Category Archives: Theatre

Reel Classics with The Rep: PICNIC

Posted on by

Tonight at Laman Library, the Arkansas Repertory Theatre continues “Reel Classics with the Rep.”

Join The Rep for a discussion with The Rep’s Producing Artistic Director, Bob Hupp as he discusses The Rep’s upcoming production of A Loss of Roses by American playwright William Inge.  Following the discussion, Laman Library will screen the 1955 the Academy Award-winning romantic drama “Picnic” starring William Holden and Kim Novak based on the Pulitzer Prize winning play by William Inge.

Reel Classics With The Rep runs the second Monday of every month at Laman Library, 2801 Orange in North Little Rock and is free and open to the public.

Call Laman Library for more details (501) 758-1720.

SPRING AWAKENING at Weekend Theater

Posted on by

Spring Awakening, which won 8 Tony Awards on Broadway, is the next production of the Weekend Theater.  It opens this weekend and runs through July 1.  Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik adapted Frank Wedekind’s 1891 play about the trials, tears, and exhilaration of the teen years. The three central teens are Wendla, the naïve, newly pubescent one, who is struggling with feelings that are foreign to her; Melchior, the intellectual, knows exactly what his feelings are, but is struggling with the unfair amount of power adults possess; and Moritz, the disempowered, is basically struggling with everything and doesn’t know how to relieve the pressure surrounding him.

The cast features Jessica Smith, Garrett Houston, Will Nicholson, Hannah Blackburn-Parish, Justin Holzknecht, Garrett Whitehead, Jhonika Wright, Sarah Richardson, Noah Whitney, Nick Abel, Emily McDow, Lana Hallmark and Tony Spicer.  The production is directed by Ralph Hyman with music direction by Lori Isner.

The performances are at 7:30pm on Friday and Saturday evenings and at 2:30 on Sunday afternoons.

2012 Arkansas New Play Fest

Posted on by

The Arkansas Repertory Theatre presents TheatreSquared’s 2012 Arkansas New Play Fest on Thursday, May 17 and Friday, May 18 at The Oxford American building at 1300 Main Street.

Arkansas New Play Fest features professional staged readings. Each script is rehearsed, staged and performed by professional artists, script in hand, for the public and playwright.

Following each reading, there will be a talk back session with the playwright and the cast.

Thursday, May 17
7 p.m. Uprooted by Clinnesha Dillon Sibley
9 p.m. The Ballad Of Rusty and Roy by Troy And Jonny Schremmer

Friday, May 18
7 p.m. The Spiritualist by Robert Ford
9 p.m. The Football Project by Samuel Brett Williams

Featured Plays

UPROOTED
by Clinnesha Dillon Sibley
A richly drawn treatment of a timeless scenario by an award-winning Arkansas playwright. What happens when long-separated siblings reunite after the death of a parent? When successful film actress Venus Kettle returns to Indianola, Mississippi, to her mother’s “home going,” she is greeted by her sisters with a wide range of emotions, from enthusiastic glee to cold-shoulder resentment. In the meantime the play follows the parallel story of Venus’s brother, who is incarcerated in a facility in Pine Bluff, Arkansas. Uprooted is moving tribute to the redemptive power of family.

THE FOOTBALL PROJECT
by Samuel Brett Williams
November, 1998: a high school football team boarded a bus to travel to play in the state championship game. The entire town came out to see the team off—but the bus never left. One third-string player who played for mere seconds in the previous game forged his grades and caused the team to be disqualified from the championship. The town’s response was unprecedented. There were death threats, thoughts of suicide, vandalism and then a surprising amount of goodwill and even a bit of unexpected heroism. A snapshot of a town in crisis, examining one of the rare places that the ordinary and the epic, the petty and the profound collide: high school football.

THE SPIRITUALIST
by Robert Ford
TheatreSquared Artistic Director Robert Ford brings The Spiritualist back to the Arkansas New Play Festival for a second year of development, adding new revisions and, for the first time, original music. Inspired by true events, this comedic drama introduces Rosemary Dunn, an English widow who cooks for the school lunch service and communes with the spirits of dead composers. When an enterprising American reporter tries to unmask the self-proclaimed psychic as a fraud, he finds there may be more at play than simple musical sleight-of-hand.

THE BALLAD OF RUSTY AND ROY
by Troy and Jonny Schremmer
This new play with live, original music, follows the story of two half-brothers, both musicians with roots in Texas who have found their way to New York City along starkly divergent paths. One has an enthusiastic following on the New York music scene, the other among toddlers at the neighborhood church playgroup where he works. Circumstances reunite the two brothers, but a deeply troubled past involving a boyhood road trip threatens to tear them apart once again. Featuring songs – and performances – by Dusty Brown, who himself has a burgeoning career as a singer-songwriter in New York, an early version of The Ballad of Rusty and Roy was featured at the New York Fringe Festival.

Tickets are $7 per show or $20 for a two-day pass to all four readings.

A…My Name Is Alice @ Weekend Theater

Posted on by

The Weekend Theater’s production of A…My Name Is Alice wraps up this weekend.

The show was conceived by Joan Micklin Silver and Julianne Boyd, with contributions from multiple collaborators. It opens Friday, May 4 and runs on Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays through May 20.  Showtimes are 7:30 p.m. Fridays and Saturdays and 2:30 p.m. Sundays. Tickets are $20 for general admission and $16 for students and seniors age 65 and over.

The cast features area actors Antisha Anderson-Scruggs, Jane Morgan Balgavy, Sarah Scott Blakey, Rachel Hampton, Erin Martinez, Danette Scott Perry, Samantha Porter, and Beth Ross, who will portray various characters in the 20 or so scenes.  When casting the show, director Duane Jackson was looking for women of all ages, sizes, shapes, colors, and life experiences.

While each scene is self-contained, the overarching connection is always the lives of women: the friendships they share, the trials they face, and the joys of sharing this journey of life. Most consist of songs, and there are a couple of monologues, as well as a series of short poems interspersed throughout the show.

Among the scenes are “Sisters,” which details a lifelong sibling rivalry that reaches a bittersweet conclusion. “At My Age” is a duet between a 50-something widow and a teenager, both preparing for long-awaited dates with excitement and trepidation. In “Good Thing I Learned to Dance,” a woman goes from past to present recalling how dancing gave her a sort-of-safe way to let out her inner “bad girl.”

To make reservations or get more information, visit the online ticketing system at http://www.weekendtheater.org; tickets will also be sold at the door on performance days, based on availability. Reservations are no longer accepted by phone, but you can get information about the production by calling (501) 374-3761.

Arkansas Rep’s NEXT TO NORMAL

Posted on by

Deb Lyons in NEXT TO NORMAL. Photo by Dero Sanford

One of the best lines in the American Theatre in the 21st century is “Valium is my favorite color.”

It comes from the musical Next to Normal which opens tomorrow night and runs through May 27 at the Arkansas Repertory Theatre.  In addition to winning the 2010 Pulitzer Prize for Drama (one of the few musicals to nab that prize), it also won three 2009 Tony Awards.

With music by Tom Kitt and a book and lyrics by Brian Yorkey, Next to Normal is a powerful rock musical about a mentally ill suburban mom who struggles with worsening bipolar disorder and the effects that illness has on her family. The Arkansas Rep production is directed by Nicole Capri. The cast features Deb Lyons as Diana — the mother of the family, Jonathan Rayson as her husband Dan, Kristin Parker and Will Holly as their children, Mo Brady as a friend of the family and Peter James Zielinski playing a pair of physicians.  Zielinski was last seen at the Rep in The Full Monty.

Helen Gregory is the Musical Director. Other members of the creative team include Mike Nichols (scenic designer), Shelly Hall (costume designer), Michael J. Eddy (lighting designer), M. Jason Pruzin (sound designer) and Lynda J. Kwallek (properties designer).

In conjunction with this production, there are several special events.

MainStage Sponsorship Night

Tuesday, May 8 | 7 p.m.

Preshow Panel, Foster’s | 6 p.m.

Arkansas Repertory Theatre, 601 Main Street, Little Rock

Chenal Family Therapy has purchased a “Night at The Rep” and will host a MainStage Sponsor Night on Tuesday, May 8. A portion of the ticket sales for this performance will benefit a number of local non-profit ministries in the Little Rock area. Prior to the show, Chenal Family Therapy will host a panel discussion in Foster’s on the overlap of faith and psychology, featuring prominent local therapists, ministers and professors. Tickets are $35 for general admission seating. For more information or to purchase tickets to this night, contact Chenal Family Therapy at (501) 781-2230 or email Events@ChenalTherapy.com.

SIGN INTERPRETATION

Wednesday, May 9 will be sign interpreted for the hearing impaired.

Reel Classics with The Rep: “Who’s Afraid of Virginia Woolf”

Monday, May 14 | 6:00 p.m.
2801 Orange, North Little Rock 

Reel Classics With The Rep runs the second Monday of every month at Laman Library, 2801 Orange in North Little Rock and is free to the public. Call the Laman Library at (501) 758-1720 for more information.

MainStage Sponsorship Night

Tuesday, May 15 | 7 p.m.

Preshow Reception, Rep Lobby | 5:30 p.m.

Conversation with Clinicians after the Performance

Arkansas Repertory Theatre, 601 Main Street, Little Rock

The University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences Psychiatric Research Institute has purchased a “Night at The Rep” and will host a MainStage Sponsor Night on Tuesday, May 15. This event is open to the public. Tickets are $40. For more information or to purchase tickets to this night, contact Cary Wilson at (501) 526-8100 or visit the first floor reception area at the UAMS Psychiatric Research Institute.

MainStage Sponsorship Night

Tuesday, May 22| 7 p.m.

Preshow Reception, Rep Lobby | 6:00 p.m.

Arkansas Repertory Theatre, 601 Main Street, Little Rock

The Arkansas Repertory Theatre’s Young Artist Guild has purchased a “Night at The Rep” and will host a MainStage Sponsor Night on Tuesday, May 22. This event is open to the public. Tickets are $25. For more information or to purchase tickets to this night, contact The Rep Box Office at (501) 378-0405.

Happy 100 to WR

Posted on by

One hundred years ago today, Winthrop Rockefeller was born in New York.  After moving to Arkansas in the early 1950s, he would establish himself as a positive force for the development of the state.

Perhaps his most obvious impact was helping to transform the provincial Little Rock Museum of Fine Arts into the first rate Arkansas Arts Center.  He and his family were generous donors of money and art to this effort.

Through the effort of the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, many cultural institutions have received funds for programming which has reached into every county and every corner of this state.  For instance, one of the Arkansas Symphony Orchestra’s string quartets is the Rockefeller Quartet.

Mr. Rockefeller at the groundbreaking for the Arkansas Arts Center

It is hard to quantify what impact his efforts had on cultural institutions which did not even exist in his lifetime.  Without the elevation of the arts and the understanding of their impact, it is doubtful that endeavors such as the Arkansas Repertory Theatre, Arkansas Opera Theatre (now Wildwood Park for the Arts) and Ballet Arkansas would have had success with donors in their nascent days.

In 2012, a year-long Celebration is planned to highlight the legacy of Winthrop Rockefeller in the state 40 years after he left office as the state’s 37th governor.  His leadership in political, economic, and cultural arenas as well as in his philanthropic endeavors had a significant impact on the development of Arkansas. This celebration is intended to promote an understanding of these accomplishments to an audience that may know little of his deeds as an historical figure or his contributions to the evolution of the state.

Over the next year, the Winthrop Rockefeller Institute, the Winthrop Rockefeller Foundation, Winrock International, the Winthrop Rockefeller Charitable Trust, the University of Arkansas at Little Rock, the Central Arkansas Library System, and the Arkansas Arts Center will celebrate the 100th anniversary of Winthrop Rockefeller’s birth by reaching out from Petit Jean Mountain, the home he created in his adopted state, to the rest of Arkansas and the United States.

This Centennial Celebration will offer a variety of programs that will honor his legacy, bringing it alive to a new generation. These programs will convene some of the nation’s leading thinkers and innovators to explore his contributions and take a contemporary look at the issues about which he cared so deeply. Alongside celebratory events, the Celebration will include an assortment of academic conferences, public forums, art exhibits, and educational programs.

LION, WITCH, WARDROBE at Children’s Theatre

Posted on by

In the same week that Arkansas Arts Center Children’s Theatre alum David Auburn had his latest show open on Broadway, the Children’s Theatre opens the final show of the 2011-2012 season.  The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe will run from April 27 – May 13, 2012.

“The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is the story of four courageous siblings who embark on a wonderful adventure,” said Artistic Director Bradley Anderson. In this Children’s Theatre production, C.S. Lewis’ masterpiece transports your
family to a world of magic and enchantment when siblings Lucy, Susan, Peter and Edmund embark on an epic journey and learn the true meaning of loyalty, courage and sacrifice.

The cast for The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe includes Allison Light as Susan; Will Nicholson as Peter; Lucy Miller as Lucy; Dean Patterson as Edmund; Jimi Brewi as Mr. Tumnus; Vanessa Sterling as White Witch; Josh Rice as Fenris Ulf; Kati Campbell as Mrs. Beaver; Mark Hansen as Mr. Beaver; John Isner as Aslan; Mattingly Bartole and Margaret Lowery as Rabbits; Brooke Melton and August Fitzgerald as Nymphs; Park Lanford, Aaron Eley and Nate Buursma as Wolves; Morgan Maxwell and Rachel Caffey as Two Nyads; Anna Newman and Jacqui Harvey as Dryads; Ashton Brass, Becca Hughes and Jhonika Wright as Foxes; and Wylie Greer and Anna Tess as Squirrels.

The set design is by Keith Smith, technical direction by Jimi Brewi, costume design by Erin Larkin, lighting design by Penelope Poppers and production stage management by Sinovia Mayfield. Lori Isner is the musical director.

Performance times for The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe are Fridays at 7 p.m., Saturdays at 3 p.m. and Sundays at 2 p.m. Single tickets are $14 for adults and $11 for children.

The Lion, The Witch and The Wardrobe is proudly presented by Arkansas Blue Cross Blue Shield and Joshua Kolden. The production is sponsored by the Edmonda and Richard M. Logue, M.D. Marcus Worth Logue Memorial Gift. The media partner for the 2011-2012 Children’s Theatre season is Little Rock Family.

For more information or to purchase tickets, call 501-372-4000 or visit http://www.arkarts.com.