Category: theatre

Actors’ Equity Expels Former Artistic Director Of The Citadel Theatre

“Acting on the findings of a Disciplinary Committee relating to a safe and respectful workplace complaint, Equity’s national Council ratified the recommendation of the Committee and expelled Bob Baker from Equity membership on June 23, 2019,” a notice on Equity’s website reads. “A possible appeal period has now closed.” – The Globe and Mail (Canada)

A Paris Theatre, Closed For Two And A Half Years For A $35 Million Renovation, Is About To Reopen

This isn’t just any (massive) theatre renovation. “It was in the Châtelet where the artistic revolutions and innovations of Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes were first seen; here where Mahler, Strauss and Tchaikovsky conducted; where Josephine Baker, Cole Porter and Juliette Gréco all sang.” Now a British artistic director, the first woman in the theatre’s history, leads the Châtelet as it prepares to rejoin the cultural life of Paris. – The New York Times

Study Shows That Gendered Discrimination, And A Lack Of Parental Support, Create Massive Barriers For Women Theatre Designers

Sometimes you just need a study to back up what seemingly everyone (at least the women) already knows: “The fields of design, production, and technical theatre are the most male-dominated,” and the reasons? Er: Ninety percent of respondents “reported having experienced a negative work environment, gender-based harassment, and/or pay disparity,” especially in lighting and sound design. – American Theatre

After 40 Years, ‘For Colored Girls’ Returns, As A Celebration And As A Weapon, To The Theatre Where It Was Born

Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf “has been part of the canon since it became a Broadway hit in 1976. Still, [the play] doesn’t get a lot of professional productions; it’s been much more a staple of college theater. … But at a moment when race and gender are so prominent in the tumultuous civic dialogue — and when black playwrights, particularly women, are pushing both the content and form of contemporary American drama in new directions — the time seems right to revisit Shange’s text.” – The New York Times

‘Unmanly Grief’ — Performing A Trans Hamlet

“Jenet Le Lacheur — a transfeminine Brit who earned recognition, before coming out, in the West End production of Harry Potter and the Cursed Child — has … [recently starred] as Hamlet in Daniel Winder’s dystopian production of the Shakespeare play … The fact that Winder’s Hamlet was nonbinary and transfeminine was largely subtextual — a subtle but important thread running through the production.” – HowlRound

This Off-Broadway Play Was So Fraught, It Hired Post-Show Counselors For The Audience. Now It’s Headed To Broadway — Can Broadway Handle It?

Jeremy O. Harris’s Slave Play “often funny and pervasively unsettling, examines that lingering wound [of American slavery] through the frustrated sex lives, and taboo sexual fantasies, of three contemporary interracial couples. … An internet-based backlash, seemingly fueled by people who had not seen the play, was threatening enough to require stepped-up security” for its Off-Broadway run. “Many of the participants still can’t quite believe this play, on Broadway, is happening.” – The New York Times

After Controversy, Jewish Theatre Artists In Britain Form Collective To Draft ‘Best Practices ‘Guide

A few weeks ago, the group said in an open letter that Jews were not sufficiently represented onstage – or offstage, in production teams – in the theatre in Britain, criticism sparked by a production of The Falsettos. What to do about it? Well, the group, now named the Jewish Artists’ Collective, “will draft a best-practice proposal for the industry and open a conversation with both Jewish and non-Jewish artists.” – The Stage (UK)