There are two remedies for what ails the uneven production of Molière’s “The Imaginary Invalid” at the Schoolhouse Theater in Croton Falls: Time and pace. With time — and more performances — the pace may pick up and save a production that has plenty to recommend it. The evening starts… Read More →
I got word this morning that Purchase College has appointed Ken Tabachnick dean of the School of the Arts, to begin July 1. Tabachnick, the announcement notes, “has extensive experience in multiple facets of the arts, having worked as an administrator, lighting designer, consultant, producer, and legal counsel. He recently… Read More →
If all goes as planned, theatergoers this month will attend performances of Gabrielle Fox’s three one-act plays (under the umbrella title “Fox Tales”) and learn about and support Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS. Likewise, when people settle in to see Mark Jason Williams’ hourlong play “Recovery” — inspired, in part by… Read More →
Penny Peyser will be back at her parents’ Irvington home this weekend, back from L.A., where she has lived for 34 years. The actress — who played Alan Arkin’s soon-to-be-married daughter in the 1979 film “The In-Laws” and went on to roles on “Knots Landing” and other TV series —... Read More →
A mention of the playwright Eugene O’Neill isn’t likely to conjure thoughts of a sunny, turn-of-the-century Fourth of July. O’Neill is best known for his American tragedies “The Iceman Cometh” and “Long Day’s Journey Into Night.” But he wrote just such a sunny-turn-of-the-century-Fourth-of-July story, his one well-known comedy: “Ah, Wilderness!”... Read More →
Rockland Shakespeare Company will hold auditions tonight and tomorrow at 7 for “Much Ado About Nothing.” Auditions in the Performing Arts Black Box Studio Theater, Room 7100, Cultural Arts Center, Rockland Community College, 145 College Rd. Suffern. Auditioners will read from the script and, if cast, rehearsals will be held in the evening…. Read More →
In 1855, Walt Whitman wrote “I Hear America Singing,” a poem celebrating the workers whose “songs” made the country great. “I HEAR America singing, the varied carols I hear …” This week, Rye will be singing — or at least a group of more than 30 friends and neighbors will… Read More →
Christine Andreas and David Nathan Perlow stand side by side during the curtain call at the Longacre Theatre eight shows a week, a diminutive Broadway veteran and a lanky newcomer belting out “The Best of Times” with the rest of the company in “La Cage Aux Folles.” “The best of… Read More →
Running the risk of becoming a very sad blog today with more sad news to share. Joseph Manzo, whose costumes graced the stages of schools and theater groups across the Lower Hudson Valley, died Friday. Frank Portanova, director at Archbishop Stepinac High School — where Joe’s design for “The Drowsy… Read More →
Sad to learn on Saturday night of the death of AP Broadway critic Mike Kuchwara, who had been the AP’s man on the aisle for more than 25 years. A gentle, jovial man, always accessible and with an ever-present smile. The marquees of Broadway theatres in New York will be… Read More →
In the comedies of Molière, it’s fairly safe to assume two things: Everyone has an angle. And the maid is always the smartest person in the room. That’s just how Allyce Beasley likes it. Beasley — perhaps best known as Agnes DiPesto, the rhyming receptionist from TV’s “Moonlighting” — plays… Read More →
Great news if you’ve been booked lately and haven’t caught Penguin Rep’s excellent production of Tom Dudzick’s wonderful “Over the Tavern,” starring the amazing Kathryn Markey (pictured). The comedy, which was originally slated to close June 6, has been extended and will now run through June 13. Directed by Thomas Caruso, “Over… Read More →
Eugene O’Neill created the tortured Tyrones, but he also made the Millers, a happier clan and the focus of his only comedy, “Ah, Wilderness!” The Armonk Players will present “Ah, Wilderness!” June 3 through 6 at the North Castle Public Library’s Whippoorwill Hall in Armonk. Curtains are 7:30 on June… Read More →
Schools from Bergen County dominated the nominations for the 2010 Metropolitan Awards, honoring achievements at 39 participating high-school musicals from Westchester, Rockland, Putnam and Bergen counties.
The tally of nominations for the 2010 Metropolitan Awards, minus the teacher-nominated category for technical merit. 14: Ramsey (NJ) 11: Bergen County Academies (NJ), Fair Lawn (NJ) 10: Don Bosco (NJ), St. Joseph’s Regional (NJ) 9: Putnam Valley, Spring Valley, Northern Highlands (NJ) 8: Peekskill, Tappan Zee 7: Archbishop Stepinac… Read More →
Here, from Helen Hayes Youth Theater producer Danielle Rudess, are the nominations for the 2010 Metropolitan Awards, honoring achievements in participating high-school musicals from Westchester, Rockland and Bergen counties. Thirty-nine schools entered: 19 from Westchester, 13 from Bergen, six from Rockland and one from Putnam. (Producer Rudess said Putnam Valley… Read More →
Just finishing up the post on the Metros… Some surprises afoot, methinks.
Check back here at noon for the list of nominees for the 2010 Metropolitan Awards, celebrating achievements by participating high-school theater programs from Westchester, Rockland, Putnam and Bergen counties. Waiting to hear from Danielle Rudess this morning about the 12th annual awards, to be handed out June 7 at the… Read More →
Note to the Jerome family of Brighton Beach: The Pazinskis of Buffalo are giving you a run for your comic money at Penguin Rep in Stony Point. Tom Dudzick’s comedy “Over the Tavern,” now opening Penguin’s 33rd season, is a Catholic cousin to Neil Simon’s “Brighton Beach Memoirs.” It’s about… Read More →
Just got off the phone with Danielle Rudess, producer of the Metropolitan Awards, which celebrate achievements in high-school musicals in Westchester, Putnam, Rockland and Bergen counties. She’s set to announce the 2010 nominees— right here—tomorrow at noon. Rudess says the race for outstanding overall musical was so tight it may… Read More →
On Friday, Justin Prescott graduated from Purchase College’s Dance Conservatory. Saturday morning, he awoke with something not all newly minted graduates can say they have in this economy:?a job. For the past six weeks, the 22-year-old Texan has been preparing to join the cast of “Fela!” Bill T. Jones’ Broadway… Read More →
Sometimes we need a reminder that, no matter how different we all may seem, on some level we’re all in the same boat. That’s the power of theater and, this weekend and next, that’s the appeal of Axial Theater’s “For the Love of Money.” Billed as “an evening of monologues… Read More →
The summer’s not yet here, but the folks at Westchester Broadway Theatre are already looking to August, announcing auditions for Jonathan Larson’s “Rent.” Here’s the call:
Chappaqua actor Curtis Nielsen, who is helping to revive Chappaqua Drama Group, will be a busy man in coming months, performing an adaptation of Greg Mortenson’s “Three Cups of Tea” in schools across the country. He kicks off the tour May 18 at The American Place Theatre’s 2010 Literature to Life… Read More →
Nyack playwright Tom Dudzick and Penguin Rep artistic director Joe Brancato form a mutual admiration committee. Brancato starts his barn theater’s 33rd season the way he started its 32nd, with a Dudzick play. Last year it was “Our Lady of South Division Street,” the hilarious story of a family who… Read More →
Write what you know, goes the old writer’s maxim. For years, Tom Dudzick loved telling stories of growing up over his father’s Buffalo bar. But the playwright, who now lives in Nyack, just couldn’t bring himself to commit those stories to paper. “Because I was Catholic,” he says. “There was… Read More →
The White Plains Performing Arts Center’s Conservatory Theatre is putting the finishing touches on “Fame,” the musical based on the TV show that was popular when I was as old as some of the kids in this cast. Directed by Jeremy Quinn, with choreography by Linda Duci and musical direction… Read More →
It should come as little surprise that I’m a fan of “Glee.” Came across this clip of a 9-year-old Lea Michele on the Sally Jesse Raphael show and had to share. I love how, right after she performs, she applauds her accompanist.
Liz and Ann Hampton Callaway, those Chicago girls who now call Croton-on-Hudson home, will present “Boom!” at 8 p.m. June 4 at New York’s Town Hall, 123 W. 43rd St. Billed as a “tribute to the boomers music of the ’60s and ’70s, tickets to “Boom!” are $45 and $50 through… Read More →
The American Film Institute put “Some Like It Hot” — Billy Wilder’s 1959 film starring Tony Curtis, Jack Lemmon and Marilyn Monroe — on the top of its funniest-movies list. “Sugar” — the musical based on the film, now getting a spirited revival at Westchester Broadway Theatre in Elmsford —... Read More →
