The Playgoer

Slate's Jack Shafer rightly calls for a moratorium on "playwrights migrating to tv" stories until there's something, you know, new to report. A quick Nexus search plays like a broken record: The New York Times noted the "steady flow of directors, producers, and playwrights out of the theater" and into TV in...

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This article about the proliferation of co-productions even between lower-budget theatres in the greater Philly area reminds us of what's become a staple in the regional theatre circuit.  And so I ask you actors, designers, directors, artistic directors--co-productions: good thing or bad thing? On the good side: longer runs (i.e. longer contracts,...

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"I think the theatrical machinery works today more slowly than it did in the 1930s, when the theater was a more bustling and robust industry. By the time a “topical” play has been developed and workshopped and tried out in a regional theater, say, the point it addresses may have...

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New contract agreement for Off Broadway negotiated with Actors Equity.  Note what I call the "Q Clause": Members of the Off-Broadway League may now produce shows in the Broadway Box in Off-Broadway-sized houses of 499 or less without paying a salary premium.  This would not apply to any productions that have...

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 Judi Dench as Titania, Queen of the Faeries, in Peter Hall's latest Midsummer Night's Dream, currently on in London. From Matt Wolf's NYT review:I can report that I haven’t laughed so delightedly in ages as I did at the moment at which our heroine’s sexually reinvigorated fairy queen responds to a...

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Who is Lucy Prebble?  She's the 29-year-old British playwright who decided to write an Enron play a few years ago and found someone to produce it--in London.  And now that it's a proven success there, of course, it's coming to Broadway. Time Out NY's David Cote asks (in the online pages...

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Arts education blogger Richard Kessler is alarmed about "outsourcing" arts education, at least based on an LA Times report about some Burbank school. Ideally, arts education is delivered best by a powerful combination of certified arts teachers, classroom teachers, and cultural organizations, including teaching artists....Where there are not enough certified arts...

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Chairman Rocco has touched Minneapolis-based actor/director Ralph Remington for the post of Director of Theatre & Musical Theatre at the NEA.  Remington, 47, a 1984 graduate of Howard, moved to the Twin Cities to pursue acting. He founded Pillsbury House in 1992 and ran it until 1999. He has acted at...

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Yep, Ohio Theatre is indeed closing. This August.  The reprieves have run out, negotiations are over. No update on the website yet, but a release has gone out, including an invitation to any "alums" to contribute to what sounds like a terrific archive in the making: To mark this traumatic event, the...

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And still not even effective! “Everyone hears the announcement, but no one thinks it applies to them,” said Seth Sklar-Heyn, the associate director of “A Little Night Music."Catch the Our Town story at the end....

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"The RSC says that it plans to store its Park Avenue Armory theater "probably in the U.S." at the end of its 2011 residency, and that it will be reused for other productions here and in England.... I have a different idea. The Actors' Shakespeare Project in Boston, American Players Theatre...

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Critic-o-Meter is now StageGrade.  The little blog with a dream, founded by our friends Rob Weinert-Kendt and Isaac Butler to keep a record of all major NYC reviews of new openings quickly became an invaluable resource.  And now it's all spruced up, sponsored and monetized! Congrats to Rob and Isaac on...

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Did the role of Eddie Carbone's wife Beatrice in A View from the Bridge somehow get smaller in the last twelve years?  According to the folks at the Tonys it apparently did: [S]ome of the producers on “View [from the Bridge]” are said to be a little frustrated that a Tony...

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-Who is Peaches?  And why is she being barred from performing her one-woman Jesus Christ Superstar?  Fight the power, Peaches! -In case you missed last weekend's Sunday Magazine, NYT's Alex Witchel catches up with director David Cromer, post-Brighton Beach Memoirs. (He's back in NY, Off B'way, with a new Australian play.) -Carrie...

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"There are lots of spaces, particularly on side streets, that are loftlike, large, clean and very affordable — great opportunities for arts organizations, many of them nonprofits....It’s centrally located and relatively close to the theater district." -Robin Abrams, of Lansco Corporation brokers, talking up the Garment District where a bunch of...

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In the era of the diminishing subscriber base, Seattle's ACT (as in "A Contemporary Theatre") may be on to something: The spacious building [ACT's downtown home] houses four different stages. But ACT doesn't have enough money to produce plays on more than one stage at a time. [Carlo Scandiuzzi, ACT's Executive...

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Quick follow up to last week's discussion on the big RSC-NYC visit.  A reader who works in Development graciously shared the following revealing info on that 40% of RSC fundraising dough that comes from the States: The RSC uses an American 501(c)3, RSC America, to raise funds here. Am I...

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I imagine some out there are a bit aghast at Charles Isherwood's pronounced Anglophilia in today's Times, celebrating the much ballyhooed New York season the RSC will play here next summer.  (That's 2011, folks, so take it easy.)  I myself can't wait for the spirited letters that hopefully the Times...

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-LA Times reports from the onstage final farewell to Pasadena Playhouse. -Time Out's David Cote tells Lincoln Center Theatre what they can do with their fancy new blackbox space. (Seriously, he has suggestions.) -London's Royal Court is expanding to--out of the theatre and into the mall!...

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The official computer rendering of what the Royal Shakespeare Co. plans to build inside NYC's Park Avenue Armory. One has to admit, the sheer physical challenge described in Playbill is quite impressive: [A] full-scale replica of the company's intimate thrust stage Courtyard Theatre will be constructed to house the plays. The 930-seat...

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Detroit's Michigan Theater, built in 1926 by movie-palace makers Rapp & Rapp, as it looks today. According to Wikipedia: "The Michigan Theater was permanently closed and partially demolished in 1976. Due to problems with the structural integrity of adjoining office building, the main hall and lobby were gutted and converted into...

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Lincoln Center Summer Festival dropped a nice press bomb this morning... the Royal Shakespeare Company will hold court in Manhattan in the summer of 2011 for an unprecedented six-week, five-play residency. The troupe will occupy a newly constructed theater inside the Park Avenue Armory as part of the Lincoln Center FestivalAnd...

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"Essentially, any activity that requires us to travel to a venue, take a seat, and watch people performing in some disciplined fashion is not as popular as it used to be." New Yorker classical music critic Alex Ross (subscription required), commenting on this NEA survey from last fall. True? Talk amongst yourselves......

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It should obviously not come as a surprise that one of the exceptions to the President's proposed "spending freeze" beginning next year will not be the National Endowment for the Arts.  In fact the proposed NEA budget in his 2011 plan is $6 million lower than the current level (still...

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  Welcome to the future--where apparently Lincoln Center will always be a balmy 70 degrees and patrons will all be smiling and somewhat medically sedated. Actually, like a slick ad graphic, the focus here is not meant to be the surroundings but that little rectangle on top of what we know...

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