Rachel Padula-Shufelt News

Live theatre returns to Greater Boston Stage Company! The raucous The 39 Steps kicks off the 2021-2022 mainstage season on September 23rd as GBSC presents this fast-paced whodunit for anyone who loves the magic of theatre. This two-time Tony (R) and Drama Desk Award-winning treat is packed with laughs, a slew of characters, a plane crash, handcuffs, missing fingers, and some good old-fashioned romance.

Due to its ongoing discovery of the technical needs of producing virtual theatre, and to ensure the best possible production for its audience, SpeakEasy Stage Company is delaying the streaming dates for its production of TJ LOVES SALLY 4 EVER by one week.  The show will now stream from Friday, April 30 through Thursday, May 13.

Among tonight's winners was the pre-Broadway engagement of Six the Musical. which took home Outstanding Visiting Production for its run at ART, while David Byrne's American Utopia was honored with Best Visiting Performance, Musical.

Two dozen nominations of outstanding actors, directors, designers and ensembles were announced today by The Boston Theater Critics Association (BTCA) for the 38th Annual Elliot Norton Awards.

The Boston premiere of Lucy Kirkwood's 2018 Tony Award-nominated play THE CHILDREN at SpeakEasy Stage Company is an affecting drama, thanks to a combination of the playwright's excellence at her craft, Director Bryn Boice's focus, and the trio of Elliot Norton Award-winning actors whose portrayals constitute a collective master class. Inspired by the 2011 nuclear disaster in Fukushima, Japan, THE CHILDREN puts issues of climate change, the environment, and a generation's responsibility for stewardship under an unforgiving spotlight, challenging the audience to engage in self-reflection.

From February 28 to March 28, SpeakEasy Stage Company will proudly present the Boston premiere of the acclaimed drama THE CHILDREN by British playwright Lucy Kirkwood.

New Repertory Theatre dusts off an old chestnut for a family-friendly, non-holiday, crowd-pleasing offering as their gift for the season. Lionel Bart's OLIVER!, based on Charles Dickens' novel OLIVER TWIST, is known to be a little dark, with its themes of orphans, child exploitation, and vast income inequality (sound familiar?), but in the hands of New Rep's new Artistic Director, Michael J. Bobbitt, the darkness is lightened up with jaunty performances, a smattering of silly antics, and a set design (Luciana Stecconi) that skews to the cartoonish. With almost a dozen capable adults anchoring the cast, the seven children of all ages are given free rein to behave like children, albeit amazingly talented and spirited ones.

The much-anticipated MOBY DICK (A Musical Reckoning), from the team that brought you NATASHA, PIERRE & THE GREAT COMET OF 1812 in 2015, has finally surfaced at the Loeb Drama Center of the American Repertory Theater in Cambridge. Based on the iconic American novel by Herman Melville, the three-and-a-half-hour-long musical endeavors to theatricalize about 40 of the book's 135 chapters, taking a much larger bite from the source material than the mere 70- page section of Leo Tolstoy's WAR AND PEACE adapted for THE GREAT COMET. Oh, would that Dave Malloy (music, book, lyrics, and orchestrations) and Rachel Chavkin (director, co-developer) had approached this project with such surgical skill, rather than casting the broadest of nets upon the waters.

Last Night the BODYGUARD opened to a very warm audience reception at North Shore Music Theatre. The final offering of the 2019 regular musical season THE BODYGUARD is a new musical based on the smash hit 1992 film.

Get in the mood for the rapidly approaching holiday season by going to the Lyric Stage Company of Boston's production of THE THANKSGIVING PLAY, a sharp and funny satire by Native American playwright Larissa FastHorse that holds a mirror up to reflect the craziness of political correctness on steroids. How does a quartet of white theater artists tell the Thanksgiving story and honor Native American Heritage Month in a 45-minute elementary school play without offending anyone while being historically accurate? Very carefully, and not without numerous false starts, each one more ridiculous than the last, until not to decide is to decide.

Bill Hanney's award-winning North Shore Music Theatre (NSMT) is thrilled to announce complete casting and creative team details for the upcoming production of, THE BODYGUARD, starring the previously announced Cheaza Figueroa and Judson Mills in the roles made famous by Whitney Houston and Kevin Costner in the smash hit 1992 movie. The Boston area Premiere of THE BODYGUARD plays from Tuesday, October 29 a?' November 10, 2019.

Meet the cast of SUNSET BOULEVARD at North Shore Music Theatre, which stars Alice Ripley as the fading Hollywood star, Norma Desmond

In the annals of musical theater, Norma Desmond is one of those larger than life characters, like Mame Dennis, Dolly Levi, and Eva Peron, who cries out for an actor with a specific and rare combination of skills to play the role. Tony Award-winner Alice Ripley ascends to playing the faded silent-screen star in the North Shore Music Theatre production of SUNSET BOULEVARD, after originating the role of Betty Schaefer in the 1994 original Broadway cast which starred Glenn Close. In so doing, Ripley joins the pantheon of singular talents who have put their personal stamp on the musical iteration of Norma, stepping out of the shadow of the indelible mark Gloria Swanson made on celluloid in Billy Wilder's 1950 film.

Just as the centuries-old spirituals sung by American slaves created community and gave voice to the thoughts and emotions they were forced to repress, so too the music in CHOIR BOY serves to give hope and healing to the young men struggling to find and express their true identities at a boarding school designed to shape them into society's culturally approved version of a?oestrong, ethical black men.a?? As classroom students, they must live up to the high standards set by the Headmaster and a strict 50-year honor code. As members of the school's acclaimed choir, they are set free when they sing.

Due to overwhelming demand, SpeakEasy Stage Company has added an additional week of performances of its acclaimed production of the hit Broadway play CHOIR BOY. The show will now run thru Saturday, Oct. 19, 2019.

North Shore Music Theatre has announced complete casting for the upcoming production of Andrew Lloyd Webber's masterwork, SUNSET BOULEVARD, which will star the previously announced Alice Ripley as the fading Hollywood star, Norma Desmond.

From September 13 to October 12, 2019, SpeakEasy Stage Company will proudly present the New England premiere of the acclaimed Broadway musical drama CHOIR BOY.

Jersey Boys opened this week to one of the most enthusiastic welcomes I have ever witnessed at NSMT. The show stopping ovations were so heartfelt & sustained that the actors literally had to stop, numerous times, to wait for the applause to finish before continuing, and the show deserved the adoration, it is simply terrific.

Bill Hanney's award-winning North Shore Music Theatre (NSMT) continues the 2019 Musical Season with JERSEY BOYS, the story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. This special extended engagement plays for four week starting Tuesday, August 6 and playing thru Sunday, September 1, 2019. JERSEY BOYS is sponsored by Abiomed.

Bill Hanney's award-winning North Shore Music Theatre (NSMT) continues the 2019 Musical Season with JERSEY BOYS, the story of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. This special extended engagement plays for four week starting Tuesday, August 6 and playing thru Sunday, September 1, 2019. JERSEY BOYS is sponsored by Abiomed.