Today’s Highlights:
* Educational Theatre‘s Theatre Alive FREE benefit celebration, hosted by Nia Vardalos & John Stamos, featuring Wayne Brady, Tina Fey, Jennifer Hudson, Samuel L. & LaTanya Richardson Jackson, Audra McDonald, Amber Riley, and more, streams at 8:30 PM ET.
* Beirut benefit reading, by Alan Bowne, featuring Marisa Tomei, Oscar Isaac, and Patrick Breen, streams at 7:30 PM ET at Off-Broadway’s MCC Theatre.
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Video: Stars in the House, a Baby cast reunion, hosted by Liz Callaway, with special guests Richard Maltby Jr., David Shire, Todd Graff, Beth Fowler, Catherine Cox, and Martin Vidnovic. (1:51:46)
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New York Theatre Barn will continue its New Works Series in February, with episodes airing at 7 PM ET. Each installment features excerpts and conversations with the creative team and performers.
Feb. 3: The Lesson, by Avi Amon, Nolan Doran & Ty Defoe, featuring Milo Alosi, Bradley Dean, and Heath Saunders. 
A fantastical re-imagining of a chance encounter between a revolutionary Beethoven and a more-established Mozart, whose worlds — and hearts — collide in Vienna in 1787.
Feb. 3: Nothing To See Here, by Bryan Blaskie & Laurie Hochman, featuring Jonathan Christopher and Forest VanDyke. In the summer of 1925, the struggling town of Dayton, Tennessee hosted a trial that claimed national headlines and divided the country: The Scopes Monkey Trial. This is the story of Frank Robinson, the man who built the trial as a publicity stunt for his town.
Feb. 17: House Rules, by Daniel Mertzlufft & Kate Leonard, featuring Max Antonio Gonzalez, Michelle Beth Herman, and Mertzlufft. Jacob Hunt is a forensics-obsessed teenager living with autism in modern-day Vermont. With the help of his devoted mother and oft-overlooked younger brother, Jacob relies on strict routines to navigate daily life as smoothly as possible. The family is thrown into chaos, however, when Jacobs beloved social skills tutor is found dead and Jacob is suspect number one.
Feb. 17: Little Miss Perfect, by Joriah Kwame & Lauren Funderson, featuring Savannah Fisher and Joriah Kwame. Coming of age is even harder when you’re also coming out. Noelle’s world turns upside down when she develops feelings for Malaya, the foreign exchange student being hosted by her conservative family. As class president, she also must confront her privilege and compliance when her high school refuses to take steps in being more inclusive. Noelle struggles to decide whether she will be true to herself and an ally to her peers, or if she will settle with simply being Little Miss Perfect.
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Off-Broadway’s Theater Resources Unlimited will stream TRUSpeak … Hear Our Voices! on Sun. Feb. 21 at 5 PM ET.
* Virtual Happy Hour, and online musical by Richard Castle & Matthew Levine, directed by Jessica Garrou, with music direction y Ben Doyle McCormick, featuring Brendan Bradley, Nick Cearly, Lauren Molina, Tatiana Wechsler.
* Game Boy, by Melissa Bell, directed by Bryanda Minix, featuring Cady Huffman, Will Mader, and Jianzi Colon0Soto.
* Change of Plans, by Michele Ann Miller, directed by Cate Cammarata, featruing Crystal Kellogg.
* Our of Order, a memory play by T. Cat Ford, directed by Glynn Borders, featuring Maggie Baird, Andrea Lynn Green, and Crystal Tigney.
* A Woman’s Perspective, by Melvina Douse Manuel, directed by Van Dirk Fisher, featuring Regina Taylor, Robert Baptiste, Gha’il Rhodes Benjamin, Andate Carter, Shariff Sinclair, and Tyrone Hall.
* Zoom, a monologue by Joe Nelms, directed by Dennis Corsi, featuring Jim Brochu, Brenda Braxton, Bob Cuccioli, Dickie Hearts, Ann Harada, and Jana Robbins.
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RIP: Cloris Leachman has died of natural causes at the age of 94.
She got her start as a child actor at the Des Moines Little Theatre. After college, she moved to new York to study with Elia Kazan at the Actors Studio.
At the beginning of her career, she understudied in the Broadway plays Happy Birthday and John Loves Mary, and won a 1951 Theatre World Award for her performance in A Story for a Sunday Evening.
Leachman’s Broadway credits through the 1950s included South Pacific (Nellie Forbush, taking over the role in 1952), and A Touch of the Poet (Sara Melody, taking over the role in 1959). She also appeared in the out-of-town tryouts of Come Back, Little Sheba and The Crucible, but bowed out of both productions before they reached Broadway.
Film credits include “The Last Picture Show” (Best Supporting Actress), and “Young Frankenstein.”
Leachman was inducted into the Television Academy Hall of Fame in 2011, and she never stopped working. She most recently appeared in an episode of the “Mad About You” reboot in 2019, and has a handful of now-posthumous films slated for release in 2021 and beyond.
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Video: A celebration of Ann Reinking, featuring Chita Rivera, Don Correia, Dylis Croman, Sandy Duncan, Marilu Henner, Bebe Neuwirth, Ben Vereen, and Treat Williams. (53:09)
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Complete casting has been announced for London’s National Theatre production of Romeo and Juliet, to air Apr. 23 at 9 PM on PBS (check local listings), directed by Simon Godwin.
Jessie buckley (Juliet), Josh O’Connor (Romeo), Adrian Lester (Prince), Lloyd Hutchinson (Lor Capulet), Colin Tierney (Lord Montague), and Ella Dacres (Peta), along with Fisayo Akinade (Mercutio), Deborah Findlay (Nurse), Tamsin Greig (Lady Capulet), Lucian Msamati (Friar), Shubham Saraf (Benvolio), David Judge as Tybalt, Alex Mugnaioni (Paris), and Ellis Howard (Sampson).
The adaptation is set in present-day Italy, where Catholic and secular values clash as the 2 young lovers strive to transcend a world of violence and corruption.
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Off-Broadway’s Mint Theater presents a video recording of Teresa Deevy’s Katie Roche (2013), to stream Feb. 1 – Mar. 28, directed by Jonathan Bank.
Margaret Daly, Patrick Fitzgerald, Jon Fletcher, David Friedlander, Jamie Jackson, John O’Creagh, Wrenn Schmidt, and Fiana Toibin.
Katie is a servant girl of uncertain parentage. She is wild with ambition and dreams of finding something great to do. The play takes you on Katie’s journey as she struggles to find herself and her destiny.
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Kritzerland presents the world premiere of Tonight’s The Night, an original streaming musical written specifically for the online world in which we all live, written & directed by Bruce Kimmel, with music direction by Richard Allen.
3 performances only!
* Wed, Feb. 10 (9 PM ET/6 PM PT)
* Fri, Feb. 12 (9 PM ET/6 PM PT)
* Sun. Feb. 14 (8 PM ET/5 PM PT)
Eric Peterson and Hartley Powers
What happens when two people — a former couple — haven’t seen each other in 20 years? He finds her on Facebook, contacts her, and suggests they meet up on Zoom. The do, and what follows is funny, touching, and tuneful, as they navigate their way through the thickets of their past relationship, which he remembers one way and she remembers quite differently.
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Atlanta’s Alliance Theatre has announced updates to its 2020-21 season. Further details TBA.
* The Under the Tent series, (providing more socially-distanced performance options), including a concert staging of Working: A Musical and Beautiful Blackbird Live.
* Hands Up and Accidental Heroes both move to the 2021-22 season.
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Brian Moreland is the recipient of the Ninth Annual Broadway Global Producer of the Year Award from Broadway Global.
Moreland was chosen by Broadway Global for his outstanding work on and off the stage, his commitment to employing diverse talent, ingenious creative teams, and his dedication to the theater community.
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Chicago’s Goodman Theatre has announced a reading of Martin Yousif Zebari’s Layalina, to livestream Sat. Jan. 30 at 7 PM CT, directed by Azar Kazemi.
Sahar Dika (Karima/Layal), Arash Navarro Fakhrabadi (Sahir/Amin), Ethan Hoya (Yasir/Mazin), Becca Khalil (Layal/Marwa), and Revon Yousif (Mazin/Yousif).
Layalina examines how families maintain their love in the midst of turbulent global and social change.
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Syracuse Stage presents Anna Deavere Smith’s Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992, to stream on demand Feb. 3-14, directed by Steve H. Broadnax III.
Patrese D. McClain
The docudrama was created in 1993 in response to the assault on Rodney King and the subsequent unrest following the acquittal of four LA police officers charged in the attack.