What Did He See? - 1988 - Off-Broadway Articles Page 11

'...as Willie Dixon has said so many times, 'the blues are the roots, the rest of the music are the fruits.'

Neil Simon's Rumors - one of the most popular stage farces of the late 20th century - is given its due with the fourth production at Nashville's iconic and I daresay historic Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre. Directed with panache by stage veteran Lydia Bushfield (who, herself, has starred in one of the four productions of Rumors at Chaffin's Barn over the past quarter-century), Simon's broadly drawn characters are brought vividly to life by a cast of capable and very funny actors who know how to land a line, deliver a rejoinder and, when called upon, play the straight man to help a fellow actor out when it comes time for him to shine.

Opening night quickly approaches at Nashville's historic Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre - which this year celebrates its 50th season - for Neil Simon's Rumors, first produced on the iconic and completely magical floating stage in 1991.

Orange County, Calif.—April 11, 2016—The stars come out for seven sensational concerts showcasing major names, top talent and a plethora of indelible music for Pacific Symphony's 2016-17 Pops season! Led for the 26th year by acclaimed Principal Pops Conductor Richard Kaufman, the lighter side of the Symphony opens with the return of multiple Grammy Award-winner Amy Grant. Then, sit back and enjoy some good-natured hilarity when the hit movie “Home Alone” returns to the screen with the Symphony performing the score live! For the holidays, share the spirit of the season with The Ten Tenors, and spend Valentine's Day weekend with Michael Bolton. Get an early jump on summer with The Beach Boys, before being treated to the unique humor and talent of Jason Alexander, best known for his role in “Seinfeld.” Finally, a tribute to the legend responsible for so many unforgettable movie tunes—John Williams—finishes out this incredible season.

Broadway World Austin continues our series of interviews with Austin theatres with Ken Webster of Hyde Park Theatre, the Austin Chronicle Reader's Pick for Best Theatre Director in 2010, 2012, and 2013.

Now that 2015 is squarely in the rearview mirror, and everyone is back to work after the holidays, it is time to take a look at some of the best films of the past year. As was the case with my Top 15 TV Shows of 2015 list, this is not intended to be a comprehensive list. I am one man, and I have not yet seen every major movie released last year. However, as I continue to work through screeners and upcoming screenings (I live in Orlando, so not all of the awards-bait has been released here yet), I will count down the top 2015 releases that I saw during the calendar year. Notable omissions are BRIDGE OF SPIES, THE REVENANT, THE DANISH GIRL, and CONCUSSION, all of which I hope to see by the end of the week.

Lin-Manuel Miranda's smash may have been the year's top theatre story, but 2015 was full of controversy and celebration.

You can take the writer out of the theatre, but you can't take the theatre out of the writer. For the past 20 years, Aaron Sorkin has been one of Hollywood's most successful scribes. From THE AMERICAN PRESIDENT to THE WEST WING to THE SOCIAL NETWORK, and many more remarkably successful projects in between, he has continually redefined the way audiences appreciate complex and intelligent characters. However, the writer made his name with his 1989 Broadway play A FEW GOOD MEN. Three years later, when the now iconic story made its way to the big screen, Sorkin wrote the screenplay, and his career as a screenwriter was born. However, with his latest film, STEVE JOBS, which opens nationwide on Friday, Sorkin proves that he still knows how to write an incredibly powerful three-act stage play, even if it just so happens to appear on the big screen.

 Asolo Repertory Theatre kicks off its highly anticipated 2015-16 season with the electrifying Tony Award-winning musical WEST SIDE STORY. One of the greatest musicals ever written, Asolo Rep's production will open Friday, November 13 at 8pm and run through Sunday, December 27, with previews November 10 - 12 at 8pm in the Mertz Theatre located in the FSU Center for the Performing Arts. This American masterpiece was crafted by some of the most legendary artists of all time, with a book by Arthur Laurents, music by Leonard Bernstein, lyrics by Stephen Sondheim, and choreography by Jerome Robbins. Two-time Tony Award nominee Joey McKneely, who reproduced the choreography for the celebrated 2009 Broadway revival, will direct and reproduce Robbins' timeless choreography for Asolo Rep's production. 

To share an electrifying and distinguished work from Italy with a larger audience, La MaMa E.T.C. will present Teatro Patologico (Pathological Theater) from Rome in 'MEDEA,' adapted and directed by Dario D'Ambrosi, tonight, October 8, to the 18th, 2015 in its Ellen Stewart Theater, 66 East 4th Street.

Harold Pinter was born in Hackney, in London's East End, in October of 1930. An only child, he was born to Jewish parents of very moderate means; his father, a tailor, and his mother, a homemaker, were first-generation descendants of Eastern European immigrants. Like many of his contemporaries, Pinter's childhood was shaped by the onslaught of World War II; at the age of nine, he was evacuated from London through Operation Pied Piper and resettled in a town in Cornwall. The sense of isolation he felt in Cornwall would come to influence his work, as would the changed London to which he returned during the Blitz, where he was witness to, as his 2008 Guardianobituary put it, 'the dramatic nature of wartime life - the palpable fear, the sexual desperation, the genuine sense that everything could end tomorrow.'

To share an electrifying and distinguished work from Italy with a larger audience, La MaMa E.T.C. will present Teatro Patologico (Pathological Theater) from Rome in 'MEDEA,' adapted and directed by Dario D'Ambrosi, October 8 to 18, 2015 in its Ellen Stewart Theater, 66 East 4th Street.

There is something noble about earnestly attempting to do good, despite the overwhelming evidence that what you are embarking upon is almost certainly doomed to disappoint. Not only is that sentiment at the center of CARRIE THE MUSICAL, which Clandestine Arts is premiering in Central Florida through August 30th at the ME Theatre, but it also accurately describes the undertaking of performing this infamous piece of musical theatre history. Like Carrie's senior prom, unless everything goes unbelievably perfectly, the musical is likely going to be a substantial let-down. While Clandestine has put together an impressively talented group of young performers, especially in the show's four leads, the uneven and sloppy production undermines whatever power the piece might otherwise have had.

Bravo to Chance Theater for taking on this mainstream hit and making it actually feel like a fresh, awesome little indie. Now playing through August 9, the latest offering from Orange County's bold, award-winning regional theater company is their own 'intimate' theater re-staging of HAIRSPRAY, the 2002 hit Tony Award-winning musical comedy. The results? Quite simply a more compact production that is an absolutely undeniable, all-around rousing winner. Under the direction of Kari Hayter, the celebratory production's immersive, semi-theater-in-the-round minimalist approach actually thrusts the show's outstanding music and comedy out front, wonderfully blanketing the audience in the show's pro-integration, pro-acceptance storyline about a rotund young lady with big hair and big dreams who sets off to change the world.

Today we celebrates the news of a planned ALADDIN prequel by looking back at the Hollywood and Broadway hit.

The audiences at Miller Outdoor Theatre got a big, fat welcome back to the early 1960s, where tall hair and bright, jarring outfits were all the rage, thanks to TUTS' Humphreys School of Musical Theatre's fun and boisterous production of HAIRSPRAY. With a pastiche score by Marc Shaiman and Scott Whitman and witty book by Mark O'Donnell and Thomas Meehan HAIRSPRAY is a faithful musical version of John Waters' 1988 film of the same name. The story follows larger-than-life Tracy Turnblad as she tries to secure a coveted spot on the famous Corny Collins Show -- no easy task thanks to the show's producer, Velma Von Tussle and her daughter, Amber. Backed by her doting father Wilbur, plus-sized and hesitant mother Edna, and sheltered best friend Penny, Tracy won't let anything stop her as she sets out to change Baltimore, and the world, for good. The stage was full of wonderful performers, so much so that it was difficult to choose whom to watch. 

Today we are talking to a world renowned stage and screen star who has excelled in playing a dizzying array of recognizable characters onstage and onscreen over the course of his unique and diverse career - the affable Alfred Molina. Besides discussing his many upcoming endeavors, Molina points out the importance of The Actors Fund in Los Angeles and highlights his participation in the upcoming LA Actors Fund Tony Awards Viewing Party, which will be held on June 7, and reflects on some of his fellow honorees, as well. Offering news on many of his current and forthcoming projects, Additionally, Molina also looks back at some of his most memorable roles to date ranging from his work with Paul Thomas Anderson on both BOOGIE NIGHTS and MAGNOLIA to his recent rapturously reviewed indie hit LOVE IS STRANGE co-starring John Lithgow to the Joe Orton stage-to-screen adaptation PRICK UP YOUR EARS and much more. Besides of all of that, Molina also comments on his time spent on stages around the world, notably Broadway headlining the most recent revival of Golden Age classic FIDDLER ON THE ROOF, as well as outlines some future roles he would like to pursue onstage, as well. All of that and much, much more with one of Broadway and Hollywood's very best!

We open with Maggie, Josh and Liza clearing the apartment of the girls' mattress — there was a case of bedbugs in the building, and though it wasn't directly in their apartment, Maggie and Liza are clearing out just to be safe. While Maggie hightails it to her cousin's, Liza's — you guessed it — temporary living with Josh. Cue the foreplay and sexual innuendo… and there sure is a lot of it. 

Today we are celebrating the breaking news that a classic musical is eying a Broadway return in honor of its 50th anniversary, MAN OF LA MANCHA.

It was the summer of 1988 when I first heard the melodious JESUS CHRIST SUPERSTAR score. After church, Mamma and Nanny T would make rounds to the local garage sales and the original cast album was one of their finds. I had a vintage stereo with a record player and this was my solace after church or rehearsal. When Bayou City Theatrics announced this show my excitement ranneth over and I was ready to head to the theatre to see what the creatives had for the American Stage.

?Kurt Cobain, legendary lead singer, guitarist and songwriter of Nirvana, "the flagship band of Generation X," remains an object of reverence and fascination for music fans around the world.

As BroadwayWorld reported this morning, stage, screen, and cabaret star Julie Wilson passed away yesterday, April 5, from complications from two recent stokes. She was 90 years old. Rick McKay, the producer/director of Rick McKay's Broadway: The Golden Age Film Trilogy, recently took to Facebook to bid farewell to his friend:

Kevin Thiel doesn't see any particular challenge in performing Otterbein University's INTO THE WOODS four months after Hollywood released the musical as a feature film.

El Rey Network Founder and Chairman Robert Rodriguez sits down with award-winning film and theater director, university professor, author, activist, and political organizer Luis Valdez