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THEATRE

Mia Farrow Tests Positive For COVID, So An Associate Director Goes On Broadway For Her

The play - The Roommate - opened on Thursday with Farrow and Patti LuPone, but on Saturday, Farrow tested positive. Actor and associate director of The Roommate Marsha Mason went on, script in hand, on Sunday. - The New York Times

How To Have Success With A New Play’s Rolling Premiere

The rules? Be flexible. “We each have our audiences, which are different in Memphis than in Sarasota or Houston, and we each have our missions. For some theatres, it’s about the actors or the playwright. For us at Hattiloo, it’s about accessibility to all socioeconomic groups.” - American Theatre

Surprise: Alan Cumming To Become Scottish Festival Director

The Pitlochry “theatre in the hills” is known for its unique ensemble and repertory practice: across the summer season actors appear in three or four daily changing productions, learning the parts simultaneously. - The Guardian

Alan Cumming Is Taking Over A Theatre In His Native Scotland

The Emmy- and Tony-winning actor will become artistic director of Pitlochry Festival Theatre, a well-regarded company located near his birthplace in the highlands of Perthshire. He begins the job this January and his first fully-programmed season will be in 2026. - BBC

Jesse Green On What Makes Classic Plays Classic

"There’s a reason, aside from name recognition, that they keep coming back. Though products of vastly different times and cultures, they dig so deep into their specific truths that they reach a common, eternal one, from which many others may spring." - The New York Times

Lincoln Center Theater Appoints Lear deBessonet And Bartlett Sher Its Next Leaders

The new directors will take up their posts when current artistic director André Bishop retires next summer after 33 years. Sher, as executive producer (a new position at LCT), will focus on international partnerships, brand expansion, and fundraising; as artistic director, deBessonet will oversee programming, artist relations, and day-to-day operations. - Deadline

Orlando Fringe Opts For Group Therapy

The new leadership structure is dubbed a "tri-directorate model" with three equal directors at the top each with distinct areas of specialization, as opposed to a single Executive Director. - Orlando Weekly

In Staging A Script About Sri Lanka’s Civil War, A Playwright Suddenly Learns About His Own Family’s History

S. Shakthidharan, born a Sri Lankan Tamil, was a toddler when his family fled the fighting and settled in Australia. When he asked his mother about their old life on the island, she angrily refused to discuss it — until she saw a workshop of his play, Counting and Cracking. - The New York Times

If You Don’t Know Whether Someone Is Really A Theatre Kid, Check This List

For one thing (guilty over here at AJ), "Do they spell it t-h-e-a-t-r-e instead of t-h-e-a-t-e-r? That’s a good one. Only a true theatre kid spells it ‘theatre.’ A ‘theater’ is where you watch ‘theatre.’ You see?” - American Theatre

A Docu-Play About Hamas’s October 7 Terror Attack

October 7, a verbatim play along the lines of The Laramie Project and Anna Deavere Smith's works, is drawn from interviews with more than 20 survivors of the atrocities by Irish journalists Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney. - Los Angeles Times (MSN)

Seattle Theatres In Disarray And Downsizing

There’s been a lot of bad news: Seattle theater companies are launching emergency fundraisers, exploring mergers, furloughing or laying people off, and cutting back on — or even postponing — shows and downsizing casts. Workers are worried about the future of the field. - Seattle Times

US Playwright Ken Ludwig Gives £1 Million To Preserve Shakespeare Family Home

The author of the farce Lend Me a Tenor and the book for the Gershwin musical Crazy for You donated in order to fund desperately-needed preservation work on Hall's Croft, the home of Shakespeare's daughter Susannah and a very rare example of intact Jacobean architecture. - Time Out UK

After A Big Broadway Theatre Merger… Big Profits

Taking over ownership of Jujamcyn’s five Broadway venues, including the August Wilson and Walter Kerr theatres – a deal finalised in summer 2023 – pulled in £75.5 million in revenue and profit of £18.2 million. - The Stage

Auditions For Drama School: Fair Or Unfair?

They're certainly difficult, especially since COVID. High school drama programs rarely prepare students well for conservatory work, including the audition process, and a small (and pricey) industry has developed solely in coaching young applicants for their auditions. - ArtsHub

This Fall On Broadway: Bring On The Divas

Theater stages are the diva’s holy playground, where complex characters and powerful performances ask audiences to question their received ideas. A new slate of shows this fall promises both rapture and reexamination. - Washington Post

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