Category: theatre

The movie version of Ntozake Shange’s Obie Award-winning 1975 play, “For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow Is Enuf,” will be “Perry’s first to be based on non-original material” and “will have a cast of all female actors.” He will write, direct and produce.

“The Provenance of Beauty: A South Bronx Travelogue is sightseeing tour-cum-performance piece that captures a neighborhood in flux. The project’s stage is literally the South Bronx streets; its seats, a moving bus. An audio guide is pumped through headphones, and features a narrator (who performs live at the front of the bus) and two prerecorded characters.”

“Word among legiters has it that production on the troubled musical will start up again Wednesday with a call to resume work on the show, which has been halted since early August due to what producers call a cash-flow problem. The industry had recently been hearing that ‘Spider-Man’ could possibly pick up sometime this week or next, although no official confirmation has been issued by producers or the show’s reps.”

“Theatre Royal Bath is planning a major refurbishment scheme which it hopes will reintroduce the ‘wow factor’ back to the venue, reduce running costs and meet access[ibility] requirements … [The Royal] dates back to 1805 and is one of the few remaining theatres dating from the early 19th century that is still serving its original purpose.”

“As part of its 2010-11 season dedicated to the work of Tony Kushner, Signature Theater Company will mount the first New York revival of his Pulitzer- and Tony-winning Angels in America since it closed on Broadway in 1994.” Directing will be Michael Greif (Rent, Grey Gardens, Next to Normal).

“If Shakespeare production is in a state of confusion, so too are the critics. We scribblers sometimes like to see ourselves as part of a great tradition that extends from Hazlitt and Shaw to Agate and Tynan: however puny our efforts, we are subliminally conscious of our rich inheritance. Yet criticism today operates in a very different climate from the past.”

“Renowned for her versatility and aptitude with accents, Meryl Streep seems able to play almost any role. Now, a group of thesps – all men – will try to find their inner Streep in a live stage tribute recreating her greatest screen monologues.” (Hmm – We used to do this at parties …)

“With more and more young TV viewers migrating to the Web, TV executives are trying to lure them back with the same awkward-ironic brand of humor that drew them to the Internet in the first place.”

The financially-strapped theatre hopes to create some buzz. Buyers snapped up the limited offer in a matter of days, purchasing 287 five-play subscriptions for $87.50, plus Goldstar’s $10.50 service fee.

“Key characters in this play are a white woman and her family. The director happens to be black, as does the playwright. Should it matter? If the answer seems simple, recent dialogue in the theater community suggests otherwise.”