Fame or Famine

“Embrace what frightens you. Get some new experiences.”
– Adam Carolla, Dancing with the Stars
Over the weekend I’ve been in Fort Lauderdale as part of a performing arts  seminar. Part of it was myself and others doing some Japanese-based performance art, something like a cross between butoh and kabuki and a post-modern aesthetic. There were other groups there, but if can say so, ours was the most planned of the events.
It  was an interesting experience, because my friends and I came to this conference from several different states, and spent a few hours in a hotel room Thursday night planning out …read more

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No, this is not some weird new musical, this is exactly what I’m saying it is: sex workers in western Maharashtra, India, have spent over a month taking acting lessons and then putting together a play about their lives.
Entitled  My Mother, the Gharwali, Her Maalak, His Wife, the play has the avowed message that “We too are human beings like you, and this is a profession like any other.” The play opens March 18, to portray the people who interact with the sex workers in everyday life.
“We are also humans” 
“We sell our bodies to earn money,” says Sangeeta, a sex …read more

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or, : From Broadway to Virginia to Melbourne to Hometown, USA in search of a Cat on a Hot Tin Roof.
I had expected to write, today, about the revival of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, featuring Tony-award winning actors such as Phylicia Rashad, James Earl Jones, and Anika Noni Rose (all of whom are also TV and movie stars, but it does my luddite heart good to only list them as being paragons of the theatre). It’s a production that has sparked some controversy due to the cast being entirely African American. However, living in the midwest, I can’t …read more

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I’m indebted to Paul Thompson of the Broadway blog for his series on “My Times Square“. A Chicago native, his documentation of wandering around the Big Apple brings back the same kind of memories that this midwesterner has.
They’re Showing WHAT, WHERE?
He comments on the amazing fact that Studio 54 is now a theatre, something that I was not really all that surprised at when I saw the revival of Cabaret there a few years back. That’s a musical that suits the scandalous history of the place, and the fact that I could only afford nosebleed seats was eased by the …read more

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PULP, a musical spoofing 1950s novels stereotyping lesbian romance, 3/7-29, Bartell Theatre, showing at 7:30 pm Thursdays ($10) and 8 pm Fridays-Saturdays ($15). 661-9696 ext. 3
When: 03/07/08
Cost: $15/$10
Call: 661-9696
Email: pulp@stageq.com
More Information:
Singing Lesbians to set up Camp in March
Musical satire of 1950s Pulp Romance Novels opens March 7th
StageQ, Inc, the local not-for-profit LGBTQ Theater Company announces the musical comedy “Pulp” to run March 7 – March 29, 2008 at the Bartell Theater, 113 E. Mifflin Street in Madison.
“Pulp,” is a “comedy with music” spoofing the lurid 1950s novels of over-the-top stereotypes of lesbian romance. Everything from …read more

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I find it fascinating that “fine artists” – people with serious high-falutin’ credibility in the fine arts – are lending their talents to stage productions these days. Julie Taymor directing the Lion King is a good example. Latest case in point: Isabel Allende is directing, of all things, Zorro: the Musical.
“I am a serious writer!”
That’s what she said when she was approached by John Gertz and Sandra Curtis, from Zorro Productions, who asked her to write the story of how Diego de la Vega became Zorro.
Looking at the story, though, she fell in love with the tale all over again. …read more

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In looking over my various Google Alerts, I was pleased to see yet another celebrity apparently heading to Broadway: Sarah Jessica Parker, of Sex & the City fame, was slated to appear in the U.S. version of Boeing Boeing, a comedy about three airline attendants who get engaged to the same man.
Currently playing in London, it’s supposed to open in the Longacre Theatre in NYC. Parker has been quoted as saying, “…this will be a fantastic new challenge.” But it may be more of a challenge than she thinks: according to ContactMusic, representatives from the show have vehemently denied her …read more

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It’s getting scary.
I was fine – excited, even – when the Lion King came out. Even though it took until last month for me to actually see it, the fact that it was directed and designed by Julie Taymor was more than enough to make me forgive Disney for taking a cartoon and using up valuable stage space – space that could have been used by the next Neil Simon or Stephen Sondheim.
Then came Beauty and the Beast. Haven’t seen it, but I hear it’s impressive. The costume of the candlestick alone was pretty cool, and I raised four daughters …read more

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“Company”
Last night’s presentation on Great Performances was as good as promised. Anyone who has ever liked Seinfeld or Sex and the City will appreciate it – in fact, you might think the play was a rip-off of those ouvres until you realized that Sondheim wrote it in the 70’s. The music is also melodic enough that I was able to appreciate it more than the wandering tunes of Sweeney Todd, and included one of my favorites: “Not Getting Married“, a hilarious patter song sung by a nervous bride on her wedding day.
Raul Azara had an understated elegance to being the …read more

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If you’re not involved in the Twitter community, don’t become so. It will turn your phone and your computer into a banal and tedious little bird that intermittently interrupts your train of thought or activity with useless facts about people you’ve never met.
Unfortunately, I’m firmly esconced in the twitterverse, which is why I am able to let you know that the Resident Production Stage Manager for the Shakespeare Theatre Company, M. William Shiner, is “tweeting” about his work. It’s a way to get a glimpse into the life backstage, and my daughter, who is looking at going into backstage work …read more

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