Category: theatre

“A small group of people said they had barricaded themselves inside the 110-year-old Hackney Empire theatre to escape the violence. ‘We are stuck inside,’ said one person … ‘It’s very scary. We are in the back of the building, staying away from the front. We have barricaded the doors and put chains on the doors.”

“While some casting directors have looked at audition tapes here and there over the years, the advent of YouTube, Skype, Facebook, Flip cameras and widely available video equipment has recently given technology a greater role in theater casting, providing a foot in the stage door for the technically savvy.”

“Marquette has established the Stephen Sondheim Research Collection after acquiring a vast collection of materials relating to the works of the Broadway composer and lyricist.”

If you want to see Shakespeare this summer, don’t go looking for offerings from the Los Angeles Shakespeare Center. For the first time in 25 years, there’s no outdoor show.

Ivan Heng began the Man Singapore Theatre Festival to showcase local playwrights. The topics this year could be explosive, but Heng says, “in theatre, we can discuss these issues in a safe but intelligent way, in a shared experience.”

Stephen Fry, The Met Opera, the Royal Shakespeare Company and others help fill movie theatres across the U.K. on nights that might traditionally be dark.

“The notion that British theatre is ruled from the South Bank – or the West End – is now, supposedly, a thing of the past. So how is everyone getting along? What are they learning from each other? Have they succeeded in reconfiguring the theatrical landscape? And just how many national theatres does one nation need?”

“Why can’t New York get the hang of cocktails before comedy? Isn’t it time we put the ‘dram’ back in drama? Perhaps we ought to remember that the US has a history of banning both booze and theatre.”

The Woodshed Collective – “an ambitious New York theater company with a commitment to low-budget, site-specific productions (past locations have included an empty swimming pool and a ship)” – has taken over a decrepit old church for a new play about a decrepit old apartment and a suicide.

“Hardy theatregoers who have stood patiently to watch rain-soaked summer performances at the Globe theatre in London will welcome plans for a new Jacobean-style theatre on the South Bank – with that latest theatrical innovation of the Bard’s day, a roof.”