Category: theatre

At its annual conference last month, Theatre Communications Group asked four leading figures – Howard Shalwitz, artistic director of Woolly Mammoth in D.C.; Lisa Portes, head of directing at DePaul University’s Theatre School; Jack Reuler, artistic director of Mixed Blood Theatre in Minneapolis; and Mica Cole, repertory producer for the Oregon Shakespeare Festival – to answer that question. Here are their responses.

“Just as plays have used fight consultants for decades, both for the safety of the actors onstage and to ensure convincing portrayals, now the title of intimacy director, choreographer or consultant is appearing more often in the credits. ‘As an actor, I can’t tell you the number of times where I’ve been told by a director, ‘So, kiss there,’ without any further direction or insight on where a person’s hands go, who initiates, who stops, how long does it go?’ says Emily Sucher, [an] intimacy consultant.”

Is the wildly popular “Hamilton,” unveiled to the world in 2015, a classic? Do we know yet if it is a transcendent touchstone of American culture, in the manner of a Sinatra, a Sondheim, or even a Dolly Parton? Does it merit this recognition before, say, Aaron Copland’s “Fanfare for the Common Man” or Lorraine Hansberry’s “A Raisin in the Sun” or Duke Ellington’s jazz compositions? Surely not. In this sense, the Kennedy Center is taking a risk with its long game, and messing with the mission of the Honors. Which is to say that the Honors have long sought to set in stone artistic achievement — not be part of the original, taste-making plaster.

Until now, theatres near new developments have faced the threat of restrictions to their licences or – in the worst-case scenarios – complete closure, because of potential noise complaints from people moving into properties nearby that were granted planning permission after the live venues were established.

That’s the goal in Chen Shi-Zheng’s adaptation of The Orphan of Zhao, anyway. “Despite the familiarity of this 13th-century play to spectators in Mr. Chen’s homeland, they might have trouble understanding all the lines. The principal actors Mr. Chen has cast for this staging in China are almost all Americans, and they will speak in English. In fact, very little about the production will signal the story’s Chinese origins.”

Jennifer Caldwell, who was working in the box office in London’s Arts Theatre, got the call to fill in when the understudy was already filling in someone else’s role: “One of the producers saw me on the box office and said ‘I’ve had an idea’ about getting me to fill in. I said maybe, so he said ‘what if we cut parts of the show – can you do a reduced version of the track?’ and I said why not! We rehearsed from 3.30pm until 5pm and were on stage at 7pm.”

“However complex the causes of Mr. Loeffelholz’s death may be, widespread discussion of his final rehearsal has brought new attention to the way theatrical creative teams wield power in an era of increasing concern about how managers treat subordinates in the workplace.” In other words, there’s a lot – a lot – of bullying on Broadway.

Fans would demand nothing less: “In an unusual twist, the ‘Hamilton’ movie won’t be a filmed adaptation. Instead, it is a recording of the show made in 2016 with its original cast, including Mr. Miranda in the lead role.”

In a review of Head Over Heels, the hybrid Go-Go’s jukebox musical and Elizabethan farcethat opened on Broadway last night, the New York Times’s chief theater critic Ben Brantley misgenders the character of an oracle played by former Drag Racecontestant Peppermint, who happens to be making her debut as the first openly trans woman actor to create a principal role on Broadway.