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If reading my column isn't enough to keep you apprised of what's onstage this season, you can pick up information first-hand on Monday when the League of Cincinnati Theatres (LCT) offers its annual CURTAIN UP preview event, beginning at 5:30 p.m. at the Cincinnati Playhouse. It's free, and you'll be able to enjoy food from area restaurants and caterers. At 7:30 there will be a "Curtain Up Cabaret," featuring highlights and performers from various local theaters. More than 20 companies belong to LCT, founded in 1999 to strengthen Cincinnati's theater community. LCT helps members with awareness and attendance, and it offers many useful events, such as a unified audition process through which many theaters can find the best actors for their productions. Info:
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If reading my column isn't enough to keep you apprised of what's onstage this season, you can pick up information first-hand on Monday when the League of Cincinnati Theatres (LCT) offers its annual CURTAIN UP preview event, beginning at 5:30 p.m. at the Cincinnati Playhouse. It's free, and you'll be able to enjoy food from area restaurants and caterers. At 7:30 there will be a "Curtain Up Cabaret," featuring highlights and performers from various local theaters. More than 20 companies belong to LCT, founded in 1999 to strengthen Cincinnati's theater community. LCT helps members with awareness and attendance, and it offers many useful events, such as a unified audition process through which many theaters can find the best actors for their productions. Info: www.leagueofcincytheatres.com.
In case you haven't been paying attention, here's one more reminder that Cincinnati is not some cultural backwater. The October issue of American Theatre (at right) just arrived with a cover photo of three women who are "among the most-produced playwrights of the coming year." They are SARAH RUHL (whose The Clean House is at the Cincinnati Playhouse, Jan. 24-Feb. 24, 2006; it's onstage at four other theaters this season), Cincinnati native THERESA REBECK (her Bad Dates was at the Playhouse last winter, and it's getting nine more stagings this season) and LYNN NOTTAGE (whose Intimate Apparel just completed a three-week run at Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati; it tops the list of productions, with 16 around the nation).
Another show that's up there on American Theatre's list of frequent productions is Tracy Letts' Bug, which has one of its seven stagings this season at Atlanta's Actor's Express (where Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival founder Jasson Minadakis is now artistic director): Through Oct. 29, it features Cincinnati actress SHERMAN FRACHER as Agnes, a drug-weary waitress.
If reading my column isn't enough to keep you apprised of what's onstage this season, you can pick up information first-hand on Monday when the League of Cincinnati Theatres (LCT) offers its annual CURTAIN UP preview event, beginning at 5:30 p.m. at the Cincinnati Playhouse. It's free, and you'll be able to enjoy food from area restaurants and caterers. At 7:30 there will be a "Curtain Up Cabaret," featuring highlights and performers from various local theaters. More than 20 companies belong to LCT, founded in 1999 to strengthen Cincinnati's theater community. LCT helps members with awareness and attendance, and it offers many useful events, such as a unified audition process through which many theaters can find the best actors for their productions. Info: www.leagueofcincytheatres.com. ...
In case you haven't been paying attention, here's one more reminder that Cincinnati is not some cultural backwater. The October issue of American Theatre (at right) just arrived with a cover photo of three women who are "among the most-produced playwrights of the coming year." They are SARAH RUHL (whose The Clean House is at the Cincinnati Playhouse, Jan. 24-Feb. 24, 2006; it's onstage at four other theaters this season), Cincinnati native THERESA REBECK (her Bad Dates was at the Playhouse last winter, and it's getting nine more stagings this season) and LYNN NOTTAGE (whose Intimate Apparel just completed a three-week run at Ensemble Theatre of Cincinnati; it tops the list of productions, with 16 around the nation). ...
Another show that's up there on American Theatre's list of frequent productions is Tracy Letts' Bug, which has one of its seven stagings this season at Atlanta's Actor's Express (where Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival founder Jasson Minadakis is now artistic director): Through Oct. 29, it features Cincinnati actress SHERMAN FRACHER as Agnes, a drug-weary waitress. A review in The Atlanta Journal-Constitution says, "Fracher gives one of the best performances I've seen all season," noting, "The unspeakable sadness of Agnes' back story makes her unhealthy behavior and intense loneliness seem absolutely truthful. What Fracher does so magnificently is amplify her character's gullibility and naiveté, her tics and spastic behavior, her constant jonesing for alcohol, cigarettes and cocaine, to the stuff of high comedy." Fracher, a recent CEA nominee (for the alcoholic mom in ETC's While We Were Bowling last spring, will be back on Cincinnati stages in 2006 in Moonlight and Magnolias at ETC and A Streetcar Named Desire at CSF. ...
If you're a local writer with a script that's been publicly read and you're hoping to have a more full-blown workshop, a deadline is approaching to submit it to the CINCINNATI PLAYWRIGHTS INITIATIVE: Submissions need to be postmarked by Oct. 31. You must be a resident of Ohio, Kentucky or Indiana. Send one or two plays, with a $15 check, to CPI, P. O. Box 141164, Cincinnati OH 45250-1164. It's an opportunity to see your work come to life, with a director and actors over a seven-day process, happening at Ensemble Theatre or the Contemporary Arts Center.
MINI REVIEWS
John Kander and Fred Ebb concocted some of the greatest musical theater numbers of the past half-century, many of which are in the revue AS THE WORLD GOES 'ROUND, presented on Sept. 22-25 by Mad Anthony Players at Hamilton's Fitton Center. Chris Beiser did double-duty as director and performer: Despite singing Chicago's "Mr. Cellophane," you'd notice him. With versatile and animated Michael Starks, Beiser offered the production's best segment, the counter-pointed "I Don't Remember You" and "Sometimes a Day Goes By." Three female performers were weaker individually, but they brought comic energy to "Class" from Chicago and "The Grass Is Always Greener." Too often, however, the show suffered from amateurish choreography and sloppy lighting cues. Kander & Ebb's tunes always yield a satisfying evening, but a little more finesse would have been appreciated. (Rick Pender) Grade: C
