Many New Yorkers—including this one—forget that on the West End the show ran for 17 years. Estimations of the show’s total earnings ring up at more than $1.4 billion. Not bad for a musical that started life as a 1970s pilot for a Thomas the Tank Engine cartoon. - Gordon Cox
"Joan Lader has never advertised, never solicited clients. But for two generations of Broadway stars, as well as dozens of opera singers and pop and rock luminaries, she remains an indispensable vocal therapist and vocal coach." Patti LuPone says flat-out, "She saved my career." - The New York Times
"Kwei-Armah, who started out as an actor and has been greatly acclaimed as a playwright and director, ran Baltimore’s Center Stage theatre from 2011 to 2017 before returning to Britain." He ends his highly-lauded tenure as artistic director this fall. - The Guardian
An announcement from the Roundabout Theatre Co. says, "Ms. Daly was unexpectedly hospitalized on Friday and unfortunately needs to withdraw from the production while she receives medical care; she is thankfully expected to make a full recovery." Amy Ryan will take over the lead role. - Deadline
After school, they would take the bus from the Upper West Side down to the theater district. I asked her how she could afford it. “It was under $10 for orchestra, third row,” she told me. That number looked low to my 2024 eyes, so I looked it up. She was right, of course; tickets were between $3 and...
"A special rate of £269.50 a week is being offered for a private room within the shared student accommodation on the campus, which includes a self-catering kitchen. … The Fringe Society is joining forces with Queen Margaret University to run the venture" roughly 5 miles from central Edinburgh. - The Scotsman (MSN)
The Globe released a social-media statement defending the casting, saying that although they “recognise the barriers to access in our industry and are working hard to address that”, they also believe that “all artists should have the right to play all parts in ”. - The Guardian
In Boston as in many other places, "financial struggle has become a grim common denominator among theaters with different aesthetic identities and sense of mission.” Which companies will survive? - The Boston Globe (MSN)
“No one like Milo Rau exists in American theater, because commercial producers need to make money, and no government body is willing to match the generous artistic subsidies handed out by European governments. … Some of that subsidy will end up going to plays that disgust the audience." - MSN (The Atlantic)
"You need to pry that book from cold dead fingers and make it yours,” the artistic director of the California Shakespeare Festival told Octavio Solis as he worked on his third revision of a Quixote adaptation for the stage. - Los Angeles Times
“We couldn’t make this production in a nonprofit model—we don’t have that structure. We have a bookstore and a coffee shop that sustains itself, in which we can hang out after closing and make this play in a quirky way. It has lowered the level of challenge and hurdle to get it done.” - American Theatre
It's "one neat trick" that he learned while playing all the parts in an adaptation of Chekhov's Uncle Vanya in London's West End last year. - The Guardian
As controversy continues over Michelle Terry, artistic director of Shakespeare's Globe (and able-bodied), casting herself as Shakespeare's only explicitly disabled character, actors with disabilities who have played the role themselves weigh in. - The Guardian
"Big-budget shows are increasingly using illusions to help tell stories full of wonder. … Ten years ago, a consultant magician would be brought on to a production to help achieve an effect. Today, illusion designers are a core part of the design team, like the lighting or sound crew." - The Guardian
Unless there's a turnaround in the sector, arts leaders who spoke with the Star say the once-thriving sector in Toronto — one of the largest theatre centres in the world — could become a shell of its former self. - Toronto Star
