Today’s Highlights:
Queen of the Night, world premiere by travis tate, directed by Raz Golden, featuring Danny Johnson and Leland Fowler, opens at VT’s Dorset Theatre Festival.
Durang!, 4 one-act plays by Christopher Durang, directed by Kristin Towers-Rowles, featuring Michelle Bonebright-Carter, Megan Cochrane, James Everts, Shayna Gabrielle, Don Lovato, Michael J. Marchak, Michael Mullen, Will Potter, Chris Ramirez, Jen Talton, Neil Unger, and Mouchette Van Helsdingen, begins previews at LA’s Crown City Theatre.
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Reviews for The Public Theater’s Merry Wives at Central Park’s Delacorte Theatre:
NY Times (Jesse Green): Jocelyn Bioh reshapes a comedy of clever women, frail men and harsh revenge into one of love and forgiveness, just when New York needs it… a joyful adaptation of Shakespeare’s The Merry Wives of Windsor set in an African diasporic community in Harlem, is doing everything a comedy can do to embrace all comers… Purists who pine for the original (circa 1597) text — and possibly the world in which it existed — will find plenty that gets their goat in Bioh’s makeover, including roasted goat… Much of Shakespeare’s wordplay, incomprehensible without an Elizabethan thesaurus, has been swept away along with words like “master” and “mistress” and their buzzkill implications. Thankfully, Bioh has not replaced them with woke lecturing… she has made us all a part of the family, perhaps erasing some of Shakespeare’s worldview in the process, but underlining the human qualities we know from our own households — or, if not, from popular culture.
Variety (A.D. Amorosi): …the gleeful, spiritualized, comical… a genuine marvel: a smartly clever clash of cultures, changing attitudes, and all the rich ways in which West African immigrants have made South Harlem their home. Sure, there may be more goofy revenge fantasies and farcical jealousies played out in Merry Wives than a season of “Real Housewives,” but there is more joy to behold here than bitchiness or recrimination… Directed by Saheem Ali, who’s originally from Kenya, and written by Ghanaian-American playwright/adapter Jocelyn Bioh, Merry Wives feels personal, even reverent… puffs much-needed new life into what has always been one of Shakespeare’s minor works and makes it ring out like a major chord… [Bioh’s] remixed script is full of lush lyricism and driven by a forceful commitment to portraying an immigrant community in all its lively facets, but make no mistake: Bioh is as dedicated to laugh lines as she is to the story of West Africans’ striving and thriving in America…
Vulture (Helen Shaw): …the experience of going to Merry Wives is entirely glorious… The sense of collective celebration in the theater the night I went was positively medieval… The production itself has been carefully chosen to feel like a vigorous leap upward… it is the first time (outside of musical adaptations) that the summer festival has so definitively cast aside conservative dramaturgy and invited a Black playwright to make the piece her own… Bioh’s adaptation contains a lot of Elizabethan text, but now it pulses differently… There are guys in this show, but you can feel them being bustled away from your attention. We’re in this to hear the Real Housewives of Windsor invent increasingly elaborate insults… Every Shakespeare modernization comes at a cost. There will be a dozen ways in which changing the frame enriches the play and a handful of ways it wrenches the play out of true. Here, only the wives are made more merry… Falstaff has been stealing scenes for hundreds of years — in Merry Wives, you meet the women who steal them back.
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Hadestown has announced complete casting for its Broadway return, as well as for the national tour:
BROADWAY (resumes performances Sept. 2 at the Walter Kerr Theatre), features Reeve Carney (Orpheus), André De Shields (Hermes), Amber Gray (Persephone), Eva Noblezada (Eurydice), Tom Hewitt (Hades Sept. 2 – Oct. 31), Patrick Page (Hades, as of Nov. 2), Jewelle Blackman (Fate), Jessie Shelton (Fate), and Mariand Torres (Fate), with Anthony Chatmon II, Afra Hines, Timothy Hughes, John Krause, Trent Saunders, Kim Steele, Malcolm Armwood, Adam Hyndman, Tara Jackson, Yael “YaYa” Reich, T. Oliver Reid, and Khaila Wilcoxon.
TOUR (opens Oct. 5 at Greenville, SC’s Peace Theatre): Nicholas Barash (Orpheus), Morgan Siobhan Green (Eurydice), Levi Kreis (Hermes), Kimberly Marable (Persephone), Kevyn Morrow (Hades), Belén Moyano (Fate), Bex Odorisio (Fate), and Shean Renne (Fate), with Lindsey Hailes, Chibueze Thouma, Will Mann, Sydney Parra, and Jamari Johnson, Kimberly Immanuel, Alex Lugo, Eddie Noel Rodriguez, and Nathan Salstone. Tour schedule here.
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Rumor: Beanie Feldstein is rumored to star as Fannie Brice in the new Broadway revival of Funny Girl. Stay tuned….
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Chicago’s Porchlight Music Theatre has announced its 2021-22 season:
IN PERSON PEODUCTIONS:
Pump Boys & Dinettes (Oct. 30 – Dec. 12, opening Nov. 4), directed by Daryl Brooks, with music direction by Robert Redrick, and choreography by Reuben D. Echoles.
Blues in the Night (Jan. 15 – Feb. 27, 2022), directed by ___, starring Felicia P. Fields, directed & choreographed by Kenny Ingram.
Spring Awakening (Apr. 23 – May 19)
VIRTUAL PRODUCTIONS:
Nunsense (Nov. 17 & 18), the theater’s 1985 production
Passing Strange (Feb. 16-17, 2022, the theater’s 2008 production.
The Apple Tree (May 18-19), the theater’s 1966 production
…and more…
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Alfred Molina married Disney Animation Studios CCO Jennifer Lee on Aug. 9, with Jonathan Groff officiating the ceremony.
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Video: Daniel Radcliffe performs “She’ll Be Coming Round the Mountain When She Comes” in Season 3 of “Miracle Workers” on TBS.
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“Broadway: Beyond the Golden Age” will premiere Aug. 14 on PBS, hosted by Jonathan Groff.
Your favorite stars will recount their memories of Broadway from 1959 – early 1980s, featuring Carol Burnett, Liza Minnelli, Dick Van Dyke, and many more.
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Initial casting has been announced for the film adaptation of The Jersey Boys.
Nick Jonas (Frankie Vallie), Andy Karl (Tommy DeVito), Matt Bogart (Nick Massi), and CJ Palikowski (Bob Gaudio).
The musical was filmed on stage in Cleveland. Additional casting, release date, and more information TBA.
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Freda Pyane: Tribute to Ella Fitzgerald will run Aug. 26 – Sept. 5 at PA’s Bucks County Playhouse.
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Ivo van Hove’s revival of West Side Story will not reopen on Broadway.
Producer Kate Horton’s statement: “This difficult and painful decision comes after we have explored every possible path to a successful run, and unfortunately, for a variety of reasons, reopening is not a practical proposition.
Though it opened prior to the pandemic, the production was not eligible for the 74th annual Tony Awards.
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“Red Pill,” written & directed by Tonya Pinkins will screen Fri. Aug. 13 at 8:30 PM ET at NYC’s Image Nation Outdoor Festival at NYC’s St. Nicholas Park, followed by a talkback with Pinkins and cast.
Tony Pinkins, Kathryn Erbe, Luba Mason, Jake O’Flaherty, Adesola Osakalumi, Ruben Blades, and Colby Minifie
The story centers on six liberal activists as they travel to a red state on the eve of the 2020 election.
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Traffic & Weather, a concert featuring songs of the late Adam Schlesinger, who died in April 2020 from COVID-19 complications, continues through Aug. 14 at NY’s Adirondack Theatre Festival, directed by Martha Banta.
Performers not listed.
Schlesinger will appear Off Broadway in 2022, with the premiere of The Bedwetter at the Atlantic Theater Company (Apr. 30 – June 20).
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Audio: “Every Day,” with Ethan Slater, Norbert Leo Butz, Lilli Cooper, and Nick Blaemire.
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Complete casting has been announce for Michael John LaChiusa’s The Gardens of Anuncia, to run Sept. 10 – Oct. 17 at San Diego’s Old Globe, directed by Graciela Daniele, with choreography by Daniele & Alex Sanchez, and music direction by Deborah Abramson.
Carmen Roman (Older Anuncia), Kalyn West (Younger Anuncia), Enrique Acevedo (That Man), Andréa Burns (Tia Lucia), Eden Espinosa (Mami), John Herrera (Grandfather), Tally Sessions (The Deer), and Mary Testa (Granmama Magdalena).
Inspired by the life of Graciela Daniele, Anuncia tends the garden of her country house as she reflects on her life, looking back on her girlhood in Juan Perón’s Argentina and paying homage to the family of women whose sacrifices allowed her to become and artist.
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NBC‘s live production of “Annie Live” will air Thurs. Dec. 2 at 8 PM (check local listings), directed by Alex Rudzinski & Lear deBessonet, with choreography by Sergio Trujillo, and orchestrations by Stephen Oremus.
Harry Connick Jr. (Oliver Warbucks), Taraji P. Henson (Miss Hannigan), Nicole Scherziner (Grace Farrell), and more TBA.
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It’s a Grand Night for Singing will run Sept. 24 – Nov. 28 at CT’s Goodspeed Musicals, directed by Rob Ruggiero, with musical arrangements by Fred Wells.
Casting TBA.
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Audio: Kristin Chenoweth performs “Tribulation” in Apple TV’s “Schmigadoon.”