one-act whodunits hosted by Burlesque Goddess, Honey Ima Home. Written and directed by Kasey Wilson, performances will be given on Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 p.m. from May 22 - June 27, 2009 at The ATTIC Theatre and Film Center; 5429 W. Washington Boulevard (between Fairfax and Hauser Streets), Los Angeles, CA 90016.

EVN Productions and Old Timey Productions, in association with The ATTIC Theatre and Film Center will present the World Premiere of 'NIGHTS OF NOIR!' - 'Marked For Love' & 'Of Dicks And Dames,' an evening of two 40's themed one-act whodunits hosted by Burlesque Goddess, Honey Ima Home. Written and directed by Kasey Wilson, performances will be given on Fridays and Saturdays at 8:00 p.m. from May 22 - June 27, 2009 at The ATTIC Theatre and Film Center; 5429 W. Washington Boulevard (between Fairfax and Hauser Streets), Los Angeles, CA 90016.

Today's Broadway Blogs on BroadwayWorld.com from Friday, April 3, 2009.

The Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park will continue its Thompson Shelterhouse Theatre season with Arlene Hutton's engaging and endearing play LAST TRAIN TO NIBROC . This sweet journey of the heart begins public previews on March 28 and continues through April 26. Young lives intertwine when Raleigh, a recently discharged flyboy with ambitions of becoming a writer, and May, a woman who dreams of doing missionary work, board the same train to Los Angeles in the winter of 1940. They soon come to realize that not only are they headed in a similar direction, but their roots are closer than they could have dreamed.

The Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park will continue its Thompson Shelterhouse Theatre season with Arlene Hutton's engaging and endearing play LAST TRAIN TO NIBROC . This sweet journey of the heart begins public previews on March 28 and continues through April 26. Young lives intertwine when Raleigh, a recently discharged flyboy with ambitions of becoming a writer, and May, a woman who dreams of doing missionary work, board the same train to Los Angeles in the winter of 1940. They soon come to realize that not only are they headed in a similar direction, but their roots are closer than they could have dreamed.

Today's Broadway Blogs on BroadwayWorld.com from Friday, December 19, 2008.