AmericanTheaterWeb Top News

LATE AFTERNOON ADDITIONS

Associated Press

Actor Van Johnson,' 40s Heartthrob, Dies at 92
Van Johnson, whose boy-next-door wholesomeness made him a popular Hollywood star in the '40s and '50s with such films as ''30 Seconds over Tokyo,'' ''A Guy Named Joe'' and ''The Caine Mutiny,'' died Friday of natural causes. He was 92.

Time Out New York Blog

Theater that rocks
Some playwrights or actors might consider themselves rock stars, but the boys of Less the Band really are grasping at the hammer of the gods: balls-out dramatist Adam Rapp and kick-ass downtown scenery

Playbill

* Reza's God of Carnage to Arrive on Broadway in Spring 2009

TheaterMania

* Warchus to Direct Reza's God of Carnage on Broadway Spring 2009

DC Theatre Scene

Krista Cowan named new Artistic Director of Journeymen Theater Ensemble

The Playgoer

Doubts about "Doubt"?
Reading Ella Taylor's Voice review of JP Shanley's film of his mega-successful Pultizer and Tony-winning play Doubt (a major December release & Oscar contender in case you hadn't heard), I wondered why we never heard such critiques of the play on stage.

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EARLY AFTERNOON ADDITIONS

New York Magazine Vulture Blog

Shrek the Musical’s Sutton Foster on the Grave Seriousness of Onstage Farting

Playbill

* Tony Winner Jackman to Host Academy Awards
* LaMaMa to Present American Premiere of Yanagai! Yanagai! in 2009

TheaterMania

* Hugh Jackman to Host Academy Awards
* The Living Theatre to Present 50th Anniversary Revival of The Connection
* J. Smith-Cameron and Deirdre O'Connell to Star in Looking for the Pony

The Hub Review

The Pulitzers leap into the millennium!
News reaches us that the Pulitzer Prize Board for the first time will consider online writing. An interesting shift - can the Gold Dust Orphans (see below) be far behind?
The Hub Review, the guide to everything that matters in Boston and elsewhere.

Whatsonstage.com

Allen's Treasure Island Posts Closing Notices, 10 Jan
Treasure Island has posted early closing notices at the West End’s Theatre Royal Haymarket. Ken Ludwig’s new stage adaptation, starring Keith Allen (pictured) as Long John Silver, opened on 17 November 2008 (previews from 7 November) and had be...

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LATE MORNING ADDITIONS

AmericanTheaterWeb

CDs of 2008: A Retrospective - Part 5 (Sony/BMG Masterworks, ArkivMusic)

Playbill

* Billy Elliot — The Musical to Offer Actors Fund Performance in 2009

TheaterMania

* Iconis' Things to Ruin to Begin Weekly Run at Zipper in January

Parabasis

Close Reading: State Arts Policy (part II)

Superfluities Redux

Following Up
What a difference a year makes. I wrote last November about the lack of productions in the English-language theatre of plays by English-language dramatists like Edward Bond, and now Bond is all over the place; at least,

Whatsonstage.com - Off-West End & Fringe

Award-Winning Caravan Pulls into Royal Court, Feb 2009
From 10 to 28 February 2009 documentary theatre company Look Left Look Right will be coming to a new site at the Royal Court Theatre with Edinburgh Fringe First winner The Caravan. The play dramatises the events of summer 2007 in which 48,000 British homes flooded due to excessive rainfall, ...

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EARLY MORNING ADDDITIONS

The Guardian Performing Arts Blog

Alexis Soloski: Oppositional political theatre isn't dead in the US
Christopher Shinn is too hasty in claiming that American playwrights and theatres are failing to respond to the political events of the last decade

The Stage UK

Culture secretary backs copyright extension for performers
Culture secretary Andy Burnham has, for the first time, endorsed the principle of extending the term of copyright protection for performers on sound recordings from its current limit of 50 years.

The Stage UK - Blogs

Mark Shenton: Typos and some one-star shows….
Ian Shuttleworth has helpfully pointed out in his regular editorial introduction to Theatre Record, the publication that invaluably collects every national review published into one place, that I “unintentionally but perhaps tellingly misspelt” the Chancellor of the Exchequer’s name...

Whatsonstage.com

Cast: Barber Joins Madame, Atwell in Bridge, Be Near
Full casting has been announced for Michael Grandage's forthcoming production of Madame de Sade, the third instalment in the Donmar West End season at Wyndham's theatre, which runs from 18 March (previews from 13 March) to 23 May 2009. Joining prev...

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THE DAY'S FIRST TOP STORIES

New York Times

Orchestrating an Ogre’s Monster Makeover
A look at how the green ogre has made the move from page to screen to stage.

Brantley: Holiday Gifts for Devotees of Broadway
Should there be someone in your life who wishes to pass for Theater-fluent, I propose giving him or her the following Theater Literacy Kit.

Isherwood: Song Lyrics and Memoirs for All Seasons
To help divert your friends during this anxious time, these new books and DVDs — and one actual show guaranteed not to send sophisticated theatergoers into sugar shock — are recommended.

New York Post

Riedel: Film stars enter for 'Exit'
From Oscar to Ionesco

Bloomberg.com

Sutton Foster, Shrek's Tony-Winning Princess Bride, Tap Dances With Rats
Some Broadway stars decorate their dressing rooms with talismans for luck and telegrams of congratulation. Sutton Foster, who plays the tap-dancing, semi- ogre love interest Fiona in the new musical version of “Shrek,” has a quieter aesthetic.

Variety

'Christmas Story' musical developing
Beau Bridges will lead reading of adaptation

Hartford Courant

Long Wharf Manager Gets Yale School of Drama Job
Joan Channick is leaving Long Wharf Theatre in New Haven where she has been managing director for the past two years, to become associate dean of the Yale School of Drama.

Playbill

* DIVA TALK: Holiday Chats (Part I) with Blackwell, Champlin, Fowler, Fraser, Michele and Murney

TheaterMania

Peter Filichia's Diary: The Broadway University Pop Quiz Answers
Last Wednesday, I gave readers six acronyms of songs from 25 different musicals, and asked them to tell me from what famous shows they came. All words in each title were capitalized, even if they

Chicago Tribune Theater Loop Blog

David Cromer's 'Our Town' headed for New York
David Cromer's hit Chicago production of Thornton Wilder's "Our Town" appears headed for Off-Broadway in a few weeks. Details have yet to be released, but Cromer and the New York producer Scott Morfee are currently casting a commercial, New York

Dallas Morning News Arts Blog

Broadway Diary December 2008 - Thursday night
I don't think I ever flew so low over Flushing in Queens as landing at LaGuardia airport this afternoon in some truly nasty December weather -- sharp winds from the east, intermittent rain and near-freezing temperatures. Even my theater-going friend, a lifelong New Yorker, told me later, "We don't get many days like this."

DC Theatre Scene

Chatting with the creators of Next to Normal

Boston Globe

Stages: Greek comedy about love and war fast-forwards to 2016
"Lizzie Stranton" is a modern take on Aristophanes's Greek classic "Lysistrata."

San Francisco Chronicle

Raunchy Glee
"A Tenderloin Christmas Hustler" incorporates classic, family-friendly themes in a not-so-family-friendly environment.

The Guardian Performing Arts Blog

Mark Lawson: The play's the thing
The mania for star actors has got out of hand when audiences will only turn up for Tennant as Hamlet

Daily Telegraph

Nicole Kidman may give theatre new Viagra dose
When Nicole Kidman disrobed for her British stage debut in The Blue Room, at the Donmar Warehouse, it was described as "pure theatrical Viagra" for reviving the theatre's fortunes.

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