Broadway To Vegas

Copyright: May 14, 2023
By: Laura Deni
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SUZIE MILLER'S PRIMA FACIE IS FORMIDABLE

Prima facie is a Latin expression meaning "sufficient to establish a fact or raise a presumption unless disproved or rebutted."

As an every day legal term it refers to the first impression of a case.

As a Broadway play at the John Golden Theater, it's one of the best plays of this or any season.

Prima Facie is a one-woman play by former attorney Suzie Miller. The plot follows Tessa, a brilliant criminal defense barrister whose view of the legal system changes after she is sexually assaulted. The show was nominated for five Laurence Olivier Awards, winning for Best New Play and Best Actress for Jodie Comer. In America Comer has been nominated for every possible award. Expect her to take home several.

Tessa specializes in defending men accused of sexual assault - after all somebody has to defend them - and all accused are entitled to the best possible defense. Tessa has distanced herself from the personalities, coolly examining and cross examining the women who testify against her clients. Detached, she challenges their accusation. Tessa knows how to effectively do her job and she feels good about herself.

The play itself is an indictment of the legal system. Comer's exhaustive, high octane performance is searingly passionate as personal reality causes her to question her views of the legal system which claims to be fair but in reality is misogynistic.

Comer's mental gymnastics - from flashbacks to present - are accompanied by a demanding physical exhibition as she leaps around the stage, on and off tables and filing cabinets - effective and unique staging by Miriam Buether. Her use of filing cabinets as building blocks projects the walls and barriers of the legal system as well as the complexities of the legal system which needs de-fragmentation - secrets hid in a complex filing system - or are they the eyes of the victims? The on stage rain can be a metaphor for drowning in the legal system.

Brilliantly directed by Justin Martin, other characters come into focus as Comer not only portrays Tessa, but vocally presents others, from her mother to her clients and their victims.

Penned by former attorney Miller, there are important facts about lawyers. An attorney doesn't have to like their client. An attorney doesn't have to believe in or approve of their client. In order to function in their career they can't become emotionally involved in their client's case, or the lawyer wouldn't be able to function. A lawyer is a client's mouthpiece. As Tessa points out "A good lawyer just tells the best version of their client’s story." She calls her profession "the game of law" where "we don't call it losing. We call it 'coming second.'"

She is a hurricane of emotion - as if working until you can't feel is the key to survival in a profession which is rife with depression and suicides. A lawyer is the most stressful occupation in the U.S. according to a new analysis from the Washington Post. An ALM Mental Health and Substance Abuse Survey, found that lawyers have four times the depression rate of the general population.

Natasha Chivers’s lighting ranges from blistering accusatory to sociologically illuminating.

Jodie Comer in Prima Facie.Press photo by: Helen Murray.

In doing her duty to her client Tessa forces the women whose assault cases have been brought forward to relieve their attack so that they may be picked apart like a fallen sparrow being nibbled on by a vulture. It's implied that perhaps she is at least partially responsible during Tessa's stunning, powerful but detached cross examination of an empty chair, in which the one can easily conquer up the images of frightened, desperate women trying to justify fractured memories and life altering experiences.

Then Tessa is herself assaulted - date rape from a colleague.

Tessa, from the lower middle class who hard scrambled her way into Cambridge law school, versus her rapist, the son of a rich, powerful London lawyer.

Defense attorney Tessa becomes the plaintiff. Her world is upended.

When Tessa is on the witness stand to defend herself she is faced with what she has spent years doing to others; putting victimized women on trial for the crimes committed against them.

Memories change and victims can be manipulated into doubting themselves.

As Tessa tells the court in her own defense: "The legal system made me look like a liar," she concludes. "The legal system feels broken."

All of the creatives have done an exceptional job: Ben and Max Ringham’s sound design (from heart beats to disco music - perhaps the loudness used as emphasis), video design by Willie Williams and Rebecca Lucy Taylor’s score.

Costume Design by Miriam Buether; Associate Lighting Design: Dan Walker; Moving Lights Programmer: Marc Polimeni.Production Stage Manager: Diane DiVita; Assistant Stage Mgr: Georgia Bird Voice & Dialect Coach: Kate Godfrey; U.K. Marketing: Alain Airth; U.S. Marketing: Elizabeth Furze and AKA; U.K. Press: David Bloom and Story House; U.S. Press Representative: The Press Room.

Also In an unusual but important addition the Prima Facie playbill contains an informative fold-out offering a list of facts about sexual assault in America and information about the organizations the School Consent Project and Everyone's Invited.

The play pleads for change in how the legal system handles sexually assault. Because a defendant is presumed innocent until proven guilty and is entitled to a defense - that change isn't going to happen any time soon.

Also, the public in general needs to understand that: with the passage of time, the stored memory undergoes important changes, as revealed by the behavioral outcomes of its retrieval. In other words, every time you remember an event from the past, your brain networks change in ways that can alter the later recall of the event. Thus, the next time you remember it, you might recall not the original event but what you remembered the previous time. The victim isn't changing their story or lying. Jurors must have an understanding of how the brain operates.

Only on stage through July 2, 2023. Make it a point to see this play.

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This is not your typical, totally boring textbook.

In the pages of How To Earn A Living As A Freelance Writer (the first to be lied to and the last to be paid) you'll find sex, celebrities, violence, threats, unethical editors, scummy managers and lawyers, treacherous press agents, sex discrimination; as well as a how-to for earning money by writing down words.

ART AND ABOUT

PIERCE BROSNAN 69, a self taught painter who has been painting since 1987 staged an exhibition entitled So Many Dreams yesterday, May 13, 2023, in Santa Monica, California.

Always interested in painting, he began his show business career, not as an actor, but as a graphic artist in a studio in Putney, South London. Shortly thereafter an acting opportunity came along and Pierce put down the brushes. Self taught, he again took up painting in 1987 as stress reliever when his late wife, Cassandra Harris, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer. Their daughter Charlotte died of the same disease in 2013 at the age of 41.

Brosnan may be self taught, but he's no rank amateur. Influenced by Picasso and Lichtenstein, he once sold his portrait of Bob Dylan for a whopping $1.4million.

Happily remarried to Keely, she is the one who encouraged him to having an exhibition.

On his Instagram account he explained: "I shall have my first art show in LA...if not now when? Time to let them go"

MARY QUANT

Mary Quant Exhibit.Photo: V&A Museum

the exhibition focuses on how Quant revolutionized high street with her subversive and playful designs for a younger generation.

The V&A’s major retrospective of Dame Mary Quant, one of Britain’s most iconic and celebrated fashion designers, will be shown at Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum in Scotland from May 20 to October 22, 2023, after returning from international tour.

This will be the final chance to see the exhibition, which features over 100 garments, accessories, cosmetics and photographs drawn from the V&A’s extensive collections, Dame Mary Quant’s archive and, following a public appeal, many private collections.

Focusing on the years from 1955, when Quant opened her experimental boutique Bazaar on the King’s Road, Chelsea, through the ‘Swinging Sixties’ when Mary Quant was awarded her OBE, to 1975, it showcases the period when Quant revolutionized the high street with her subversive and playful designs for a younger generation. From Quant’s early years when the self-taught designer created garments overnight to her designs being sold internationally, the exhibition reveals the real stories behind the myths to explore how Quant democratized fashion and empowered women through her determination, ingenuity and unique personal style, which she exported around the world.

Displays explore the evolution of the miniskirt, her novel use of modern materials such as PVC, and how her Ginger Group wholesale label was sold internationally from Glasgow’s House of Fraser to department stores in San Francisco and Sydney. Alongside miniskirts, hot pants and tights, accessories, including Quant Afoot shoes, and make-up, iconic photographs will celebrate the marketing campaigns that helped promote Mary Quant’s photogenic looks and youthful brand.

Dame Mary Quant received the Companion of Honour Award in HM King Charles III’s first New Years Honours List.

Jenny Lister, co-curator of Mary Quant at the V&A, said: "Mary Quant transformed the fashion system, overturning the dominance of luxury couture from Paris. She dressed liberated women, freed from rules and regulations, and from dressing like their mothers."

An exhibition organized by the Victoria and Albert Museum, London.

On display Kelvingrove Art Gallery and Museum, Scotland.

KARL LAGERFELD: A LINE OF BEAUTY on display through July 16, 2023 at The Met Fifth Avenue, New York City.

The Costume Institute's exhibition examines the work of Karl Lagerfeld (1933–2019). Focusing on the designer's stylistic vocabulary as expressed in aesthetic themes that appear time and again in his fashions from the 1950s to his final collection in 2019, the show spotlights the German-born designer's unique working methodology.

Most of the approximately 200 pieces on display are accompanied by Lagerfeld's sketches, which underscore his complex creative process and the collaborative relationships with his premières, or head seamstresses.

Lagerfeld's fluid lines united his designs for Balmain, Patou, Chloé, Fendi, Chanel, and his eponymous label, Karl Lagerfeld, creating a diverse and prolific body of work unparalleled in the history of fashion.

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SWEET CHARITY

ARTISTS STAGE AUCTION TO SAVE NINA SIMONE'S CHILDHOOD HOME

Nina in the Sky with Diamonds by Stanley Whitney. Executed in 2021. Signed and dated on verso. Oil on linen. 60 by 60 in. (48 3/10 x 43 1/5 cm.) Estimate $450,000 - 480,000 USD. © Stanley Whitney. Courtesy of the artist

Adam Pendleton, Rashid Johnson, Ellen Gallagher and Julie Mehretu purchased the singer’s house in North Carolina sight unseen and are now restoring it to a "space that extends the scope of Nina Simone’s legacy," according to Sotheby's.

The Simone home has been named a National Treasure by the National Trust for Historic Preservation.

On May 20, 2023 a fundraising gala dinner Co-Presented by the African American Cultural Heritage Action Fund and Pace Gallery at Pace Gallery in New York, supported by a special Sotheby’s online auction of 11 works donated by artists will take place.

Donated works to be gaveled down include vibrant oil paintings by Cecily Brown – currently enjoying a mid-career retrospective at the Metropolitan Museum of Art – and Sarah Sze (whose site-specific installations can be enjoyed at the Guggenheim) as well as by the four artists who saved the house from demolition.

The auction was co-curated by Pendleton and the tennis icon Venus Williams. "I’m so excited to be a part of this expansive project centering on the life and legacy of Nina Simone," Williams says. "Each of the artists Adam and I have selected for the auction has a unique, powerful voice."

Other highlights from the auction include Rashid Johnson’s Bruise Painting Nina’s Blues (2023) – which delivers a soulful abstraction akin to Simone’s keyboard jams – and Robert Longo’s Untitled (Nina), a politically evocative charcoal portrait of a black panther.

At the gala dinner and auction at Pace, the Grammy-award winning musician H.E.R. will perform a set that will include one of Simone’s songs.

Nina Simone Childhood Home: Benefit Auction has on line bidding through May 22, 2023.

WITH MUSIC IN MIND takes place on May 18, 2023. The New York Pops is continuing their partnership with CaringKind and the Museum of the Moving Image with a special performance from The New York Pops Piano Trio on May 18, 2023 at The Museum of the Moving Image in Astoria, NY.

Hosted by Steven Reineke, musicians from the orchestra will perform Academy Award songs from the 1930s and 1940s, including selections like The Way You Look Tonight; They Can’t Take That Away from Me, and When You Wish Upon a Star. The performance will be followed by a Q&A with Steven Reineke and The New York Pops Piano Trio: Lee Musiker, Piano - Jeffrey Carney, Bass - James F. Saporito, Drums - Kimberlee Wertz, Vocals.

With Music in Mind is a free performance intended to provide individuals living with Alzheimer’s and dementia an opportunity to connect with their strongest memories associated with classic movies and their iconic soundtracks. While priority access will be given to individuals living with Alzheimer's and dementia and their caregivers, any additional seats will be open to the public.

This event is made possible through a partnership by The New York Pops, CaringKind's connect2culture, and the Museum of the Moving Image.

GIBSON GIVES the philanthropic arm of Gibson–the iconic American instrument brand–donated 52 guitars, gear, and equipment to benefit students attending the National School of Arts in Cuba.

Access to even simple musical supplies such as guitar strings is limited in Cuba. Gibson provided 100 sets of guitar strings, guitar picks, and 52 Epiphone acoustic guitars to the 21 music education programs through the National School of Arts. Students and representatives of Havana elementary schools and conservatories were on hand for the gifting and celebration. Additionally, Gibson will donate 100 more Epiphone guitars to the school in the coming months.

"Our country will always be grateful to those who decide to help and build bridges of hope through art and music," stated Lianys Torres Rivera, Head of the Cuban Diplomatic Mission in the U.S. "The Gibson Gives Foundation has achieved an amazing goal in Cuba. It was able to bring to our country guitars for music students in Havana and Pinar del Rio."

SPREADING THE WORD

THE GREAT GATSBY will have royal visitor on May 18, 2023. Prince Edward, The Duke of Edinburgh, Patron, Northern Ballet, will attend a performance of The Great Gatsby at Sadler's Wells Theatre, in London.

Scott Fitzgerald's classic American novel is brought to life as dancers glide across the floor in gorgeous Chanel-inspired costumes to a cinematic score by Sir Richard Rodney Bennett CBE played by a live orchestra.

Mysterious millionaire Jay Gatsby has a penchant for lavish parties and beautiful women. As the sparkling façade of his world begins to slip, the loneliness, obsession and tragedy that lies beneath is revealed in one of Northern Ballet’s most treasured productions.

SALON DU CHOCOLAT ET DE LA PATISSERIE the world's largest chocolate show will transform the Dubai Mall in Dubai, UAE into a chocolate paradise. Salon du Chocolat Dubai is returning at Galeries Lafayette Gourmet, The Dubai Mall, from May 18-20, 2023. The much-loved show will bring together professional chocolate tasters, chocolatiers, chocolate aficionados, authors and pastry chefs.

The cacao-inspired fashion show, which was a hit last year, will return "bigger and better than ever" - a fashion show like no other, discover the creations of talented pastry chefs and fashion designers as they showcase their extravagant chocolate dresses and sweet abayas!

50 different brands of the "necessary food group" will be showing off their decant delights.

THE PRINCESS BRIDE IN CONCERT: FILM AND ORCHESTRA presented by the Kansas City Symphony takes place May 18-21, 2023 at the Kauffman Center for the Performing Arts in Kansas City, MO.

IN HONOR OF THE 5TH ANNIVERSARY OF HARRY POTTER AND THE CURSED CHILD ON BROADWAY MOME Commissioner Anne del Castillo presented the show with a proclamation on behalf of Mayor Adams which declared April 22 "Harry Potter and the Cursed Child Day" and a street sign naming 43rd Street between 7th and 8th Avenues "Cursed Child Way" just for the occasion.

LUCILLE LORTEL THEATRE in New York City has announced the launch of: Immigrant Experiences, a new musical theatre development program focused on the works of immigrant playwrights and composers in partnership with The New School’s College of Performing Arts. Created in collaboration with the New School by Michael Heitzman, Lucille Lortel Theatre’s Artistic Director of New Musical Development, this program showcases Lucille Lortel Theatre’s commitment to the development of new musical theater, the fostering of new artists, and creating a larger, more diverse community of theatre makers and audiences.

Current graduate students of the College of Performing Arts were invited to submit a statement of intent to develop a musical theatre composition based on the immigrant experience. The selected emerging artists were then tasked with creating musical theatre songs based on their personal experience or subjects close to them.

The 15-week program is led by Jaime Lozano, a known multi-hyphenate musical theater composer, storyteller, and director and the classes are hosted at The New School. Known Broadway award-nominated and award-winning guest teachers such as Helen Park, Nathan Tysen, and others have helped mentor and advise participants in the development process. The participants span the globe with representation from China, Mexico, Philippines, Spain, the United States of America.

The 7 composers and playwrights include: Giancarlo Abrahan, Xiaokang Deng, Chicahua Zipactonal Martínez, Manel Paret, Cassie Shao, Carrie Shao, and Anamaria Willars Vargas.

The program culminates with a concert presentation of the story-telling songs on May 15 at The Lucille Lortel Theatre. These works will be performed by a cast of Broadway performers and a three-piece band. With this methodology, participants will collaborate with performers, a music director, and a director, bringing the songs to life on the stage for the first time. Adrian Alexander Alea is the director, Ben Moss is the Music Director/Pianist, along with Yahir Montes (Guitar/Bass) and Joel E Mateo (Drums/Percussion). Performing in the presentation will be Broadway artists: Kathryn Allison, Robi Hager, Kendyl Ito, Jeigh Madjus, Marina Pires, Imani Russell, and Alex Vinh.

HUGH BONNEVILLE who hosted the Coronation Concert made a clever remark about the guest of honor. In referring to King Charles' love of music he referred to him as 'The man formerly known as Prince.'






THE PULIZER PRIZES FOR 2023 HAVE BEEN ANNOUNCED The Pulitzer prize for fiction was awarded on to two class-conscious novels: Demon Copperhead, Barbara Kingsolver’s modern recasting of the Dickens classic David Copperfield, and Hernan Diaz’s Trust, an innovative narrative of wealth and deceit set in 1920s New York.

Beverly Gage’s G-Man, her book on longtime FBI leader J Edgar Hoover, was given the Pulitzer for biography. His Name Is George Floyd: One Man’s Life and the Struggle for Racial Justice, by Robert Samuels and Toluse Olorunnipa, won for general nonfiction. Sanaz Toossi’s play English won for drama and Jefferson Cowie’s Freedom’s Dominion: A Saga of White Resistance to Federal Power was honored for history.

Finalists included On Sugarland by Aleshea Harris, "an ambitious drama inspired by Sophocles of a community shaped by the trauma of a nameless war" and The Far Country, by Lloyd Suh, "an account of emigrants who traveled from China to San Francisco and suffered in the shadows of a strange new world".

The one-act play English premiered off-Broadway at Atlantic Theater Company. Toossi is an Iranian American playwright from Orange county, California, who graduated with a master’s from New York University. Her other works include Wish You Were Here.

The Pulitzer for memoir or autobiography was given to Hua Hsu’s coming-of-age story Stay True. Carl Phillips, won in poetry for Then the War: And Selected Poems, 2007-2020.

Omar by Rhiannon Giddens and Michael Abels, won the Pulitzer for music.

The Pulitzers honored the best in journalism from 2022 in 15 categories, as well as eight arts categories focuses on books, music and theater.

The public service prize winner receives a gold medal. All other winners receive $15,000. The prizes were established in the will of the newspaper publisher Joseph Pulitzer and first awarded in 1917.

PLAYWRIGHT CHRISTINA ANDERSON has won the 2023 Harold and Mimi Steinberg/American Theatre Critics Association New Play Award for her play the ripple, the wave that carried me home.

The Steinberg/ATCA Award, which carries a $25,000 cash prize, recognizes an outstanding script that premiered in a professional production outside of New York City in 2022. Anderson’s play, which examines a daughter’s reckoning with her family’s legacy of political activism, debuted at Berkeley Repertory Theatre in Berkeley, Calif., in September 2022. It was produced in association with the Goodman Theatre in Chicago, where it was staged earlier this year.

Two 2022 Steinberg/ATCA citations were also presented to Sally and Tom by Suzan-Lori Parks, produced by the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis, and Swing State by Rebecca Gilman, produced by the Goodman Theatre in Chicago. Each citation carries a $7500 cash prize.

The 2023 awards were presented on Saturday, May 6, in Costa Mesa, Calif., as part of the Pacific Playwrights Festival. ATCA thanks South Coast Repertory for generously hosting the presentation.

With an annual prize total of $40,000, Steinberg/ATCA is one of the largest national new play award programs. ATCA began honoring new plays produced at regional theaters outside New York City in 1977, and the awards have been funded by the Harold and Mimi Steinberg Charitable Trust since 2000. Plays receiving a production in New York City during the award cycle are not eligible for the Steinberg/ATCA award, recognizing the many other awards programs already in existence there.

At the ceremony, ATCA also presented the 2023 M. Elizabeth Osborn Award to Madison Fiedler for her playSpay, premiered by the Rivendell Theatre Ensemble in Chicago. Named for the late critic, new play advocate and ATCA member Betty Osborn (1941-1993), the award recognizes the work of an emerging playwright who has not yet received a major New York production or a major national award. The Osborn Award carries a $3000 prize.

THE NEW YORK DRAMA CRITICS' CIRCLE has named Bruce Norris’s Downstate best play of the 2022-23 season. The award for best foreign play went to Tom Stoppard’s Leopoldstadt. No award was given for best musical.

The awards, which will be presented during a private ceremony on Tuesday, May 22, include a cash prize of $2,500 for Best Play and $1,000 for Best Foreign Play, made possible by a grant from the Lucille Lortel Foundation.

Special citations were awarded to the Broadway revival of Parade, to playwright Adrienne Kennedy for lifetime achievement, and to La MaMa Experimental Theatre Club for ongoing achievement in Off-Off Broadway theater.

THE BOARD OF TRUSTEES OF THE SHAKESPEARE THEATRE OF NEW JERSEY (STNJ) has announced that Brian B. Crowe will succeed Bonnie J. Monte as the company’s new Artistic Director starting on January 1st of 2024. Now in his 28th season with the institution, Mr. Crowe, who began his tenure back in 1996 as a directing intern from Ohio.

He has served as the company’s Director of Education for the past 25 years. Most notably, his collaboration with Ms. Monte on Shakespeare LIVE!, the organization’s flagship touring company, has resulted in LIVE! evolving into the largest and most prominent Shakespeare touring company for students in the mid-Atlantic region, having now reached over 700,000 young people during its existence.

Wood Huntley, STNJ’s Board President said, “We could not be luckier than to have a successor for Bonnie who has a long and prominent record of success with the company. Being able to transfer leadership with complete confidence in the new Artistic Director is a great gift, and the Board is thrilled that Bonnie can hand the reins over to someone we all know will carry on her great work at the highest level of competency and artistry.”

NEW YORK FOUNDATION FOR THE ARTS HALL OF FAME recently inducted MOME Commissioner Anne del Castillo for her role in advancing NYC arts and entertainment and connecting artists to opportunities. The event recognizes visual, literary and performing artists who have had a profound impact on the arts through their creative work, and individuals and organizations who have championed the value of the arts in the world. The evening also honored visual artist Marylyn Dintenfass, writer and performance artist Carmelita Tropicana and patron of the arts Brookfield Properties.

OTHER PEOPLE'S MONEY

NEVADA FILM STUDIO INFRASTRUCTURE ACT which aims to bring film production to Nevada in a massive way was introduced last Thursday, May 11, 2023 by Democratic state Sen. Roberta Lange as Nevada Senate Bill 496. The bill has bipartisan support and is expected to pass in a vote slated for Tuesday.

The bill would establish what it calls the "Las Vegas Media Campus Project" and "Summerlin Production Studios Project," both of which could apply for film infrastructure tax credits for qualified film and television production. The Las Vegas media campus would be located at the Harry Reid Research and Technology Park, a tech hub being developed by University of Nevada, Las Vegas (UNLV). As first reported by The Nevada Independent SB 496 is sponsored by GOP Sens. Scott Hammond and Heidi Seevers Gansert and Democratic Assemblyman Cameron Miller.

The bill would significantly expand the film tax credit program aimed at bringing Hollywood movies to Nevada.

Sony Pictures has come forwards saying they would be involved in the development.

Sony Pictures owns the Columbia Tri-Star catalog of films and franchises, including the rights to "Spider-Man," "Ghostbusters" and "Jumanji."

"Sony Pictures supports expanding film and television production in the state of Nevada. Working with The Howard Hughes Corporation and Birtcher Development and pending the passage of legislation guaranteeing a competitive Nevada production incentive, SPE is prepared to commit up to $1 billion in production spend in Southern Nevada over the next 10 years," a spokesperson for the studio said in a statement to the press.

Also on board is Mark Wahlberg who is currently filming a movie in Las Vegas. He says he wants to make Vegas "Hollywood 2.0".

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GROUNDHOG DAY book by Danny Rubin. Music and lyrics by Tim Minchin.

Directed by Matthew Warchus. Choreography by Lizzi Gee.

Phil Connors is a pretty awful guy. But when the cynical Pittsburgh TV weatherman is sent to cover the kooky annual Groundhog Day event in the small town of Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania, he finds himself caught in a time loop that sends him on a hilarious path to enlightenment and redemption.

A comic parable of love, hope and transformation, this Olivier Award-winning (Best New Musical, Best Actor) musical sensation based on the 1993 hit film returns to The Old Vic. Starring Andy Karl as cynical weatherman Phil Connors. Tanisha Spring is Rita Hanson.

Others in the cast include: Jasmin Colangelo, Kelly Ewins, Kamilla Fernandes, Aimée Fisher, Zack Guest, Nick Hayes, Jacqueline Hughes, Ashlee Irish, Chris Jenkins, Andrew Langtree, Billy Nevers, Eve Norris, Mark Pearce, Ben Redfern, Durone Stokes, Alex Stoll, Jez Unwin, and Annie Wensak.

The creatives are: Rob Howell Set & Costumes - Christopher Nightingale Orchestration, Additional Music & Musical Supervisor - Hugh Vanstone Lighting - Simon Baker Sound - Paul Kieve Illusions - Andrzej Goulding Video & Animation - Finn Caldwell Additional Movement - Will Burton for GBC Casting - Alan Berry Musical Director - Charlie Hughes-D'Aeth Voice - Penny Dyer Dialect - Paul Warwick Griffin Associate Director - Nik Ashton Associate Director - Natalie Gilhome Assistant Director - Helen Siveter Associate Choreography?- Bec Chippendale Associate Set - Megan Rouse Associate Set - Zoë Thomas-Webb Costume Supervisor - Campbell Young Associates Hair, Wigs & Make Up - Marcus Hall Props Props Supervisor - Jack Hopkins Assistant Musical Supervisor - Chris Hirst Associate Lighting - Jay Jones Associate Sound - David Gallagher Orchestral Management.

Playing from May 20, 2023 through August 12, 2023 at The Old Vic in London.

TOMMY AND ME By Ray Didinger.

Directed by Nick Corley.

Magical things can happen when a boy meets his sports idol. Legendary Sports journalist Ray Didinger’s lifelong relationship with Philadelphia Eagles star wide receiver, Tommy McDonald, led both down an unexpected path — straight to Canton, OH and the National Football League’s Hall of Fame. “Tommy and Me” is a valentine to the relationship between sports stars and fans everywhere.

Didinger is an American sportswriter, radio personality, sports commentator author and screenwriter. He is a member of the Pro Football Hall of Fame as part of the Writer's Honor Roll.

May 19 to June 17, 2023 at Bucks County Playhouse in New Hope, PA.

LOVE LETTERS by A.R. Gurney.

Directed by Ciarán O’Reilly. Starring Matthew Broderick and Laura Benanti.

A Pulitzer Prize finalist for Drama, A.R Gurney’s Love Letters is a two-hander drama comprised of letters exchanged between two friends over a lifetime. Andrew and Melissa, both born into wealth and position, begin their correspondence in childhood with birthday party thank-you notes. Their letters continue through their boarding school and college years while they are romantically attached and later through their individual marriages and careers. As the actors read the letters aloud, an evocative, touching, frequently funny, but always telling pair of character studies is revealed, where what is implied is as revealing and affecting as what is written down.

On Irish Rep's Francis J. Greenburger Mainstage in New York City. Now Through June 9, 2023.

THE GOODBYE GIRL based on the Neil Simon film of the same name with a book by Neil Simon, music by Marvin Hamlisch, and lyrics by David Zippel.

Directed by Tony winner David Zippel.

Choreograph by Gerry McIntyre.

Musical direction by Miles Plant.

Tony winner Santino Fontana and Sierra Boggess will lead the company of twelve.

The cast will also feature Tony nominee Christopher Sieber as Character Actor, Debra Thais Evans as Cosby, Lena Josephine Marano as Lucy, Tara Radha Rajan as Melanie, Honor Blue Savage as Cynthia, Alyssa Isihara as Jenna and others, Emma Kantor as Rhonda and others, Jessica Ann Lawyer as Donna and others, Daniel Pahl, Tony Collins, and Dan DeLuca as the Elliot standby.

The Goodbye Girl follows the unlikely romance between Paula (Boggess), a single mother who has been jilted one too many times, and Elliot (Fontana), the opinionated actor who shows up—unexpectedly—on her doorstep with a lease to sublet her apartment.

The creatives are: The production will also have set design by Joshua Warner, lighting design by Ethan Steimel, costume design by Thomas J.C. Gluodenis, properties design by Emily LaRosa, associate music direction by Griffin Strout, dramaturgy by Frederick Miller, assistant choreography by Sara Andreas, technical direction by Justin Kirkpatrick, and casting by Holly Buczek of Wojcik Casting Team. The stage management team includes Kyle Binkley and Maria Papadopoulos.

Spotlight Musical Theater Company’s production of the 1993 Broadway musical The Goodbye Girl, has performances only through May 21 at Off-Broadway's Theatre Row, New York City.

BEES & HONEY by Guadalís Del Carmen, inspired by Juan Luis Guerra’s Como Abeja Al Panal.

Directed by Melissa Crespo.

Bees & Honey is bille as a "Washington Heights love story that follows married couple Manuel and Johaira as they enter new phases in their lives. But as the challenges of life and marriage mount, the young and ambitious couple must answer the age-old question: Is Love enough?"

The cast includes Maribel Martinez as "Johaira" and Xavier Pacheco as "Manuel."

The creatives are: set design by Shoko Kambara, costume design by Devario D. Simmons, lighting design by Reza Behjat , sound design by Germán Martínez and original music by Dilson. Teniece Divya Johnson is the Intimacy and Fight Director. R. Christopher Maxwell is the Production Stage Manager. Casting is by Destiny Lilly, CSA of The Telsey Office.

Bees & Honey is produced in collaboration with The Sol Project and is supported in part by the National Endowment for the Arts and the R&S Shulman Fund.

Officially opens on Monday May 22 for a limited run through June 11, 2023 at MCC Theater’s Susan & Ronald Frankel Theater in New York City.

PRIMARY TRUST by Eboni Booth.

Directed by Knud Adams.

Meet Kenneth (Harper), a 38-year-old bookstore worker who spends his evenings sipping mai-tais at the local tiki bar. When he’s suddenly laid off, Kenneth finally begins to face a world he's long avoided – with transformative and even comical results. Primary Trust is about new beginnings, old friends, and seeing the world for the first time.

The cast includes Eric Berryman, William Jackson Harper, April Mathis, Jay O. Sanders and Luke Wygodny.

The creative team includes: Marsha Ginsberg (Sets), Qween Jean (Costumes), Isabella Byrd (Lighting) and Mikaal Sulaiman (Sound).

Primary Trust opens officially on Thursday, May 25, 2023 at the Laura Pels Theater in the Harold and Miriam Steinberg Center for Theatre in New York City. This is a limited engagement through Saturday, July 2, 2023.

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This is not your typical, totally boring textbook.

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FINAL OVATION

GRACE BUMBRY famed mezzo-soprano died on May 7, 2023 in Vienna, Austria. She was 86. Recently, she suffered an acute ischemic stroke from a fall and was hospitalized.

Bumbry was a member of a pioneering generation of African-American opera and classical singers in the worlds of opera and classical music and helped pave the way for future generations of African-American opera and concert singers. She was also a singer with a wide range that not only sang mezzo roles but also performed numerous soprano roles to great success.

Born on Jan. 4, 1937 in St. Louis, Missouri, she entered a teen talent contest sponsored by St. Louis radio station KMOX. She would win the contest which included a $1,000 war bond, a trip to New York, and a scholarship to the St. Louis Institute of Music. However, the institute did not accept her because she was black.

However, the concert promoters arranged that she appear on Arthur Godfrey’s nationally televised Talent Scouts program, singing Verdi’s aria "O don fatale." That performance allowed her to enter Boston University College of Fine Arts and she later transferred to Northwestern University.

In 1958, the mezzo won the Metropolitan Opera National Council Auditions.

Her operatic debut came in 1960 as Amneris at the Paris Opéra. At the age of 24 she gained international recognition when she sang as Venus in “Tannhäuser” at Bayreuth and became the first black singer to appear at the famed festival. She received a 30-minute ovation for her performance there, including 42 curtain calls.

That performance led her to the White House at the invitation of Jaqueline Kennedy; she later returned in 1981 to sing at Ronald Reagan’s inauguration.

Bumbry went on to debut at every major opera house including the Royal Opera House in 1963, La Scala in 1964, the Wiener Staatsoper in 1964, and Metropolitan Opera in 1965.

In the 1970s, Bumbry made her debut as a soprano singing the title role "Salome" in 1970 at Covent Garden, and later debuted the title role of "Tosca" at the Metropolitan Opera.

She received a Grammy Award in 1972 for Best Opera Recording and on Dec. 6, 2009, was among those honored with the 2009 Kennedy Center Honors.

RITA LEE renowned Brazilian rock singer and songwriter, an icon of the Tropicalia artistic movement, died in her home in Brazil on on Tuesday, May 9, 2023, after a two-year battle with lung cancer. She was 75.

She was a singer and songwriter praised for her versatility, playing at least five instruments: drums, guitar, piano, harmonica and autoharp. She was also one of the first Brazilian musicians to use electric guitar.

In 1988, the British newspaper Daily Mirror revealed that then-Prince Charles admired her song Lança Perfume and considered her his favorite singer.

She won a Latin Grammy in the Best Portuguese Language Album category in 2001, for her album 3001.

With more than 55 million records sold, her songs touched on issues related to feminism and sex in an era when such issues were taboo. Lee was also well known for her animal rights activism and veganism. (Reporting by Steven Grattan; Editing by Bernadette Baum) She was honored with The Latin Recording Academy’s 2022 Lifetime Achievement Award.

"Our most sincere condolences to her family, friends and all lovers of her music. Rest in peace, Rita Lee!," said Manuel Abud CEO of The Latin Recording Academy.

Next Column: May 21, 2023
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Laura Deni

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