Category: theatre

Mohammad Al-Attar: “[Many] Syrians are bitter that a decent number of intellectuals were afraid to speak out or slow to criticise what the regime was doing. Each person has his or her own reasons for this. … People are trying to liberate themselves – we have to explore questions we have postponed and examine our political positions.”

Natalia Koliada: “I am always against separating, saying there should be political theatre or social theatre or female theatre, or aboriginal theatre – it is about theatre. It is about going deep into one life, like a total immersion in personality, in a different circumstance.”

“The modern winner among challenging stage directions is generally held to be ‘They cross the Andes’, in Peter Shaffer’s 1964 play The Royal Hunt of the Sun.” Yet, observes Mark Lawson, “even the most notoriously difficult stage directions … are actually less daunting than they look.”

“Side Show was one of those artistic ventures that, adored by musical theater enthusiasts but shunned by the less ardent of Broadway’s fans, failed to catch on.” Now the show, about a pair of real-life conjoined twins who became circus stars during the Great Depression, is “getting another chance at broadening its base” with a reworking by its creators slated for San Diego and Washington DC beginning next year.

Amir Nizar Zuabi: “The man might have been born in Stratford-upon-Avon four centuries ago, but he is alive and well today in Aida refugee camp, not far from the church of the nativity in Bethlehem. … [The] reason I say this with such conviction (and even dare, sometimes, to believe it) is that, reading his plays, I have a sense of familiarity that can only come from compatriots.”

“Stories work in two ways: they either deepen the pathways and associations we already have in our brains, reminding us of what we’ve already learned, or they create new pathways and associations, helping us explore new ideas and possibilities.”

“At 34, playwright Quiara Alegría Hudes has a lot going for her: this year’s Pulitzer Prize for drama, a piece of a Tony Award-winning musical (In the Heights) and a growing repute as one of the most poetic, socially clued-in young voices in the American theater. Now what she really could use is a little West Coast love.”

“The bittersweet musical “Once” captured the hearts of Tony Award voters on Sunday night, winning eight trophies and earning bragging rights as the top musical on Broadway, even as most shows came away with at least something to crow about.”

“Sometimes we forget the startling fact that in the 16th century only the English had custom-built, site-specific commercial theatre. In Italy the peripatetic commedia dell’arte performed on the street; in Spain and the Netherlands plays were acted on decorated carts and wagons. The court and the church still summoned performances all over Europe. But the English had the Theatre, the Curtain, the Rose and the Globe, open to both the elite and ordinary for it cost just a penny to stand with the groundlings in the pit.”

“Forty shows opened (14 musicals, 23 plays and 3 special events) to a total gross of $1.14 billion and an audience of 12.33 million. Actual attendance was down by 200,000 people, but then last season was kind of a leap season: there were 53 playing weeks. Despite that dip in the behinds-in-seats tally, total box-office receipts leapt by about $600,000 this season.”