Enough With The Doom And Gloom For A Moment

What's going on in theatre in your area that you're excited about? Either recent industry developments or upcoming shows or whatever.  I'm excited about Stunning at LCT 3 and Clubbed Thumb's Summerworks series. Back in my home town of DC,  I'm excited by the growing interactions between institutions and smaller theatre companies  (like Synetic doing a show on the Lansburg's stage and Forum becoming a resident company at Roundhouse).

What about you?

Comments

[99]

Lucy Thurber's MONSTROSITY with 13P. Speaking of Lucy, even though it's nowhere near my area, this festival also sounds pretty damn good: http://www.playbill.com/news/article/130085-Camp_Darragh_Marvel_and_Robins_Cast_in_Perry-Mansfield_New_Works_Festival

And, lastly, if it's not too egotistical, I'm getting pretty stoked about my next project.

[Mac]

I'm excited about the Brick Theater's Antidepressant Festival.

http://bricktheater.com/antidepressant

I didn't care for the original concept of the fest, but the actual programming looks supercool. I saw "Infectious Opportunity" last weekend, which was stupendous, and I'm seeing "Glee Club" Friday, and then hopefully some more over the weekend.

[Guy Yedwab]

I'm excited that Basil Twist is performing in Southern California while I'm here... there's damn little enough of interesting arts in my home area.

[Travis Bedard]

Seriously? Austin.
There are shows upon shows busting at the seams... Killer Joe opened last week, The Long Now (with puppets!) is running... Touch opens next week, No Exit opens next week, Long Days' Journey is apparently spot on... there's just too much to actually see...

[Eric Ziegenhagen]

Last week I finally saw TJ and Dave -- http://www.tjanddave.com/ -- which has been running on and off for a few years (and has run at Barrow Street in NYC as well). It's TJ Jagedowski and David Pasquesi (who played Larry David's dentist on a few Curb Your Enthusiasm episodes), though Tracy Letts sometimes fills in for either one of them. It's 60-minute, long-form improv, but what really makes it work (beyond extraordinarily subtle characterisation and plot) is how these two guys bring all of their unfunny first-hand knowledge into the show -- so instead of, say, two frat guys crushing beer cans against their heads, the performance I saw had a 10-minute conversation about how ions work in lightning and thunderstorms, which led into a conversation about salted versus unsalted butter. It's the kind of dense, complicated, "slow" stuff that wouldn't work on TV, it was as good a pair of performances (and almost as good a play) as I've seen anywhere lately, it's performed on a bare stage with no internal light or sound cues, it costs $5 to get in, and it sells out a 100-ish-seat theater every Wednesday night at 11 p.m.

Between that show at Patricia Barber's extrordinary sets at the Green Mill each Monday night, for my tastes it would be easy to subsist on a cultural diet of those two shows on $12 a week.

[Paul Rekk]

Art Brut is halfway through a five night stint in Chicago!

Yes. That counts.

[malachy walsh]

My play, BEYOND THE OWING - which I blogged about when Clubbed Thumb helped me develop it and deals with many of the issues this blog probes - is being produced in Minneapolis in July.

Here's a "trailer" http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oFdQegUWWes

A preliminary website as well.... beyondtheowing.com

[Ben TS]

I second Mac here: "Infectious Opportunity" at the Antidepressant Festival is great. Really thought provoking, but also remarkably breezy and fun. It's the kind of show that ACTUALLY makes you think, as opposed to "makes you think."

[Monica Reida]

When I'm in New York, I will be going to the Antidepressant Festival (so, I'll probably try to go to "Infectious Opportunity.")

One of the theaters in my hometown of Cedar Falls, Iowa lowered student ticket prices for all shows to $10 to attract more students. I'm still happy about that.

In Chicago, where I will be living and going to school, "Oedipus" done by The Hypocrites is supposed to be good. Sadly, it closes two days before I'm in Chicago again.

[Ian W. Hill]

Well, The Antidepressant Festival has come up a few times, and I was hesitant, as the TD of The Brick, to join in on that, but I might as well note that I really DO think that this year's crop of shows are pretty special. It seems to be a big group of "comedies" that are deeply nasty, thought-provoking and painful in good, productive ways while being entertaining as well.

I'm fond of all four of the ones I directly worked on: Infectious Opportunity (lovely script, fine fine superfine acting), Adventure Quest (dumb nostalgic fun that turns surprisingly serious and meaningful as it goes), ...and the fear cracked open (painful and sweet study of a relationship growing and then dying), and the Theatre Askew show with the really long title that takes apart well-meaning liberal issue theatre of the last century or so (brilliantly nasty in a Ridiculous Theatre way). I was in a tryout of Suspicious Package: RX yesterday, and if you liked late year's version, you'll love this year's.

I've also seen some of Samuel & Alisdairat tech, and it blew me away. REALLY blew me away. I hear Matt Freeman's Glee Clubis great, but it doesn't look like going to be able to see it unfortunately.

Tonight I'm seeing Edward Einhorn's Doctors Jane & Alexander at the Festival of Jewish Theater and Ideas at Theater Three, which I expect to enjoy -- I directed an earlier, short version of this show, and am pleased Edward's kept my casting of the brilliant Alyssa Simon as his mother, Jane. I participated in several years of development hell on this play as a producing company funded Edward's attempts to rewrite it to their wrongheaded, destructive suggestions, and I'm glad he's finally created a good final script the way it SHOULD be.