Kafka’s famous 1914 novel The Trial has been adapted into a disturbing play by Oregon Shakespeare Festival stalwart Kenneth Albers, and the small and intrepid New Century Theatre Company (NCTC) is currently giving it a memorable world premiere. It’s rare for the venue of a play to loom as large as the [...] Continue reading »
5th Ave. Prep School for Broadway
Since David Armstrong came to Seattle in 2000 to lead The 5th Avenue Theatre as its Executive Producer and Artistic Director, the 5th (as it’s known around town) has become an important source for new musicals on Broadway. This week David unofficially announced that two more musicals nurtured at his [...] Continue reading »
John Lahr Exits ‘The New Yorker’ after 20 Years
Theatre critics and playwrights – make that critics and artists in general – can sometimes look like cocks warily lunging at each other while entertaining onlookers. I find critics, the better ones anyway, to be more teacher and guide than adversary. But perhaps that’s easy for me to say; I [...] Continue reading »
Mark Morris Makes Seattle Proud
A boisterous heart-warming standing ovation greeted Mark Morris on Thursday evening at On the Boards in Seattle as he joined his dancers and musicians at their curtain call. Morris had danced his way home and back into the hearts of Seattle dance lovers as leader of the internationally renowned Mark [...] Continue reading »
Getting Immunized by Dr. Chekhov in St. Petersburg
In February 2005 I made a pilgrimage of sorts to St. Petersburg. (If you want cold, go to Russia in February.) I have always been a fan of Russian literature; Tolstoy’s War and Peace and Anna Karenina are among the greatest novels, and standing atop my personal pantheon of playwrights [...] Continue reading »
Dramatic Economics
How much should playwrights worry about cast size when they write a script? This unsavory question is driven by the economic mess that has imperiled nonprofit theatres in recent decades. Writers are advised to keep casts small. The smaller the cast, the less production expense, the better chance of getting [...] Continue reading »
Coming Home from Deep in the Heart of Texas
Even though renowned playwright Steven Dietz now spends the majority of each year in Austin, Texas, the Seattle theatre community still thinks of him as theirs. In 2006 Steven joined the faculty of the University of Texas to teach playwriting and directing but he makes sure that he and his [...] Continue reading »
5th Avenue Theatre Sends a Musical to Broadway
Seattle’s 5th Avenue Theatre has become known as a successful staging ground for new musicals before they make their way to Broadway. The ascent of three of those musicals to hit status – Jekyll & Hyde, Hairspray and The Wedding Singer – certainly burnished the theatre’s reputation. Now another musical [...] Continue reading »
Renowned Playwright to Visit Seattle in 2013
One of the world’s greatest living playwrights, Alan Ayckbourn, will visit Seattle next year to direct his play Sugar Daddies at ACT Theatre. This is a tremendous coup by ACT’s Artistic Director Kurt Beattie and a rare treat for Seattle’s theatre community. When I learned about this yesterday I was [...] Continue reading »
Through the Woods and Onto the Stage
New York City. Shakespeare outdoors. Two items that don’t readily combine in the mind. At least not in mine, at least not until last week, when on a warm June evening in the middle of Central Park I had the distinct pleasure of seeing Shakespeare’s romantic comedy As You Like [...] Continue reading »