the week of december 13-19, 2024

art heists, feuding royals, gilda radner

Dec 13, 2024

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Graphic Design: Elizabeth Morton | Editorial Support: Ryan Adelsheim

This is the last newsletter of the year. Nothing for the Group is taking its customary holiday break. (I start rehearsals on Monday for What the Constitution Means to Me at Round House. A real wild time to be working on that play!)

The weekly round-up will return on January 3rd. Paid subscribers will receive the usual year-in-review post sometime in the interim (i.e. after I write my Constitution program notes.)

world premieres

Billy Corben and Harley Elias’ Lincoln Road Hustle is now running through February 16th at Miami New Drama. Michel Hausmann directs the immersive, site-specific staging across restaurants, shops, cafés, and public spaces inviting audiences to “eavesdrop on live, real-time conversations unfolding around them, revealing the interconnected lives of Miami's eclectic characters through a major real estate casino deal, an audacious art heist, and a chance at love that spirals into chaos.”
Ayodele Casel’s Diary of a Tap Dancer is now running through January 4th at A.R.T. in Cambridge, MA. The trailblazing tap dancer’s “electric new play weaving together dance, narrative, and song to reveal the power of reclaiming language, culture, and one’s own identity” is directed by Torya Beard.

productions

Lloyd Suh’s The Heart Sellers runs December 14 - January 25 at The Guthrie in Minneapolis. The “poignant comedy illuminating the Asian immigrant experience” is directed by May Adrales.
Raquel Almazán's La Paloma Prisoner runs December 10-15 at Chelsea Factory in NYC. Estefanía Fadul directs the “multi-disciplinary play about the reclamation of identity, based on the true stories of a group of incarcerated women selected as beauty queen contestants at the Buen Pastor prison in Bogotá.”
Alexis Scheer’s Laughs in Spanish starts performances December 12th at 1st Stage in Tysons, VA. The Art Basel-set comedy about “a swanky modern art gallery director whose showroom has become an active crime scene” is directed by Elena Velasco.

workshops & readings

Kate Cortesi’s Ten Grand will have a reading on December 14th at South Coast Repertory Theatre in Costa Mesa, CA. The new play about “community, mental health, America's obsession with violence, and how the stories we tell become our destiny” is directed by Rebecca Wear.
Mahira Kakkar’s Draupadi will have a reading on December 16th as part of The Huntington’s Winter New Play Intensive in Boston. The “searing, sensuous, and funny reimagining of a powerful thread of the Mahabharata, the ancient South Asian epic of feuding royal families” is directed by Danilo Gambini and dramaturged by Amrita Ramanan.
Audrey Cefaly’s Trouble (At the Vista View Mobile Home Estates) will have a reading on December 16th at Everyman Theatre in Baltimore. Paige Hernandez directs the “poignant portrayal of the struggles of working-class women, addressing themes of mental health, addiction, and motherhood.” (The play is the fourth installment in Cefaly’s Alabama Cycle, an “exploration of the unsung voices, stories, and topographies of working-class people in the Gulf Coast region.”)
Krista Knight and Jill Sobule’s new musical Crimson Lit: Scarlet Letter Setlist will have an industry reading on December 20th at The Tank in NYC. The “irreverent exhumation of one of America's oldest scandals” is directed by Wendy C. Goldberg.

digital & streaming

Cary Glitter’s Gene & Gilda will livestream performances on December 13 & 14 from George Street Playhouse in New Brunswick, NJ. Joe Brancato directs the “intimate portrait of Gene Wilder and Gilda Radner from their first meeting through their personal and professional ups and downs, all the way to their poignant farewell.”

2025-26 season updates

East West Players announced its 2025-26 season. The Los Angeles theatre’s line-up includes Lauren Yee’s Cambodian Rock Band (directed by Chay Yew), Philip Kan Gotanda’s Yankee Dawg You Die, the world premiere of Prince Gomolvilas’ Paranormal Inside (directed by Jeff Liu, simultaneous co-pro with Theater Mu and Perseverance Theater), Jaclyn Backhaus’ Wives, and Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Flower Drum Song with a newly updated book by David Henry Hwang (directed by Lily Tung Crystal).
Amphibian Stage announced its upcoming season. The Fort Worth, TX theater will produce Deborah Zoe Laufer’s Rooted (directed by Scott Evans); Gabriel Jason Dean’s Rift, or White Lies (directed by Lily Wolff); Lloyd Suh’s The Heart Sellers (directed by Shyama Nithiananda); and Conor McPherson’s adaptation of The Birds (directed by Jay Duffer).

assorted

The National Jewish Plays Project announced its finalists of the National Jewish Playwriting Contest. The selected works are Louis Blachman’s D.F.J, Becca Schlossberg’s Dybbuk Bat Mitzvah, Zoe Senese-Grossberg’s Lay The Bent To The Bonny Broom, Marshall Botvinick’s The Missionaries, Jennifer Maisel’s Provenance, and Ali Viterbi’s The World To Come.

call for applications

ColLABo 2025 is accepting applications until January 31, 2025. The production development incubator (held at Carnegie Mellon’s campus in Pittsburgh in May & June) is a laboratory for “theater makers from multiple disciplines to come together to wrestle with production-related challenges on a project they intend to have produced.” (I’ve been a review panelist twice; everyone involved is a gem and I love the program’s values and resources.)

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