tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-323547312024-03-20T03:30:58.863-04:00Huntington Theatre Company - Join the Conversation!Welcome to the Huntington's blog, where we'll share news, behind-the-scenes stories and backstage goings on with you. You'll hear from Huntington staff as well as actors in our shows and other visiting artists, and we hope we'll hear from you, too, when you'd like to make a comment.Huntington Theatre Companyhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15193527109157651381noreply@blogger.comBlogger637125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-76359077582353790542013-09-30T13:00:00.000-04:002013-09-30T13:00:01.949-04:00THE POWER OF DUFF and the Power of Prayer
“Uniquely comic and unabashedly theatrical, The Power of Duff also pulses with incredible emotional clarity. It tells the transformative story of one man waking up to life, just as it seemed he was too lost and it was too late.”— Peter DuBois
Anthropologist T.M. Luhrman noted in The New York Times that “These days we Americans live not only with political schismogenesis, but also thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-88006358585499859392013-08-22T15:44:00.000-04:002013-08-22T15:44:00.439-04:00THE JUNGLE BOOK Curtain Calls
Name: Akash Chopra
Role: Mowgli
Hometown: New York City, New York
What has been your favorite moment while performing The Jungle Book? Opening night was magical and I will never forget it.
How are you like your character? Mowgli is exciting and like's adventure. He tries different things, and I think I am the same.
Who is your favorite character from thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-4789744519424301752013-08-19T13:06:00.000-04:002013-08-19T13:06:00.191-04:00The Sights & Sounds of India: Re-Imagining THE JUNGLE BOOK
The Jungle Book creative team at the Taj Mahal: TJ Gerkens, Dan Ostling, Ajay Rathore Singh, Leo Chiang, Mara Blumenfeld, and Doug Peck.
When Disney Theatrical Group conceived of a stage version of the classic 1967 film The Jungle Book, they easily could have set out to create a replica of the movie that for decades has captivated generations of children with its celebratory music thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-19262308359359074262013-08-12T12:32:00.000-04:002013-08-12T12:32:00.409-04:00The Music of THE JUNGLE BOOK
“I was blown away by Mary Zimmerman’s transporting and visually stunning production. It immediately reminded me of what I love about her work – her big heart, sophisticated mind, and playful imagination. In this latest creation, she brilliantly interweaves Kipling’s evocative prose with the story of the classic film and marries traditional Indian instruments to its jazzy, instantly thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-87213067708905950362013-08-01T10:30:00.000-04:002013-08-06T09:09:09.229-04:00Maria Aitken Brings Family Fun to THE COCKTAIL HOUR
Our relationship with director Maria Aitken goes back to 2007 with her production of Alfred Hitchcock's The 39 Steps, which moved on to Broadway and ran for nearly 800 performances. Fortunately she appears to reciprocate our love, and we've since brought her back to the Huntington for critically acclaimed productions of Educating Rita (2011), Private Lives and Betrayal thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-25487310472405993362013-07-09T13:32:00.000-04:002013-07-23T14:05:23.923-04:00I Believe In THE POWER OF DUFFThe Power of Duff marks the return of playwright Stephen Belber to the Huntington, following 2005's Carol Mulroney (the first production of ours to feature Johanna Day, who has since become a favorite of many of our audience members). Directed by our fearless leader Peter DuBois, The Power of Duff tells the story of a news anchor in Rochester named Charlie Duff who offers up a thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-58161696913924737012013-06-27T18:51:00.004-04:002013-06-27T18:57:21.216-04:00THE JUNGLE BOOK is coming! THE JUNGLE BOOK is coming!We could not be more excited to welcome Mary Zimmerman back to the Huntington, and what better way to mark her triumphant return than a stage adaptation of The Jungle Book? Some of our subscribers (and staff) still haven't fully recovered from the overwhelming joyfulness of her production of Candide, which kicked off our 30th Anniversary Season in 2011. Mary has spent much of her career thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-37603540274690947042013-06-12T12:28:00.001-04:002013-06-17T10:33:46.967-04:00Hey Remember That Time We Won A Tony Award That Was Totally AwesomeWho's got two thumbs and just won a Tony Award? This Guy. Well, technically, this company, but companies don't really have collective thumbs or anything, so the joke doesn't really work as well.
Still, the point is: We have a Tony Award!
Desiree Pedrami, Thom Dunn,
Solange Garcia, and Catherine
Halpin, outside Radio City
Music Hall
This past Sunday night was an incredibly exciting evening thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-78569863215374902162013-05-22T10:30:00.000-04:002013-05-22T10:30:01.539-04:00On Women & The 'F'-Word (Feminism) #RaptureBlisterBurn
Recently, Lisa Timmel, the Huntington’s director of new work, exchanged emails with playwright Gina Gionfriddo about her play Rapture, Blister, Burn. Their conversation centered around feminism and the eternal bonds and conflicts of mother/daughter relationships.
LT: When you started writing Rapture, Blister, Burn, were you thinking consciously about feminism today?
GG: Actually, I thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-25660612811744134632013-05-15T13:00:00.000-04:002013-05-15T13:00:05.220-04:00The Gina Chronicles #RaptureBlisterBurnFrom Sam Lasman, Literary Professional Intern
When Gina Gionfriddo’s Rapture, Blister, Burn opens in May 2013, three years will have passed since her Becky Shaw appeared on the Huntington stage. After directing Becky Shaw’s premiere, New York, and Huntington productions, Peter DuBois mounted Becky Shaw in London where it was hailed as a comedic bridge between the United States and the United thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-69444733721534899052013-05-14T11:15:00.001-04:002013-05-14T11:15:25.958-04:00Discovering Broadway with AWMC Finalist Iliana Mendez August Wilson Monologue Competition finalist Iliana Mendez, a student at Brighton High School, shares her story about discovering theatre and performing on her first Broadway stage.
Iliana Mendez, center, with Antonio Stroud, Naheem Garcia, and Derek Lindesay
My main goal for this competition wasn't winning (though it would have been a bonus if I did.) After my parents divorced, I rarely getthom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-56850388915965047752013-05-09T11:30:00.000-04:002013-05-09T11:30:02.554-04:00Gearing Up for the Boston Theatre Marathon
From Sam Lasman, Literary Professional Intern
This weekend (May 11 and 12), Boston Playwrights’ Theatre presents the 15th annual Boston Theater Marathon and the associated Warm-Up Laps reading series. The Warm-Up Laps, now in their fourth year, present free, public readings of new plays by area playwrights, and the Marathon showcases ten hours of ten-minute plays by local writers,thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-16338792113947196992013-05-08T11:00:00.000-04:002013-05-08T12:54:38.666-04:00Everything You Wanted To Know About Post-Post-Feminism But Were Afraid To Ask #RaptureBlisterBurnFrom Lisa Timmel, Director of New Work
“Midway upon the journey of our life, I found myself within a forest dark, for the straightforward pathway had been lost.”— Dante's Inferno
“I guess the grass is always greener. It’s just . . . It’s what you said, right? It’s that forty-something thing where you start thinking about the life not lived.”— Gwen, Rapture, Blister, Burn
A popular assumption thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-21003290204956449652013-05-01T10:30:00.000-04:002013-05-02T15:17:44.917-04:00It's Been A WeekSo. It's been a week.
Or technically it's been a lot of weeks but more specifically it's this past week that has been particularly exciting for all of us here at the Huntington -- following, of course, one of the scariest weeks as Bostonians that most of us have ever lived through. But as we continue to heal from that tragedy, perhaps its a confluence of events that has made our own victories thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-9213585978156242382013-04-30T10:30:00.000-04:002013-04-30T10:30:02.365-04:00Meet The August Wilson Monologue Competition FinalistsFrom Alexandra Truppi, Education Manager for Curriculum and Instruction
On Saturday, March 16, students from eleven Boston high schools
competed in the Boston finals of the August Wilson Monologue Competition.
Huntington Teaching Artists worked in residencies in classrooms at each school,
introducing students to August Wilson's life and work and teaching lessons in
acting and text analysis. thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-30522958659862787112013-04-08T14:19:00.000-04:002013-04-08T14:19:47.067-04:00A RAISIN D'Etre, by John J. King
From John J. King, the official "Child Wrangler" for A Raisin In The Sun:
The things I remember about theater I’ve worked on are behind the scenes — you don’t remember the way an audience laughed at a line on the third Friday, but you remember the story someone told in the bathroom between scenes, or the night something went wrong.
It’s been an honor and a privilege just to be in the same thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-19210347687714130862013-04-04T11:30:00.000-04:002013-04-04T11:30:01.211-04:00Super Pal, Super Star: or, The Little Girl In "M" (part 2)From Matt Chapuran, Institutional Giving Manager
To recap from the last post, the Huntington Theatre Company was looking for a kid to appear in a small role in Ryan Landry's "M," a wild new play that riffs on the Fritz Lang German film of the same name that gave us Peter Lorre as an obsessed child killer.
Mr. Landry, on set
A parade of my co-workers exited the conference room where they thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-39023436612095230192013-04-03T14:08:00.000-04:002013-04-03T14:08:56.289-04:00Super Pal, Super Star: or, The Little Girl In "M" (part 1)From Matt Chapuran, Institutional Giving Manager
At the Huntington Theatre Company, we're taking on a wild adaptation of "M," the old German Fritz Lang movie that launched Peter Lorre in the role of a child serial murderer. Although in the hands of its playwright, Ryan Landry (who once wrote a version of Cat on a Hot Tin Roof titled Pussy on the House), it may look a lot different once it thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-69063000513166934712013-03-27T13:16:00.001-04:002013-03-27T13:16:24.873-04:00The Secret History of A RAISIN IN THE SUNFrom Sam Lasman, Literary Professional Intern:
A Raisin in the Sun achieved instant success when it premiered in 1959. However, the titanic reputation of Lorraine Hansberry's masterpiece has obscured the legacy of black playwrights who preceded her. While she was the first black woman to have a play produced on Broadway, and the first black writer honored with the New York Drama Critics Circlethom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-63656175312745404682013-03-15T16:51:00.000-04:002013-03-20T16:52:21.635-04:00Reverse the Curse: A RAISIN IN THE SUN
This past Wednesday night marked a miracle: Liesl Tommy finally opened a Huntington show on schedule. Liesl’s previous two Huntington Openings were canceled –from a huge snowstorm January 5, 2011 (Ruined) and because of the Back Bay Blackout in March 13-14, 2012 (Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom). But the third time is a charm, and A Raisin In The Sun went off without a hitch!
To be fair, thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-28548483734691077052013-03-13T14:06:00.001-04:002013-03-13T15:35:23.435-04:002013 Poetry Out Loud MA State Finals
From Meg O'Brien, Manager of Education Operations
We are thrilled to introduce you to Courtney Stewart, our 2013 Poetry Out Loud Champion. This image, captured by David Marshall at the moment his name was announced as Champion, captures the spirit of the program perfectly.
This past Sunday, 23 students from all across Massachusetts met at the Old South Meeting House in the heart of thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-84830586271175205942013-03-12T11:01:00.002-04:002013-03-12T11:01:58.806-04:00A RAISIN IN THE SUN #Twittermission RoundupThis past Friday night we hosted our second #Twittermission event, encouraging the audience to tweet us questions about the production to be answered by an artist involved the show. We were lucky enough to be joined by Omar Robinson, currently serving as the assistant to Raisin director Liesl Tommy as well as a living triumvirate of man, myth, and legend. Omar has a long history thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-60099447111864042142013-03-06T17:03:00.001-05:002013-03-07T11:47:14.815-05:00A Raisin In The Sun Tech WeekThe cast and crew of our new production of A Raisin In The Sun have been working over the past few weeks to bring Liesl Tommy's fresh new vision of this timeless American classic to the stage. Cast members Keona Welch (Beneatha), LeRoy McClain (Walter Lee), Kimberly Scott (Lena), and Ashley Everage (Ruth) were kind enough to take some time out of their busy rehearsal schedule to share their thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-61807610089432608712013-03-05T15:10:00.000-05:002013-03-05T15:10:00.385-05:00This Friday -- Join the Party with #35Below!
Theatre is one of the oldest human art forms, but somewhere along the way, it developed a stigma as being for “old people.” There’s plenty of sociological and cultural history that can explain this — cost, tradition, increasing accessibility to movies / television, etc — but it’s not the “why” that we’re concerned about. The more important question is, how do we change it? We’ve tried a number thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-32354731.post-87040968912281019392013-02-25T15:58:00.002-05:002013-02-26T13:44:43.609-05:002013 IRNE Award Nominations
Johanna Day in Good People. Photo: T. Charles Erickson
From the IRNE Awards website:
The Independent Reviewers of New England (IRNE) Awards were founded by Beverly Creasey of the Journal Newspapers and Larry Stark of the TheaterMirror in 1997. The IRNE Awards recognize the extraordinary wealth of talent in the Boston theatre community.
The IRNEs are one of the big Boston theatre awards every thom dunnhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/12696350912860421500noreply@blogger.com0