Category: theatre

The fight, being waged in the chambers of federal judges in New York and Alabama, offers an unusual glimpse into the vituperative backstage wrangling that can erupt over control of a celebrated work of literary fiction when it has been adapted for the stage.

Theatres across the UK face unexpected costs in excess of £180 million under “devastating” EU proposals to ban the vast majority of stage lighting by 2020. Costs in London alone are expected to reach £35 million as venues are forced to replace most of their lighting equipment, with experts warning that venues could go dark as a result.

“The narrow lens is one of the play’s surprises: It examines the titanic forces of urban renewal via a single establishment, never leaving the checkerboard-tiled stage of [Memphis Lee’s] diner. For a play about sweeping change, what emerges is a slow portrait, one that tries to convince you that everything depends on the fate of this single black-owned soul-food cafe in Pittsburgh. … Another surprise in Two Trains Running is how far the play’s fears still echo today, some 50 years after the events depicted (and nearly 30 years since its debut).”

According to an official statement from the Florida Rep board, the reasons for the dismissal of Robert Cacioppo, who co-founded the Fort Myers company in 1998, were “behavioral problems [including] bullying, considerable absence, demeaning individuals (particularly women) both publicly and privately, and anger management issues.”

Responding to the suit filed last month by Tonja Carter, Lee’s attorney and executor, arguing that Aaron Sorkin’s script deviates too much from the novel, a $10 million countersuit filed Monday argues that “the Agreement did not give Ms. Lee approval rights over the script of the Play, much less did it give her a right to purport to edit individual lines of dialogue. It certainly did not give such rights to Ms. Carter, who is not an author, editor, literary agent or critic, and has no known expertise whatsoever in theater or writing.”

“The Pulitzer board called Cost of Living ‘an honest, original work that invites audiences to examine diverse perceptions of privilege and human connection through two pairs of mismatched individuals: a former trucker and his recently paralyzed ex-wife, and an arrogant young man with cerebral palsy and his new caregiver.'”

“Harry Potter and the Cursed Child,” a two-part drama now in previews and opening April 22, cost about $68.5 million to bring to Broadway, including not only $35.5 million to capitalize the show — more than for any other nonmusical play in history — but also another $33 million to clear out and redo the theater.

That’s right, a theatre performing a musical Titanic had to cancel when debris started falling on stage “shortly after the ship hits the iceberg.”