Tag Archive for ‘Paul Green Theatre’
“Clybourne Park” Doesn’t Measure Up
Bruce Norris’s play “Clybourne Park” is usually referred to as a “response” to Lorraine Hansberry’s beautiful “A Raisin in the Sun,” so it seems fitting that Playmaker’s Repertory Company would offer up the two shows in rotating repertory. Viewing the duo in such rapid succession, however, only serves to highlight the flaws in Norris’ version [...]
PlayMakers Rep’s Double Header of “A Raisin in the Sun” and “Clybourne Park” Packs a Wallop
PlayMakers Repertory Company should be commended for pulling off this feat. It’s a brilliant move on the artistic staff’s part to rep these two shows. If you’re an audience member who likes to feel involved in the show they’re watching, then this double-header is for you. The cohesiveness of the casts and the range of their abilities is draw enough to buy a ticket.
PlayMakers Repertory Company Presents “A Raisin in the Sun” and “Clybourne Park” on Jan. 26-March 3
PlayMakers Repertory Company, the University of North Carolina’s professional-theater-in-residence, will ring in the New Year — and help celebrate Black History Month in February — with an invigorating twin bill of “A Raisin in the Sun” (1959) by Lorraine Hansberry and “Clybourne Park” (2010) by Bruce Norris, performed in rotating repertory, on Tuesdays-Sundays, Jan. 26-March 3.
Wonderful Is the Word for “It’s a Wonderful Life”
Wonderful is the word for the current PlayMakers Repertory Company presentation of “It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play” by Connecticut playwright Joe Landry. PRC guest director Nelson T. Eusebio, III and his charismatic cast breathe new life into the familiar story about George Bailey’s Dark Night of the Soul, whose unforgettable characters flicker across television screens not only during the 1946 film’s annual airing in December, but pretty much year-round now.
PlayMakers Rep’s 2012 Holiday Show Is “It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play” by Joe Landry
Next up for PlayMakers Repertory Company is “It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play” by Joe Landry. The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s professional-theater-in-residence will reenact the Christmas-Eve travails of troubled Bedford Falls building-and-loan executive George Bailey on Nov. 28-Dec. 2 and Dec. 4-9 and 11-16 in the Paul Green Theatre in UNC’s Center for Dramatic Art.
PlayMakers Rep’s Premiere of David Ball’s Zany New Adaptation of Molière’s “Imaginary Invalid” Is a Hit
The instant Steven Epp as Molière steps out on the stage of the Paul Green Theatre to introduce the PlayMakers Repertory Company’s brand-new adaptation of the celebrated 17th century French actor and playwright’s 339-year-old play, “The Imaginary Invalid,” to a 21st century audience in Chapel Hill, it is clear that this is no average resurrection of a classic. Instead, Molière becomes a character in his own play; and the present is woven into the production — often hilariously and often erratically, but always with an eye on the original story.
John Logan’s 2010 Tony Award® Winner “Red” Chronicles a Creative Crisis of Painter Mark Rothko
PlayMakers Repertory Company will open its 2012-13 main-stage season with “Red,” 50-year-old American dramatist and screenwriter John Logan’s multiple Tony Award-winning play about Russian-born American abstract expressionist painter Mark Rothko (1903-70), on Sept. 19-23 and 25-30 and Oct. 2-7 in the Paul Green Theatre in the Center for Dramatic Art on the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill campus.
“Urinetown: The Musical” Is a Summer Youth Success
PlayMakers Repertory Company is most commonly known for producing high-quality professional theater in Chapel Hill. But for the past five years, PlayMakers has been conducting a Summer Youth Conservatory program for high-school aged students.
“Urinetown: The Musical” Is a Scathing Satire of Broadway Message Musicals on the Evils of Capitalism
PlayMakers Repertory Company’s Summer Youth Conservatory will perform a student production of “Urinetown: The Musical,” a scathing satire of Broadway message musicals on the evils of Capitalism, on July 19-22 in the Paul Green Theatre in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Center for Dramatic Art. A splendid musical satire with a terrible title, “Urinetown” features lively music by Mark Hollmann, biting lyrics by Hollmann and Greg Kotis, and an acerbic book by Kotis.
Things Go Happily Awry in “Noises Off” at PlayMakers
PlayMakers Repertory Company’s production of English playwright and screenwriter Michael Frayn’s backstage comedy Noises Off, now showing in the Paul Green Theater in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Center for Dramatic Art, is an inside joke that pokes fun at a hapless fifth-rate theater company’s increasingly desperate attempts to get a sixth-rate [...]
Michael Frayn’s Fast and Furious Backstage Sex Comedy “Noises Off” Sends the Sardines Flying
PlayMakers Repertory Company will conclude its 2011-12 main-stage season with “Noises Off,” English playwright Michael Frayn’s zany 1982 backstage comedy, performed at a breakneck pace with plenty of slapstick, including flying sardines, on April 4-22 in the Paul Green Theatre in the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s Center for Dramatic Art.
Michael Winters as the Knave Falstaff Trumps Two Kings — Henry IV and Henry V — at PlayMakers Rep
PlayMakers Repertory Company guest artist Michael Winters of the “Gilmore Girls” television series plays that uproarious roly-poly rascal Sir John Falstaff, boon companion and surrogate father to Prince Hal (guest artist Shawn Fagan), with such gusto that his larger-than-life characterization of the knave in the two-part historical drama “The Making of a King: ‘Henry IV’ and ‘Henry V’” trumps those of the two English kings — Henry IV (portrayed with an icy imperial demeanor by PRC mainstay Jeffrey Blair Cornell) and his all-too-human son and successor Henry V (Shawn Fagan as a grown-up and newly clean and sober Prince Hal).
PRC’s Joseph Haj and Mike Donahue Will Co-direct “The Making of a King: ‘Henry IV’ and ‘Henry V’”
PlayMakers Repertory Company producing artistic director Joseph Haj and freelance director Mike Donahue, based in New York City, will co-direct an ambitious epic Shakespearean production called “The Making of a King: ‘Henry IV’ & ‘Henry V’” — two historical dramas performed in rotating repertory — from Jan. 28th to March 4th on the thrust stage of the 500-seat Paul Green Theatre.
PlayMakers’ Stellar Cast Juggles Truth and Illusion in Edward Albee’s “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”
The stellar four-person cast of the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill’s professional-theater-in-residence explores the essential Truths and Illusions of life in Academia, at a backwater New England college, while two professors and their wives who get together for a nightcap after a faculty party hurl verbal hand grenades at each other.
PlayMakers Mainstays Ray Dooley and Julie Fishell Will Star in “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?”
PlayMakers Repertory Company mainstays Ray Dooley and Julie Fishell will exchange verbal brickbats as George and Martha in PRC’s provocative production of prize-winning New York playwright Edward Albee’s epic R-rated 1962 Battle of the Sexes, “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf?,” on Nov. 30-Dec. 18 in the Paul Green Theatre at UNC-Chapel Hill.
“The Parchman Hour” Is an Episodic But Eloquent 50th-Anniversary Tribute to the 1961 Freedom Riders
“The Parchman Hour” by Mike Wiley is an eloquent tribute on the 50th anniversary of the Freedom Rides; but it lacks the focus and intensity of Wiley’s wonderful one-man shows, such as “Dar He: The Story of Emmett Till” and “One Noble Journey.”
PlayMakers Repertory Company Will Stage the World Premiere of “The Parchman Hour” by Mike Wiley
PlayMakers Repertory Company will present world premiere of The Parchman Hour: The Songs and Stories of the ’61 Freedom Riders, a stirring docudrama with music written and directed by Mike Wiley, on Oct. 26-30 and Nov. 1-6 and 8-13 in the Paul Green Theatre in the University of North Carolina’s Center for Dramatic Art. According [...]
Good Vibrations: PlayMakers’ “In the Next Room” Hits the G-Spot — When “G” Stands for Guffaw
“In the Next Room (or the vibrator play)” is an inspired marriage of a vintage Victorian melodrama and a contemporary British sex farce. This R-rated presentation, which includes a short scene of male nudity, really hits the G-Spot — when “G” stands for guffaw.
“In the Next Room (or the vibrator play)” Writhes and Wriggles with Life
It’s hard to imagine that a play centering around the use of vibrators could be anything other than a bawdy laugh-fest, but PlayMakers Repertory Company’s production of Sarah Ruhl’s In the Next Room (or the vibrator play) proves surprisingly deep and sensitive. Dancing around topics as diverse and serious as what it means to be [...]
Sarah Ruhl’s “In the Next Room (or the vibrator play)” Is a 2010 Tony Award® and Pulitzer Prize Nominee
“‘In the Next Room’ is a combination of hysterical sex farce, a delicate and life-affirming Chekhov play, and an Ibsen drama written from a very personal, female voice,” claims PlayMakers Rep guest director Vivienne Benesch. “And there are wonderful characters to unearth, a great story, and even a beautiful coups de théâtre (which I won’t give away!)”
“Angels in America” Soars at PlayMakers
These eyebrow-raising plays are truly magnificent pieces of contemporary theater; and a luminous PRC cast and brilliant PlayMakers‘ guest director Brendon Fox and his unusually imaginative and resourceful creative team have nailed it (pun intended) on scenic designer Narelle Sissons’ splendid wood-paneled set, which is chock-full of secret compartments, surprises, and delights.
PRC Presents Both Parts of “Angels in America”
“[Although 'Angels in America'] deals with profound ideas of what we owe to ourselves and to each other,” says PRC guest director Brendon Fox, “[playwright Tony] Kushner is also a great entertainer. He leavens the intensity with wit, the pain with warmth. It promises to be a roller-coaster brimming with ideas, laughter, and humanity.”
“Shipwrecked! An Entertainment” Is a Swashbuckling Show by Pulitzer Prize Winner Donald Margulies
PRC guest director Tom Quaintance explains, “Donald Margulies wrote a play that is a celebration of theatricality. I have long felt that if something could be done as well on television or film, then I wasn’t interested in directing it on stage — ‘Shipwrecked! An Entertainment’ is a play that revels in that aesthetic, and I love it.”
PRC Star Charlie Robinson Captures Every Tic and Twitch of Troy Maxson in “Fences” by August Wilson
PlayMakers Repertory Company headliner Charlie Robinson tackles the thorny role of Troy Maxson with brio in the current PRC presentation of August Wilson’s prize-winning play, “Fences.” Robinson captures every tic and twitch of Troy’s prickly personality — the sunny smiles and the sulfurous glares — in a bravura performance that will surely catapult this PRC powerful production onto many Raleigh, Durham, and Chapel Hill 2010 top-10 lists.
“DROOD — THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD” | July 22-25
“The show is incredibly fun to watch and perform. [DROOD] is based on Charles Dickens’ unfinished novel THE MYSTERY OF EDWIN DROOD. [It was] The first mystery Dickens ever wrote, and he died before revealing the mystery!
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