Summer used to be the season for Shakespeare ‘al fresco’ but with the shuttering of the Shakespeare in the Cannery Program last year it seems be in shorter supply these days. Still, interested patrons can find a couple of shows at opposite ends of the North Bay to satiate their seasonal appetite for the Bard.…
The Ross Valley Players conclude their 89th season with a production of Crimes of the Heart, running in Ross through August 11. Beth Henley’s tragicomedy won the 1981 Pulitzer Prize for Drama and was followed by a film adaptation starring Sissy Spacek that nabbed three Oscar nominations. The Magrath sisters have gathered at their grandfather’s…
In comedy, timing is everything and two North Bay theatre companies have timed productions of the same comedy to run concurrently. The Cloverdale Performing Arts Center and SRJC’s Summer Repertory Theatre program are presenting Patrick Barlow’s adaptation of The 39 Steps. Based on the 1915 adventure novel by John Buchan and the 1935 Alfred Hitchcock…
The chances of Legally Blonde showing up on anyone’s list of ‘great American musicals’ are as likely as the chances of a UCLA sorority President with a Bachelor’s Degree in Fashion Merchandising really being admitted to Harvard Law School. Based on the 2001 novel by Amanda Brown and film starring Reese Witherspoon, it’s the…
My guest on the Thursday, July 18 theatre segment on KSRO’s The Drive with Steve Jaxon was David Templeton to discuss the upcoming 10th Anniversary performance of his solo piece Wretch Like Me. Click below to listen: **********
Sonoma Arts Live concludes their “toast to the classics” with a production of My Fair Lady, running now through July 28. Lerner and Loewe’s musical adaptation of George Bernard Shaw’s Pygmalion was a smash hit when it premiered on Broadway in 1956 but modern sensibilities have taken a toll on the tale of a Cockney…
My guests on the Thursday, July 11 theatre segment on KSRO’s The Drive with Steve Jaxon were Jaime Love and Larry Williams from the Sonoma Arts Live production of My Fair Lady. Click below to listen: **********
After a one-year hiatus forced upon them by the renovation of Santa Rosa Junior College’s Burbank Auditorium, the Summer Repertory Theatre program returns with a full schedule of three musicals and two plays running in “rep”. The plays will continue to be performed in Newman Auditorium while the musicals are being done in the SRT…
The Marin Shakespeare Company opens its 30th season with Measure for Measure. The Bard’s take on justice and mercy would seem to be a perfect fit for a company that brings their Shakespeare for Social Justice program to eight California State Prisons. Officially labeled as a comedy, it’s considered by some to be one…
After filmmaker Mel Brooks took Broadway by storm with his musical adaptation of The Producers, he hoped lightning would strike twice with the same approach to Young Frankenstein. It didn’t. Young Frankenstein ran for about 2,000 performances less than its predecessor and while The Producers rang up a total of fifteen Tony nominations (winning a…
North Bay Stage and Screen 