Today’s Highlights:
* Talley’s Folly, by Lanford Wilson, directed by Robert Hupp, featuring Kate Hamill and Jason O’Connell, begins streaming at Syracuse Stage.
* Lee Roy Reams in concert, with music direction by Alex Rybeck, begins streaming at Off-Broadway’s York Theatre.
* “Dash & Lily,” featuring Midori Francis, Austin Abrams, Michael Park, Troy Iwata, Dante Brown, Keana Marie. Stage favorites Larry Owens, and Patrick Vail, premieres on Netflix.
* The National Veterans Foundation presents a reading of Letters From War Veterans, featuring Dan Lauria, Jonathan Banks, Kim Brockington, Joe Mantegna, Sam McMurray, Lou Diamon Phillips, James Pickens, and Reno Wilson, at 10 AM PT here.
* Michael Cerveris: Eating Birthday Cake Alone FREE concert, streams at 8 PM ET/5 PM PT on Facebook.
* Madison Claire Parks in concert streams at 3 PM PT at Musical Theatre West.
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GRACE NOTES Quote of the Week: “An actor’s a guy who, if you ain’t talking about him, he ain’t listening.” ~ Marlon Brando
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Video: “Stars in the House,” a “Family Ties” cast reunion with Meredith Baxter, Michael Gross, Michael J. Fox, Tina Yothers, Brian Bonsall, Marc Price, and Scott Valentine. (1:25:40)
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Sag Harbor’s Bay Street Theater presents its Virtual Holiday Silent Auction from Nov. 22 – Dec. 1.
One-of-a-kind collectible items and experience packages have been provided by a gracious list of celebrities, including Billy Joel, Jimmy Buffett, Betty Buckley, Melissa Errico, Ben Vereen, Alan Zweibel, Omar-Lopez Cepero, and Arianna Rosario.
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NY’s 92Y has announced upcoming Billie Holiday events:
Nov. 22 (1 PM ET): “BILLIE” FREE film screening and live Q&A with director James Erskine
Dec. 5 (2 PM ET): Billy Holiday Listening Party, with reflections by key collaborators — Lester Young, Teddy Wilson, Benny Goodman, Count Basie, and more.
Dec. 6 (3 PM ET): Billy Holiday: A Concert Celebration, featuring Catherine Russell and Veronica Swift.
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A reading of Joe DiPietro’s Conscience will return to stream through Nov. 15 at NJ’s George Street Playhouse, directed by David Saint.
Harriet Harris (Margaret Chase Smith), Mark Junek, Lee Sellars, and Cathryn Wake.
On June 1, 1950, Senator Margaret Chase Smith stood on the Senate floor and delivered her “Declaration of Conscience” in a historic moment of political courage. The play takes you behind the scenes of 1050s Washington in the days leading up to and following the singular speech that rattled McCarthyism. Congress and the nation itself.
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LA Theatre Works (link TBA) has announced its 2020-21 digital season of radio recorded plays:
* The Thanksgiving Play (Nov. 18), by Larissa FastHorse, directed by Rosalind Ayres, featuring Liza Weil, Josh Stamberg, Ellis Greer, and Mark Jude Sullivan.
* Life on Paper (Dec. 16), by Kenneth Lin, directed by Rosalind Ayers, featuring Kenneth Lin, Sarah Drew, Seamus Dever, Kevin Daniels, Summer Spiro, and Mark Jude Sullivan. How much is one life worth? When a billionaire dies in a plane crash, a forensic economist butts heads with a small town actuary over the exact value of one man’s life.
* Extinction (Jan. 27, 2021), by Hannie Rayson, directed by Martin Jarvis, featuring Sara Drew, Seamus Dever, and Joanne Whalley. A zoologist in Australia gets funding to save an endangered species from the very company that threatens its existence. Will this deal with the devil allow her to save the species, or will it destroy her entire life’s work?
* Bump (Mar. 10), by Chiara Atik, directed by Rosalind Ayres, featuring Ana Ortiz, Herbert Sigüenza, Alma Martinez, Lucy DeVito, Anna Lyse Erikson, Anna Mathias, Andrew Sogliuzzo, Devon Sorvari, Inger Tudor, and Moira Quirk. In centuries-spanning ‘Bump,” it’s always Labor Day… If you are pregnant, if you have been pregnant, if you have resulted from a pregnancy, you will probably find the play very funny… If you are a mother, the play is guaranteed to give you flashbacks as to how you became one.
* A Weekend with Pablo Picasso (Apr. 26), written & performed by Herbert Sigüenza. In this one-man show based on Picasso’s writings, Sigüenza takes on the role of the legendary artist, inviting the audience to Picasso’s private studio for an intimate and revealing weekend as he prepares to deliver 6 new works to a buyer on Monday morning.
* For Us all, by Jeanne Sakata and No-No Boy, by Ken Narasaki (May 5). For Us All (world premiere) is a true story about the experienced civil rights lawyer who teams up with a group of young Japanese-American attorneys to use a little know legal writ to overturn the convictions of men unjustly sentenced for resisting the Japanese-American interment. No-No Boy is set during the aftermath of the U.S. government’s incarceration of 120,000 people of Japanese descent during Word War II, and the resettlement of Japanese Americans to the West Coast.
* A Good Day at Auschwitz (June 2), by Stephen Tobolowsky, starring Alan Mandell and Tobolowsky. The true story of Abe, a man the playwright met at his synagogue. Abe was a fellow of great humor and heart who not only survived 3 years at Auschwitz, but fell in love there.
* The Murder on the Links (June 30), world premiere adaptation by Kate McAll. Detective Hercule Poirot receives an urgent letter from Paul Renauld, summoning him to France. When her arrives, Poirot and his companion Hastings find they are too late to save M. Renauld, as he now lies dead, face down in a grave on the edge of the golf course he was building. Certain facts to not add up, and the case is further complicated by the discovery of another body, which has apparently been stabbed in an impossible way.
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A filmed production of A Christmas Carol, adapted by Jefferson Mays, Susan Lyons, Dane Laffrey & Michael Arden, will run Nov. 28 – Jan. 3 at Boston’s Huntington Theatre Company, directed by Arden. The production was staged exclusively for this film and captured live at New York’s United Palace.
Jefferson Mays (playing over 50 characters)
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RIP: Actor Lawrence Clayton has died at the age of 64.
Clayton made his Broadway debut in Dreamgirls in 1981 as a replacement in the role of C.C. White, and went on the play the role in the first & second national tours.
In 1992, clayton returned to Broadway in The High Rollers Social and Pleasure Club. Additional Broadway credits include Once Upon a Mattress (1996), The Civil War (1999), It Ain’t Nothin’ But the Blues (1990), Bells are Ringing (2001), and The Color Purple (2015).
Other national tours include Jesus Christ Superstar (2002) and Les Mis (2010).
Off-Broadway credits include Romance in Hard Times (1989), Tapestry: The Music of Carole King (1993), Saturn Returns (1998), Crowns (2002), and Damn Yankees (2017).
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Michael R. Jackson and the team of Ben Bonnema & Christopher Staske are the winners of the 16th annual Fred Ebb Award for aspiring musical theatre songwriters.
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Ventura’s Rubicon Theatre has announced Hershey Felder streaming events:
Nov. 22-29: Hershey Felder as Claude Debussy – A Paris Love Story
Dec. 20-27: Hershey Felder, Tchaikovsky
Feb. 7-14, 2021: Hershey Felder as Sholem Aleichem Before Fiddler (world premiere)
Mar. 14-21: Hershey Felder Puccini (world premiere)
May 16-23: Hershey Felder as Sergei Rachmaninoff in Anna & Sergei (world premiere)
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Old Friends / New Works: A Benefit for MTC will stream Thurs. Dec. 3 at 7 PM ET at Manhattan Theatre Club.
Click here to learn more and to register.
Laura Linney, Jeremy Pope, Edie Falco, Simon Stephens, Elizabeth Strout, and Jason Michael Webb.
The event features new works written specifically for the benefit, and will also include an online auction.
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“Like After Death,” a new short interactive film by Craig Cox & Alex Trow, will stream Dec. 4, 9, 15, and 17 on the All Together Now platform. 
here.
Will Roland, Ashley Loren, Emily Bautista, Lacy Allen, Rubén J Carbajal, Annie Cavalero, Tony Cavalero, Harrison Chad, Rebecca E Covington, Ashley De La Rosa, Katie Flahive, Vincent Jamal Hooper, Colby Lewis, Keetin Marchi, and Morgan Anita Wood.
A dark comedy that leads the audience on a kaleidoscopic journey through the life and death o f a social media influencer.
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“Christmas Again” will premiere on The Disney Channel this holiday season (date TBA), directed by Andy Fickman.
Priscilla Lopez, Daniel Sunjata, Scarlett Estevez, Alexis Carra, Ashlyn Jade Lopez, Beth Lacke, and Gary Anthony Williams.
An 11-year-old girl makes a wish to a shopping mall Santa and finds herself reliving the same day while learning the true meaning of Christmas.
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Wish Upon the North Star, in support of Regional Hospice’s North Star (a planned residential hospice space dedicated to end-of-life care for babies and children), will take place Thurs. Dec. 3 at 7 PM ET here, co-hosted by Miguel Cervantes and his wife Kelly.
The couple lost their daughter Adelaide in 2019 following her diagnosis with epilepsy and continue to serve as advocates for research about the disease, in addition to leading parental support efforts.