“As the discourse rages on about whether or not political correctness is destroying comedy (spoiler alert: it isn’t), these 13 comedians decided that self-interrogation is ultimately a good thing. They opened up about the material they’ve performed that hasn’t aged particularly well and how owning up to it has helped grow their comedic voices.”
Category: theatre
What I’ve Learned Doing Stand-Up At Dozens Of College Campuses: Sara Schaefer
“When I started touring universities, my first impression was not Wow, these softies can’t take a joke! It was Oh dear God, they are so young! … Some of them are only 17. A lot of them are virgins. For many of my student audience members, it’s the first time they’ve seen comedy in person. It is actually kind of scary for them: What is this strange adult woman going to do? Is she going to point me out and embarrass me in front of my hallmates?“
Iran Jails Director And Theater Manager For Staging ‘Midsummer Night’s Dream’
“Cultural official Shahram Karami told the official IRNA news agency Monday that Iran’s judiciary had ordered the detention of the play’s director, Maryam Kazemi, and the manager of the theater that hosted it, Saeed Assadi. … Both were taken into custody Sunday evening, after the broadcast of a video trailer about the work.”
Berkeley Rep Theatre Chooses A New Artistic Director
Johanna Pfaelzer, who is currently the artistic director of New York Stage and Film, a nonprofit best known for its Powerhouse Theater summer program at Vassar College, will become the next artistic director of Berkeley Rep starting next fall. She will succeed Tony Taccone, who has been at Berkeley Rep for 33 years, 21 of them as artistic director.
Britain Scraps Plans To Increase Tax On Lower-Paid Theatre Workers By 500 Percent
Er, yes, that cancelation seems like a good idea for everyone who’s self-employed and earning less than £6.205 per year.
Bristol’s Old Vic Theatre Gets A New Door, And A New Acknowledgement Of The Theatre’s Place In Britain’s Slave Trade
Many of the theatre’s founding investors in 1766 made that money directly from the city’s slave trade. The Old Vic’s artistic director: “The theatre is undeniably a part of the slave trade legacy in Bristol. … The building came out of that economic boom and I don’t think it is enough anymore to just assume that people then did not know the trade was wrong.”
Mexico Has A Booming Theatre Scene, A New Theatre Awards Show – And A Flood Of Foreign Actors
Almost all of the leads in Les Mis are from other countries, and that’s not unusual for productions in Mexico. But there’s more: “The fact that the foreign actors from Argentina, Brazil and Spain are generally taller and more fair-skinned than the Mexican actors also means they fit the conventional look of a leading role, especially when the production is exported from the United States or Europe.”
Bill Rauch Talks Inclusive Theatre
“We’re telling the best stories that we can possibly tell — the most dynamic, the best writing — period. The fact is: Voices that have been too often marginalized in our theater have some of the most exciting stories to tell. So if we’re going to tell the best stories, we darn well better have a mix of storytellers and stories that reflect gender diversity and many, many other expressions of identity.”
Juliet Is A Jar Of Marmalade, And Hamlet Is A Bottle Of Vinegar. (Yes, Really)
Alexis Soloski talks with the artistic director of the British theatre company Forced Entertainment, whose show Complete Works: Table Top Shakespeare charges through the plays with a cast of household items.
Reviving The First-Ever Updated Shakespeare (It’s From The 1660s)
“The big changes to the Macbeth at the Folger Theatre include famous monologues that have been substantially trimmed; a newly heroic Macduff and Lady Macduff, who have bigger roles than Shakespeare dreamed of; and witches in extended sequences of song and dance. … This Macbeth is a painstakingly assembled revival of a version that’s about 350 years old, adapted by William Davenant as London’s theaters reopened after being shut down for 18 years during England’s Civil War.”