I’ve been running all over creation, it seems, readying the fall theater preview, which publishes Sept. 12. We’ll take a look at the Broadway season ahead, and I’ll have interviews with some locals whose work you’ll see in the Theater District this fall. To whet your appetite…. + I chatted… Read More →
If you know the story behind “Rent,” the lyrics to “One Song Glory” can be a little heart-breaking. Early in the musical — now on stage in a stirring production at Westchester Broadway Theatre in Elmsford — the songwriter Roger (the strong-voiced Mark Ayesh) strums his guitar, alone in his… Read More →
Got word this morning that Pleasantville’s Ali Ewoldt — who played Cosette in the revival of “Les Miserables” on Broadway – will play Maria in the national tour of “West Side Story.” The tour will kick off at The Fisher Theatre in Detroit, on Sept. 30. Pretty exciting news for… Read More →
When some teachers retire, they get a watch. Some get a tree planted in their name; others may get a gift card to a bookstore. Cary Fuller is getting a staged reading starring Tony-winner Frances Sternhagen, and a drama fund in his name. The Aug. 27 reading of Lee Blessing’s… Read More →
For most of this summer, apprentice Vanessa Walsh has been playing minor roles at the Hudson Valley Shakespeare Festival in Garrison. To see more photos from a visit to the Julius Caesar rehearsal, click here. In “Troilus and Cressida,” she’s a servant, a Greek soldier and a dancer. In “Taming… Read More →
“High Tor”?on High Tor is one of several theatrical offerings across the Lower Hudson Valley this weekend. Here’s a sampling of others: Westchester Broadway Theatre opens Jonathan Larson’s Pulitzer Prize-winning musical, “Rent,” a rock retelling of Puccini’s “La Boheme” set in NYC’s Alphabet City in the height of the AIDS… Read More →
High Tor, that imposing mountain that overlooks the Hudson at its widest, has inspired hikers, painters and poets through the years. Maxwell Anderson’s award-winning 1937 play “High Tor” inspired a conservation movement that saved the mountain from becoming a trap-rock quarry like one nearby. This weekend, “High Tor” the play… Read More →
Set the DVR. Channel 13 presents a live performance of Rodgers and Hammerstein’s classic “South Pacific” on “Live From Lincoln Center” tonight at 8 p.m. Yes, LIVE. The television show will be announced by Nyack’s own Elliott Forrest, one of the voices on WQXR, New York’s classical station. I’ll never… Read More →
“History chef” Andrew Caldwell has hacked through the jungles of Guatemala, stood in King Tut’s tomb and now lives part of the year in Egypt, “up the road from the pyramids.” That’s enough to make a man hungry. Hunger — and how it is satisfied — is what drives Caldwell’s… Read More →
You might be one of those stalwart fans of Hudson Valley Shakespeare, a perennial picnicker at the Boscobel Restoration in Garrison. Your blanket fits precisely on the same spot of land overlooking the Hudson. Your basket is at home on the blanket’s edge. You even know where they keep the… Read More →
Like Phileas Fogg, the Londoner who circles the globe with just one servant and a carpetbag, the cast of Penguin Rep’s winning production of “Around the World in 80 Days” travels light. Joseph J. Egan’s set is deceptively simple: two upstage arches echo the proscenium arch, creating the feel of… Read More →
Elijah Shaheen has wanted to be a filmmaker for most of his 14 years. The Montrose teen is a huge fan of movies, so it made sense that when he wrote a play it would be called “The Movie Story.” Given that he is a big Mel Brooks fan, it… Read More →
A new creative team dedicated to producing new musicals and plays has been tapped to run the White Plains Performing Arts Center. John Ioris, chairman and president of the WPPAC board of directors, says the board voted at its annual meeting this month to appoint Laurence Holzman executive director of… Read More →
The venerable Clarkstown Summer Theater Festival marked its 38th summer last week, opening “Celebrate CSTF: A Musical Revue” — a “best-of” musical show from the Rockland County summer tradition. Directed and conceived by Joe Egan, it was what Egan calls a “sweet, simple show,” including musical numbers from CSTF shows down… Read More →
Nyack resident Ric Siler is performing his one-man show, “Old Hickory” at the Woodstock Fringe Festival this weekend. Here’s a blurb from a festival email: “OLD HICKORY is a story about a man with a little problem – two really –a fearsome ex-wife who won’t leave him alone and a… Read More →
Whatever happened to Charlie Brown and his “Peanuts” pals? The White Plains-based New York Performing Arts Center, a youth theater in its second year, is presenting one scenario, in Bert V. Royal’s satire “Dog Sees God.” The wholly unauthorized play, subtitled “Confessions of a Teenage Blockhead,” will be presented by… Read More →
It may be prime vacation time, but local theaters aren’t taking the summer off. From Stony Point to Bedford Hills, West Nyack to Port Chester, theater lovers should have no reason to stray far from home this weekend. Penguin Rep in Stony Point opens Mark Brown’s adaptation of “Around the… Read More →
Nyack Village Theatre presents “Sister Mary Ignatius Explains It All for You,” Christopher Durang’s dark take on his Catholic upbringing, directed by Michael Willows. At 8 p.m. Aug. 13, 14, 20 and 21. $13, $10 for students and seniors. Nyack Village Theatre, 94 Main St., Nyack. 845-826-2639 or nyackvillagetheatre.com. The cast… Read More →
When “Spider-Man: Turn Off the Dark” opens Dec. 21 on Broadway, it will star the previously announced Reeve Carney, who lived for a time in Croton-on-Hudson, as Peter Parker/Spidey and White Plains native Jennifer Damiano (a Tony nominee for “Next to Normal”) as Mary Jane Watson — the girl next… Read More →
This week Jonathan Larson’s legacy — “Rent” — returns to the composer’s hometown, presented by Harrison Summer Theater at White Plains Performing Arts Center. It’s among many theatrical offerings, from Brewster to West Nyack, from Eastchester to Thornwood. (A sampling follows this story.) It seems to be the summer of… Read More →
For nearly 40 years, Westchester Broadway Theatre has been giving people dinner with a show. Starting Monday, they’re giving people dinner with a movie. On select dates starting Aug. 9, the Elmsford dinner-theater will present a series of movie nights they call “Hollywood and Dine.” You can still get popcorn… Read More →
