Pasadena Playhouse, the State Theatre of California, is being given the 2023 Regional Theatre Tony Award.(Jeff Lorch) The LATimes announced that Pasadena Playhouse is this year's recipient of the Tony Award for excellence in regional theater. Hooray! It IS about time. And the Playhouse almost didn't make it to this point. After its long, storied, … Continue reading Pasadena Playhouse Takes The Tony!
Another small company doing great work in Los Angeles is Antaeus Theatre in downtown Glendale. My pal Gerry and I caught a preview performance of Caryl Churchill's Love and Information there last week. More on the production is here. I've never seen anything like this play. It was written a decade ago, but its themes … Continue reading “Love and Information” at Antaeus Theatre
YouTube is full of wonders, and I posted about this one previously. The PBS Digital Studios series about the history of theater and drama is as addictive as a bag of potato chips and much healthier for you. I couldn't stop watching the series. These fun, short, partially animated lectures cover everything from the origins … Continue reading I Finished That Fun Crash Course
"You have to relish rejection. Rejection is the evidence of your hustle. Rejection is the sign that you are throwing yourself against the door." These words of wisdom for writers come from the new pamphlet-sized book(let) by Stephen Marche called On Writing and Failure. No one enjoys failure, but for writers and other artist types, … Continue reading Submission and Rejection (Rinse and Repeat)
Pardon the plug, but my writing partner in St. Louis recently recorded three demo tracks for Lucy, which is a children's musical we wrote. It was originally produced when we were graduate students, but over the course of the COVID-19 pandemic we decided to use our free time to update and overhaul the show to … Continue reading Lucy: A Musical for the Whole Family
In January a small theater on Melrose Avenue presented a very short run of a one-act play by Lucas Hnath called A Public Reading of an Unproduced Screenplay about the Death of Walt Disney. Being curious about the subject and having enjoyed another of this playwright's works, I had to check it out. "Blown away" … Continue reading Treasure Found In LA’s Small Theatre Scene
What books are on your night stand? Terrence McNally Selected Works, Mark Harris's bio of Mike Nichols, James Lapine's Putting It Together, Shakespeare's As You Like It, and Jonathan Hickman's Fantastic Four: The Complete Collection. What's the last great book you read? Andrew Holleran's Dancer From The Dance. Are there any classic novels that you … Continue reading In which I give myself the NYTimes “By The Book” quiz (that absolutely no one requested):
Best wishes to all the theater lovers out there. Here's to a great year ahead for stage shows around the country (and an end, finally, to Covid-19). Theatermania.com published their "best of" regional productions for 2022, and I am very pleased to find they put The Geffen Playhouse production of The Inheritance right at the … Continue reading Say Goodbye To 2022!
A great listen. From last year, here's an On The Media profile of Shakespeare's influence on American history and culture. What grizzled American president played Juliet when he was a young man? https://www.wnycstudios.org/podcasts/otm/episodes/on-the-media-as-you-like-it
While pruning my hard drive today I came across a link to a friend-of-a-friend's blog. It's a listing of playwriting contests and other opportunities for aspiring dramatists. One should keep such a list handy. After all, that new Pulitzer-winning play won't produce itself if you leave it buried in some folder on your computer. Once … Continue reading Tidying Up The Hard Drive
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