Category: theatre

Not really. “West End shows featuring performers cast via TV talent searches are unlikely to have a long-term positive effect on the health of the industry, according to a new report by the Society of London Theatre.”

“For many of the writers from German-speaking countries, the so-called post-dramatic theatre (theatre writing that has dispensed with any semblance of character or narrative) has become de rigueur. But despite the differences in style and approach, a common theme emerges. Practically every play – whether it’s set in a Turkish morgue, a Slovak village or 1980s Romford – seems to be exploring the same ground: a sense of displacement, of borders breaking down and shifting, of exile and immigration, of loss of homeland.”

“In my day, it was just accepted that theatre was part of school life. Every summer term, each class would participate in the drama competition, putting on a play from scratch. By the time I’d left St Anne’s, I had been involved in devising, writing, directing, designing, acting in and stage-managing seven plays, with almost no adult input. Today this would be impossible. “There are too many exams, not just in the summer but throughout the year. There just wouldn’t be the time.”

Just what is it that got officials nervous about an outdoor production of Ragtime?

Connie Fisher won herself the part of Maria in the West End revival of Sound of Music through a high-rating BBC Saturday night talent show in 2006. “On November 15, the West End show opened to universal critical acclaim for Fisher’s fresh, vocally thrilling performance. But four months into the run, she burst a blood vessel in her throat and lost her voice. Suddenly, Fisher became the poster girl for another morality tale altogether: pushed far too far, way too soon.”

“Curiously, it’s not the pans but those reviews that turned out more positive than I intended that nag like a wobbly tooth.”

“The Chicago production of “Jersey Boys” has gone smoke-free in the last few days. It is as if the Four Seasons never took so much as a drag… As the anti-smoking law is written in Chicago, no such exception is possible. And the law makes no distinction between tobacco and herbal cigarettes.”

Next to the US, the UK is the biggest market for the production of musicals in the amateur sector, and this secondary market, as it’s called, is a major revenue stream for the creators of musicals: while major revivals only come along occasionally, amateur productions keep the flame burning for them in between. Amateurs help the theatre and theatre-makers not only to survive, but also to thrive.

“The Russian clowns who performed at the Seattle Rep last April were, apparently, impostors. (Copycats, if you will. And you will.) According to a lawsuit filed by the real Yuri and Dmitri Kuklachev, the impostors stole the real Russian clowns’ names, clothes, and hairstyles and toured the country as the Moscow Cats Theater.”

When Chicago’s Drury Lane Theatre opened on Michigan Ave. in 2005 it had a rocky start. Now not so much. “A lot of shows are now circling red-hot downtown Chicago looking for a venue. We don’t have enough theaters with more than 500 seats. A whole lot of in-town and out-of-town producers want a piece of Drury Lane. So does Broadway in Chicago, which would dearly love to program all the shows at the Drury Lane Water Tower and would probably do a fine job.”