Mondays are Dark

'Tis the season; it's the Theatre League of South Florida Holiday Party is tonight at the Bimini Boatyard.  There will be food, drink, camaraderie, and awards.  Lots of awards, as they will be presenting Silver Palm Awards to over a dozen deserving recipients, as well as two Remy Awards - the Pioneer award to Meredith Lasher, and the Service Award to yours truly.  Hope to see you there!

If you can't make it tonight, next week you have the second annual Holiday House, the mixed-bill offering of Conundrum Stages.

Now here's your Monday reading list:

Speaking of Holidays
Cirque Dreams Holidaze is coming to the Broward Center for the Performing Arts in just a couple of weeks, and the Boca Raton Observer has a 4 page pictorial about it.

He's Back
The Palm Beach Post reports that Louis Tyrell joins Delray Beach's fledgling Arts Garage to head up its theatre component.

Tyrrell estimates The Theatre’s operating budget for its first season to be in the range of $150,000. He plans to inaugurate it this February with a Master Playwright Series: four weekly play-readings/lectures on Tuesday evenings. Already committed to participate are such nationally known dramatists as Israel Horovitz, John Guare and William Mastrosimone, who will talk about the featured works, the creative process and the state of theater today.

There are plans to give Florida Stage's former subscribers admissions to some performances on a space-available basis.

Speaking of Former Subscribers.
The Playgoer analyzes TCG's recent survey that shows that subscription ticket sales have dropped an average of 15% nationwide since 2006.

Dramatic Avenues
The Drama Queen tells us about two different projects with "avenue" in the title: Avenue Q at Area Stage, and Teo Castellano's NE 2nd Avenue at the Arsht Center, which is one of several projects Teo is working on.  Actually, that second article is more about Castellano's workshops at The Playground Theatre;  I just couldn't resist the wordplay in the title.

Everything's Colorful About This Dreamcoat
Florida Theater On Stage takes a look at how the Maltz Jupiter Theater keeps track of the 240 young performers contributing to its production of Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat.  The Palm Beach Post tells you about the kids.  An TC Palm catches up with Jodi Langel, who plays The Narrator.

Sweating the Pounds Off
The Miami Herald touches base with David Arisco, artistic director of Actors' Playhouse.  Arisco recently started working out to help him tackle the role of Edna Turnblad in the Playhouse production of Hairspray.

Arisco, the Coral Gables theater’s artistic director who had taken his first acting role in seven years in the musical, was concerned about his health. At 412 pounds on a 6-foot-4 frame, Arisco had teased, “I’m the only guy in the world who had to lose weight to play a fat woman.”

Sweating the Pounds On
The Miami Herald also tells us about another play that has a part for a very large person: Shrek the Musical, opening at the Arsht Center this week.  Lukas Poost plays the title role.

“I wear a 45-pound fat suit that acts like a giant sponge,” Poost says from a tour stop in Indiana. “It absorbs more and more sweat as the show goes on.”

#icantbelievetheyredoingkidstheatre 1
Florida Theater On Stage takes a look at something new from Promethean Theatre Company; children's programming. Presumably, there will be no zombie attacks or episodes of hilarious cannibalism.

#icantbelievetheyredoingkidstheatre 2
Meanwhile, Yahoo News (don't ask me, I just find'em) reports that Mad Cat Theatre Company's next production is also aimed at children.  And not in that spraying-down-the-kids-with-a-hose-to-get-them-off-the-lawn kind of aim, either.

It is the story of little Macbeth and his request for a bedtime story to help him fall asleep. But when his mom tells his him the scary story of "Macbeth and the Monster," he gets way more than he bargained for.

Or, maybe it is.