Category: theatre

“In the US there has already been a rise in membership of show-choirs like the fictional one that Glee revolves around, and a live tour is planned for the cast. But will Glee leave an indelible mark on television? Musicals are a difficult genre to get right on TV.”

“When Marion Potts takes over as artistic director of the Malthouse Theatre company at the end of this year, she will make history as the first woman to assume creative control of one of Melbourne’s major theatre troupes.”

“Isn’t it a little embarrassing that the City of Toronto website is still claiming that Hogtown is ‘the third-largest English-language theatre centre in the world’? While Toronto may have indeed vied for that unscientific title in the 1990s, it’s decidedly been in the dust in the past 10 years.”

“Contract negotiations had been proceeding between both sides for over a year but ran into rough water late last fall over the festival’s desire to cut health benefits for workers without compensation, the union said.”

“Martin Benson, 72, and David Emmes, 71, won’t be retiring, the theater said in a statement, but will continue under the title of founding directors, advising their successor and taking “an active role” in finding and developing the new plays that have been South Coast’s leading claim to fame.”

Just days after the province announced plans for a new opera company, “Northern Ireland’s theatre capacity has increased with the official opening of the £7.6 million Theatre at the Mill in Newtownabbey. Located on the northern edge of Belfast city limits, the 400-seat venue is housed in a former linen mill and forms part of a complex that also hosts the borough council’s new Civic Centre.”

Andy Field: “The National as an organisation is a wonderful, vital idea. The national theatre as a building is an anachronism: a brutal(ist) articulation of one narrow and archaic vision of theatre that, if not obsolete, is certainly one-dimensional.”

“[I]t remains unclear how substantial those offers are and whether they are enough to save the institution. In its most recent blog post, the company stated that it has ‘been inundated with generous messages of support and many have offered to pledge money to help keep this venerable institution operational.'”

“The Abbey Theatre is the highest profile casualty in the share-out of annual funding by the Irish Arts Council, losing more than €1 million of last year’s grant. The cutback reflects the reduced level of state support for the arts.”

Duncan Sheik, the composer and lyricist who won a pair of Tonys for Spring Awakening, is now working on a singing-and-dancing adaptation of Bret Easton Ellis’s notorious novel about a homicidal maniac yuppie.