We’ve chased away an audience. The theater owners hate the unions, the unions hate the producers and the producers hate the theater owner. None of them get their way and they all take it out on the customer. - New York Theatre
Gilda Radner, Eugene Levy, Martin Short, Victor Garber, Jayne Eastwood, Andrea Martin, and Paul Shaffer all walked into a theatre. This is a (rollicking) oral history of the experience. "Jesus starts his narration, and we look up and Andrea has a dinner roll in her mouth." - Washington Post
Anuparna Chandrasekhar has wriiten about a sex tape going viral in conservative India to the notorious 2012 gang rape on a bus in Delhi. Her latest, The Father and the Assassin, examines the journey of Nathuram Godse from boy-raised-as-a-girl to Gandhi-admiring journalist to Hindu nationalist assassin. - The Guardian
At the end of a bumpy Broadway season that started late and was repeatedly disrupted by the coronavirus pandemic, the once-ordinary rituals of Tonys time have taken on a new significance this spring, as a beleaguered theater industry grasps for reassurance. - The New York Times
"Broadway performers and stage managers who worked on four shows connected to producer Scott Rudin will be released from nondisclosure agreements under terms of a settlement between the Broadway League and Actors' Equity Association." Excepting financial info and IP, the union has barred NDAs from all future Broadway productions. - Deadline
Five years after "The Greatest Show on Earth" closed down (it said) permanently, performers are being recruited and rehearsals and logistics are being planned for a 50-something-city tour to begin in September of next year. And it's confirmed: there will be no animals. - The New York Times
It's not only that "theater is a team sport." It's not just that some shows (this season, for instance, Six and Take Me Out) simply don't have lead roles. It's that even star turns can't truly sizzle if the rest of the cast isn't cooking, too. - The New York Times
"Depicting the life, persecution, death and resurrection of Jesus, ... the oldest continuous running amateur theatre production in the world will open on Saturday with a 103-performance run until October ... after having been thrown off its usual schedule by two years owing to the latest pandemic." - The Guardian
It's no coincidence that Punchdrunk has begun collaborating with Pokemon Go creator Niantic. The company's work offers the same promise as virtual reality: At its best, it can fool you into believing you've been transported to another world. - CNET
At Pasadena's A Noise Within theatre, it took the production team "five months to design and construct the makeshift pool for the production’s run." Luckily, the production manager had worked "in pool service." (This is L.A., after all.) - Los Angeles Times
Toossi on previews of English at the Atlantic Theater: "The terror of an audience coming was, like, definitely something I wish I had been prepared for. But also, something I think you can only learn by having an audience coming!" - NPR
In 2018, the facility — a former curling rink-turned-theatre — underwent a $72-million demolition and reconstruction, a project completed in 2020. However, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic's health and safety measures, the theatre's reopening was delayed until this week. - CBC
The musical, which has been posting middling box office numbers during the industry’s crowded spring season, will end its run at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre on May 29, producers announced. - Deadline
Angie Belcher, comedian-in-residence at Bristol University (yes, really) and founder of the practice Comedy on Referral, has already had a successful NHS-funded course for trauma survivors, and she's about to start one in London for men at risk of suicide. - The Guardian
"A couple of recent high-profile physical attacks on comedians ... have left some comics wondering if the stage is becoming less safe, and have led some clubs and venues to take steps to beef up their security at comedy shows." - The New York Times
