Category: theatre

“Was there a production you walked out of a different person? Share your memories – the actors, the emotions, the aftermath – of that experience” on the Arts Beat blog.

A new version of “Romeo and Juliet” is based “on the fuzzy recollections of people who read it in high school. … The result is a hilarious mishmash of half-recalled quotes, mixed-up plot points and wild digressions — all performed in the traditional Shakespearean style.”

The musical “began its pre-Broadway tryout in Chicago this month and received several positive reviews from critics — but also a pointedly tough one full of criticism from that city’s most influential theater critic, Chris Jones of The Chicago Tribune, who concluded that the show ‘needs to be funnier and more visually spontaneous.'”

“Audience members at Fela! aren’t allowed to be passive. They sing along with songs by following lyrics projected on the set — and, at one point, they get up on their feet and shake their booty … or, as Kuti would call it, their nyansh.”

Scarlett “Johansson’s debut in Monday’s preview is getting more attention than a notable reappearance, the return of Gregory Mosher, who last directed a Broadway show 17 years ago — “A Streetcar Named Desire,” starring Alec Baldwin and Jessica Lange.”

“A New York philanthropist, portrait painter and theater lover, Carol Tambor chooses one entry from nearly 2,000 at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in Scotland each year and presents it with the Carol Tambor Best of Edinburgh Award. The prize is a fully mounted production in New York, with travel, hotel and other expenses included.”

Maybe she’s right to worry. “Kristin Scott Thomas has dropped out of the upcoming Paris production of A Little Night Music due to a foot injury, with Greta Scacchi stepping into the role of fading actress Desirée Armfeldt.” The February run at the Châtelet also stars Lambert Wilson and Leslie Caron.

“For years, theaters have transformed Hughes’ original script, adding songs, and changing settings.” At San Francisco’s Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, the production “always includes wayward shepherds. They find their way to the baby Jesus by singing songs by musicians who’ve died in the past year.”

“Hairspray” is now “available in the language of Molière eight times a week. And in German, Spanish, Italian, Russian, Japanese, Mandarin… even English, for the hard of hearing.” That’s thanks to “the AirScript, a handheld electronic screen, about the size of a tiny clutch, that provides a rolling version of the show’s script in whichever language the user chooses.”

The off-Broadway Signature Theater Company’s Frank Gehry-designed Signature Center “will allow for three unique programs, more than doubling the audience capacity of Signature’s existing base. The project previously had been announced to be part of the World Trade Center Site.”