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THEATRE

The British Are Champions Of Classic Theatre — So Why Do They Shortchange This Great Classic Playwright?

Michael Billington: "In France the 400th anniversary of Molière's birth is being celebrated in a big way. In Britain it has been greeted with a deafening silence. But then we have always been slightly wary of Molière." In translation, that is. Adaptations, on the other hand … - The Guardian

The World’s First NFT Musical (You Just Knew It Was Coming)

The set of digital collectibles offered by the producers of Ross Golan's The Wrong Man "will be a mix of music, graphics, and film, including the full animated musical, vinyl, posters featuring artwork from the musical, and a previously unreleased track from Golan." - Playbill

Where Theatre’s Pause Is Particularly Agonizing

"The Baltimore Shakespeare Factory prides itself (in non-pandemic times) on mounting plays where its actors speak in original pronunciation," and a cabinet-maker who recreated an entire Renaissance England theatre space there mastered it, only to see everything shuttered for the pandemic. - Baltimore Sun

Lynn Nottage Is About To Have Three Shows Up At One Time

Playwright Nottage: "I will tell you, in all honesty, I haven't been getting a lot of sleep," but that's OK. "The dream is to really be busy doing the thing that you love, deeply immersed in making art." - NPR

Curtains Go Up, Audiences Flee Omicron, And Broadway Sees Curtains Fall Again

Too familiar, and too grim. On the upside: "Until the pandemic, the industry had been enjoying a sustained boom, fueled by a rebound in the popularity of musicals and by New York’s gargantuan growth as a tourist destination. And this downturn might not last long." - The New York Times

For Theatres Getting Back On Their Feet, The Cost Of Omicron Mounts

Take the Olney Theatre Center, for instance: "On December 22, we were almost $100,000 above our goal for Beauty and the Beast. ... On December 23 we had to cancel the rest of the run," the managing director says. "Within a week we had lost $300,000." - DC Metro Theater Arts

Being The Comedian On A Cruise Ship During COVID

Especially when you test positive before you can even perform - one time. - Los Angeles Times

The Federal Theatre Project And The Civil Rights Movement Shaped Theatre In New York

To do what they wanted to do, to be what they wanted to see, Black theatre-makers in New York took inspiration from the then-recent past, and founded their own spaces. - American Theatre

British Theatres Are Reeling From The Losses They Took Over Christmas Panto Season

The performances cancelled and ticket prices refunded when performers caught COVID and had to isolate, along with, when the show did go on, the audience capacity restrictions reintroduced as omicron spread, turned the shows theatres count on as cash cows into money pits. - The Guardian

Claim: UK Government Funding Of Theatre Makes No Sense

Even before Covid, the government’s (and Arts Council England’s) approach to the complex private/public ecology of the sector felt confused and outdated. Now, it feels positively antediluvian. - The Stage

This Troupe Of Performers With Learning Disabilities Goes Far Beyond Workshops In Schools And Hospitals

The London-based company Corali does, in fact, do programs in those places, but they've also worked with Sadler's Wells theatre and the Tate galleries and created a piece about filmmaker Derek Jarman. Their latest project will see them all impersonating the singular poet Edith Sitwell. - The Guardian

Royal Shakespeare Co. To Perform On Cunard Cruises

The RSC has signed a three-year contract with Cunard that will see a group of actors from the company performing two programs and offering workshops on board the Queen Mary 2 beginning this summer. - Daily Mail

Gideon Arthurs Chosen As New Director Of Soulpepper Theatre

Arthurs joins Soulpepper after eight years as the chief executive officer of the National Theatre School of Canada. - Toronto Star

A 30-Hour, Three-Day Theatre Piece Staged On A Three-Ton Ice Block Suspended Over Sydney Harbor

The work, titled Thaw and conceived by physical theatre company Legs on the Wall and Alaskan composer Matthew Burtner, "features an acrobatic performer balancing, grasping and watching her frozen home melt away." (Yes, it's about climate change.) - The Sydney Morning Herald

A New Molière Play (?!) At The Comédie-Française For The Playwright’s 400th Anniversary

The world's oldest operating theatre company has pieced together what it says is the original version of Tartuffe, premiered in 1664 and promptly suppressed by the enraged Catholic Church; it was the playwright's overhauled version of 1669 which became the classic we know today. - The Guardian

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