Actually, Monday’s aren’t so dark in the summer; the South Florida Theatre League brings you Summer Theatre Fest, a series of free play readings hosted at member theaters across South Florida. They occur every Monday night through the end of August.
Tonight you have not one but two choices: Palm Beach Dramaworks will be reading Julie Gilbert’s Juxtaposition, while The Krane will be reading their original work Outside at Books and Books in Coral Gables.
And before we forget, Florida Theater On Stage reminds us that the deadline to sign up for a Free Night of Theatre is today.
Here’s your steamy summer’s day reading list.
Final Exit, Jay Harris
Jay Harris was an integral part of the South Florida theatre scene, and he left us all too soon this past Friday. He not only helped to shape the Carbonell Awards into its current format, he supported numerous small and excellent theater companies over the years, making him responsible for some of the finest plays ever performed in South Florida. Florida Theater On Stage has posted an extensive obituary, as has The Miami Herald. You can find his Legacy guest book through The Sun Sentinel.
FESTIVALS FESTIVALS FESTIVALS
The Miami Herald reports that… ah, screw it. I already typed this once and lost it to the thunderstorm. Here’s what Christine Dolen said:
Three South Florida playwrights are headed to prestigious fringe theater festivals this summer: Kim Ehly to the New York International Fringe Festival (FringeNYC) with her play Baby GirL, Luis Sosa and Casey Dressler to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival with their plays Mangos & Rice and The Wedding Warrior.
If you’d like to help, here are the links you need:
But wait, there’s one more festival: the same article reminds us that The Women’s Theatre Project and Pride Center will be presenting the fifth annual Girl Play festival. A total of 18 scripts will be presented in batches of 6 plays in each program. The Sun-Sentinel talks with some of this year’s directors about the offerings.
Oh, and Ground Up and Rising is rising up again in July.
It’s All Greek To Us
Florida Weekly tells us that Palm Beach Dramaworks is running the concert version of Zorba! this week, but Florida Theater On Stage sits down with its star, veteran Broadway actor William Parry (Sunday in the Park with George, Camelot, and Gypsy)
As he relates the philosophy of his title character in the musical Zorba, William Parry’s acting chops are so second-nature that he probably doesn’t realize that a slight Greek accent is slipping into his warm deep baritone and a brio is filling the small, hot conference room at Palm Beach Dramaworks…
…that distinctive voice is instantly recognizable to any fan of Stephen Sondheim who has listened to his musicals on CD over and over.
-- Florida Theater On Stage, June 18, 2014
Now in English
The Miami Herald reports that Micro Theatre Miami will be offering some programming in English.
The deal with Micro Theater is that the plays are short (about 15 minutes each) and inexpensive (just $5 gets you into a show). Each show is performed six times per night, so you can opt for a brief, cheap experience or see every play for $25 and still get out in under two hours, waiting time between shows included.
And there’s a mini-review of each of the current offerings.
New Times Besties.
It’s that time of year, when our local editions of The New Times publishes the results of their popularity contests – may the theatres with the most social-media-savvy patrons win!
The Miami New Times honors The Alliance Theatre Lab’s cast of Savage in Limbo, Erin Joy Schmidt, Karen Stephens, the South Miami Dade Cultural Arts Center, the national tour of Elf, Nicholas Richberg, Ethan Henry, Tarell Alvin McRaney, the set of Zoetic Stage’s Assassins, The Actors’ Playhouse production of End of the Rainbow, Zoetic Stage, and their production of Fear Up Harsh,
The Broward/Palm Beach New Times recognizes Todd Allen Durkin, Valentina Izarra, Dennis Creaghan, Kim Ostrenko AND Betsy Graver, Slow Burn’s production of Parade, the set design of Island City Stage’s The Timekeepers, Slow Burn Theatre Company, The Timekeepers, Patrick Fitzwater, and the Theatre at Arts Garage production of The Longing and the Short Of It.
So It’s Not READING…
Arts Radio Network has a podcast up about Ring of Fire at Arts Garage.
Put Away The Scissors!
BroadwayWorld summarizes the stories of two productions that got caught messing with scripts to plays they were producing. It seems that directors keep forgetting that the license for doing a published play includes a directive that the play can’t be changed in any way without consulting with the holder of the copyright. It happened down here last year with a staged reading of a musical (corrected immediately) , and it happened a few years ago at the old Coconut Grove Playhouse (production shut down by the publisher).
So if you are a director, and you’re directing a published play, please remember that you can’t change the script, the order of the scenes, the lines, who says what line, or the gender of any character, unless you get permission from the playwright or his agents. I state this for that one director we all know about who has so far gotten away with it. But it won’t last. And that kind of scandal is the last thing we need if we’re reviving a theatre that already got slapped for doing it in South Florida. With much love, The Scene.
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