Events
Applications For Cycle 2 of the Terrence McNally New Works Incubator Are Available
Rattlestick Theatre, the Terrence McNally Foundation, and Tom Kirdahy Productions (TKP) announced today applications for Cycle 2 of the Terrence McNally New Works Incubator.
As a continuation of Terrence McNally’s singular legacy of mentorship, and his commitment to fostering bold new voices in the American theater, the initiative is designed to support ambitious early-career playwrights by giving them time and space to develop their work, professional mentorship with veteran playwrights, and access to the community of artists and work being developed at Rattlestick and Tom Kirdahy Productions. Inaugural fellowships were awarded in 2023 to Molly Herron Bicks, HyoJeong Choi, and Haygen-Brice Walker.
“The Rattlestick’s Terrence McNally Incubator is a peerless program, fostering unique voices by pairing them with like-minded mentors and benefiting them both in the process. The opportunity to then further develop the work in a workshop with top-tier creatives is a dream-come-true for any writer. The Rattlestick has always been a haven for daring new voices and this initiative only furthers that singular aim by cementing the future of ambitious playwriting in a strong and salient way,” notes playwright Halley Feiffer, who serves on the Playwrights Advisory Council for the Incubator.
Applications for Cycle 2 are open now at rattlestick.org and will close January 15, 2024 at 11:59pm (ET), or when 500 applications have been received. Each application is thoughtfully reviewed by a broad reader pool of industry professionals. Semi-finalists and finalists are selected through two rounds of consideration. Finalists are granted an interview with a selection panel, including representatives from Rattlestick and Tom Kirdahy Productions. In consultation with the Playwrights Advisory Council, three playwrights will be awarded the Fellowship in April of 2024. Playwrights Advisory Council members include: Sheila Callaghan, Halley Feiffer, Madeleine George, Mike Lew, donja r. love, Rehana Mirza, and Lynn Nottage.
Each McNally Fellow will receive a one-time stipend of $7,500 to be used as the playwright sees fit to best further their goals.
In consultation with Rattlestick Theater and Tom Kirdahy Productions, each McNally Fellow will be paired with a veteran playwright mentor who will read a minimum of two drafts and offer one-on-one feedback, in addition to attending a workshop rehearsal and/or final presentation subject to their availability.
After the initial mentor meeting, the playwright will revise and develop their play for three weeks. This is time for rigorous thinking, dreaming, and writing outside the constraints of a product-oriented rehearsal space.
In addition to mentor feedback, the playwright will meet with the literary teams at both TKP and Rattlestick to discuss their work and process.
McNally fellows will be invited to participate in a series of Rattlestick events where they will have the opportunity to get to know the teams at TKP and Rattlestick as well as the other McNally Fellows and other industry professionals.
The second part of the incubator will take the form of a developmental workshop culminating in a public presentation.
Core collaborators (director, dramaturg, actors) will be chosen in consultation with the selected playwright, TKP, and Rattlestick and will be compensated for their time.
Founded in 1994 by David van Asselt and Gary Bonasorte, Rattlestick Theater has been steadfast in producing diverse, challenging, and provocative plays while fostering the future voices of the American theater. Now in our 29th year, the company is focused on energetic theater that responds to the complexities of our culture in conversation with community partners. Our mission is to produce ambitious plays to inspire empathy and provoke conversation that will lead to positive social change.
From our historic West Village theater, Rattlestick has produced the first plays and early works of some of today’s leading voices, including Martyna Majok (Ironbound), Diana Oh (mylingerieplay), and Heidi Schreck (There Are No More Big Secrets), and Arturo Luis Soria’s Obie award winning Ni Mi Madre. We are proud to make Rattlestick a place where some of our nation’s most celebrated playwrights feel safe to test their boldest ideas, including Dael Orlandersmith (Until the Flood), José Rivera (Massacre, Sing to Your Children), and Sam Hunter (Lewiston/Clarkston, nominated for the Drama Desk Award for Outstanding Play and the Outer Critics Circle Awards for Outstanding New Off-Broadway Play). Rattlestick provides fellowships to writers through the Van Lier Playwrights Program, the Terrence McNally Incubator Program, the Mellon Foundation’s Playwright-in-Residence Program, and has commissioned new work from numerous writers including Cusi Cram, Mahira Kakkar, Basil Kreimendahl, Dael Orlandersmith, Stacey Rose, Arturo Luis Soria, Cori Thomas, Liba Vaynberg, and Rhiana Yazzie. Rattlestick is also dedicated to supporting immigrant artists through the Global Gab and Global Forms Programs. rattlestick.org
The Terrence McNally Foundation is a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization committed to supporting bold new voices in the American theatre by providing financial and institutional support to early-career playwrights. Created by Terrence McNally and supported through the royalties of his work, the Foundation is also committed to supporting LGBTQ+ causes, as McNally did throughout his life. terrencemcnallyfoundation.org
Tom Kirdahy Productions (TKP) is a Tony and Olivier Award-winning commercial theatrical production company whose projects have spanned Broadway, off-Broadway, the West End, national and international tours. TKP is motivated by a belief in the transformative power of live theatre, and committed to bringing soulful, ambitious, unforgettable work to audiences across the world. With a values-driven approach to commercial producing that centers and empowers artists, TKP has fostered the work of visionary theatre-makers, and continues to develop and produce game-changing projects by some of the most exciting artists in the industry.
TKP is currently producing the Broadway smash-hit Hadestown (eight Tony Awards, including Best Musical) and its national tour; the off-Broadway revival of Little Shop of Horrors (Drama Desk Award, Best Revival); and Here We Are, Stephen Sondheim’s final musical with a book by David Ives and directed by Joe Mantello. Recent productions include the first Broadway revival of August Wilson’s The Piano Lesson (Drama Desk, Best Revival) starring Samuel L. Jackson and directed by LaTanya Richardson Jackson; the new musical New York, New York from legendary songwriting team John Kander and Fred Ebb, featuring additional lyrics by Lin-Manuel Miranda, an original story by David Thompson with Sharon Washington, and direction and choreography by Susan Stroman; and the new play Grey Houseby Levi Holloway, starring Laurie Metcalf, Tatiana Maslany and Paul Sparks, with direction by Joe Mantello.
Select Broadway credits: The Inheritance (four Tony Awards, including Best Play); Terrence McNally’s Frankie & Johnny in the Clair De Lune starring Audra McDonald and Michael Shannon (two Tony nominations, including Best Revival); the global smash hit Anastasia; the box office record-breaking It’s Only A Playstarring Nathan Lane and Matthew Broderick; The Visit starring Chita Rivera (five Tony nominations). Select West End credits: The Inheritance (four Olivier Awards, including Best New Play), The Jungle, Edward Albee’s The Goat, Or Who Is Sylvia? Select off-Broadway credits: the world premiere of The White Chip, The Jungle, White Rabbit Red Rabbit (all of which were NYTimes Critic’s Picks). Additional Tony nominations: Mothers and Sons, After Midnight, Ragtime, Master Class.
Tom Kirdahy, President of TKP, is a recipient of the Robert Whitehead Award for Outstanding Achievement in Commercial Theater Producing; the Miss Lilly Award, a prize in recognition of his advocacy for women in a male-dominated industry; the 2023 Medal of Honor from the Entertainment Community Fund; and an NYU Distinguished Alumni Award. Kirdahy serves on the Broadway League Board of Governors, the Executive Board of Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS, and is a member of the Harry Ransom Center Advisory Council at the University of Texas. As an attorney he spent nearly two decades providing free legal services to people living with HIV/AIDS and served for many years on the Executive Committee of the NYC LGBT Center. Graduate, New York University School of Law, NYU CAS.
G.H. Harding
RYAN O’NEAL — For people of a certain age, Ryan O’Nea’sl portrayal of Harvard-preppy Oliver Barreett IV in 1970’s Love Story – who falls for working-class Radcliffe student Jennifer Cavilleri, was emblazoned forever in their minds. O’Neal passed Friday at 82 and left behind a rather tremendous body of work, from Peyton Place on TV, to Love Story; Paper Moon; Barry Lyndon; The Thief Who Came To Dinner; People I Know (with Al Pacino), The Driver; Irreconcilable Differences; Chances Are (with Robert Downey, Jr.) and What’s Up Doc with Barbra Streisand, on the silver screen. His output was somewhat jiggered. but boy, in each of his roles he showed a storied conviction. When I think about his roles right now, everyone reverberated with me. If you don’t believe me, watch Barry Lyndon again! Just superb!
His off-camera role was that of a wild hellion, perhaps most noted by his wooing and subsequent marriage to Farrah Fawcett, then riding her one-season arc on TV’s Charlie’s Angels. Together they had a son Redmond, who endured through his own personal tragedy.
Along with Warren Beatty, Robert Redford, Kurt Russell, and Burt Reynolds … O’Neal led the pack of leading men in the 70’s. I will miss him for sure. here’s a great tribute in the U.K.’s Guardian:https://www.theguardian.com/film/2023/dec/08/ryan-oneal-actor-tribute-love-story-paper-moon
Steve Hackett
HACKETT’S CIRCUS — (Via Prog) Steve Hackett has shared the first new music from his upcoming studio album, The Circus And The Nightwhale, which will be released through InsideOutMusic on February 16. Watch the new video for People Of The Smoke below.
“My new album kicks off with People Of The Smoke, where we’re thrown back in time to the smokescape of 1950 London,” Hackett tells Prog. “A baby’s scream becomes a steam train, black smoke invades everything and industry rules the day. This is the place where the album’s story begins…”
The Circus And The Nightwhale will be the first full-blown Hackett concept album since his 1975 solo debut Voyage Of The Acolyte, which followed Genesis’s 1974 grand double concept affair The Lamb Lies Down On Broadway.
“The Circus And The Nightwhale is an album with a difference,” Hackett adds. “This time it is a story, based both literally and metaphorically on my life… It’s both faction and fiction, beginning in a gritty world of harsh reality, spinning off into a colourful and dark, weird metaphorical universe of wonder turned to terror, with an ultimately beautiful resolve.”
The album features Hackett’s touring band as well as a raft of guests including Amanda Lehmann and Big Big Train’s Nick D’Virgilio, Hugo Degenhardt return as guests on the drumstool, Benedict Fenner features on keyboards and Malik Mansurov on tar, with Hackett’s brother John once more on flute.
The Circus And The Nightwhale will be available on several different formats, including a limited edition CD and Blu-ray mediabook (including 5.1 Surround Sound and 24-bit high resolution stereo mixes), standard CD jewelcase, gatefold 180g vinyl LP and as digital album.
Here’s the video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x_iujNWzPL0
Micky Dolenz and Nikki Novak at KTLA
SHORT TAKES — Micky Dolenz on KTLA’s Countdown To 2024New Year’s Eve interviewed by Nikki Novak. Here’s Micky and Nikki. Thanks, Kimberly Cornell, for the photo. Speaking of Dolenz, his “Shiny Happy People” recording remains for a fourth week on the UK’s Official Physical Singles Chart, right behind Coldplay’s Xmas single.
Brad LeBeau
Congrats… Brad LeBeau’s forthcoming Teardrops On The Dancefloor doc will include interviews with David Morales; Hex Hector; Maurice Joshua; Dave Aude; David Morales and Nicky Siano … all classic DJ’s … Kevin Costner and Jewel dating? Seems an odd pairing, but that’s why they do call it Hollyweird! … Great article from Ultimate Classic Rock on the much-missed Denny Laine: https://ultimateclassicrock.com/denny-laine-songs/?fbclid=IwAR0FJFlY5IIHcC6wwStnVQV5Azk2aV_FW2laG0do5E08bBb6aTDlWJ-9V1E … Big news coming from Yorkshire Publishing; currently riding high on the charts with Mark Bego’s Joe Cocker tome …
Mark Maron
And: I’m not a huge Mark Maron fan, even though a colleague has been after me for years to listen to him
Lou Adler
so I jumped in this week and listened to a podcast with Lou Adler. Lou Adler: Johnny Rivers; Sam Cooke; Monterey Pip; The Roxy; Carole King; ODE Records …a true legend. Maron was good, but seemed somewhat confused when he discussed Monterey and Herb … Alpert that it. Here’s it is: https://www.wtfpod.com/podcast/episode-1484-lou-adler
NAMES IN THE NEWS — Sam Rubin; Alison Martino; Tobe Becker; Robert Funaro; Milicient Mifficiendo; Steve Walter; Richard Johnson; Jacqueline Boyd; Peter Abraham; Adrian Niles; Jeremy Long; Joel Diamond; Les Schwartz; Tom & Lisa Cuddy; Robert Funaro; Anthony Noto; Adam White; John Weber; Randy Alexander; Jeremy Long; and CHIP!
Chanukah on Ice NYC is back at Wollman Rink, (59th Street) and 6th Avenue, this year! Guests will skate to live Jewish music throughout the night, accompanied by a life-sized dreidel mascot. Attendees will enjoy complimentary hot drinks, delicious food from Famous Pita, and doughnuts.
As part of the effort to maintain the safety of our event, ticket sales are only online and there will be no tickets at the door. Every person will be screened by our security professionals and asked to show ID. Thank you all for your understanding and cooperation! We look forward to safe and fun event for all.
In case of rain or other inclement weather, we will not reschedule Chanukah on Ice NYC, but we will send you a voucher that you can then use to schedule a time to skate at your own discretion.
This year, costs for the rink have gone up dramatically. Pricing is $35 per person.( Under 2 is free). Ticket Sales end on December 11, 11:59 PM Online registration only, no at the door sales this year.
Philanthropist Jean Shafiroff hosted the Celebrating the Art of Style reception at the Hotel Croydon in Miami Beach, FL to celebrate Art Basel Miami 2023. Cocktails and hors d’oeuvres were served as guests, celebrities, and art enthusiasts converged on the South Beach hot spot in celebration of one of the biggest art events of the year. Leading galleries from five continents exhibited significant works by masters of modern and contemporary art, as well as a new generation of emerging stars, at this year’s Art Basel show.
Notable attendees at the reception held at the Hotel Croydon included: Jean Shafiroff, Diane Lieberman, Alan Lieberman, Casey Lieberman, Katya Tolstova, Li Jing, Linda Lewandowski, Meera Ghandi, Sofie Mahlkvist, Miguel Serrano, and Pamela O’Connor.
Pudgy Penguins, the NFT collection-turned-CPG innovator that’s now entering the gaming space, was at Art Basel Miami with a special announcement. The global alpha launch of Pudgy World showcased two new hero characters Pudgy and Peaches. Players will be able to explore an open world, customize their unique penguin characters, and embark on a story-driven journey to save Peaches with their friends. The final version of Pudgy World will be made up of 13 in-game “neighborhoods,” the alpha version will unlock 7, with the final 6 slated for launch later in Q1 2024.
Earlier this year, Pudgy Penguins launched Pudgy Toys, a toy line inspired by the Pudgy Penguins NFT collection that gives royalties to NFT holders. Each toy comes with a QR code that is used to unlock unique traits inside of Pudgy World. Pudgy Penguins inked a deal to be sold in 2,000 Walmart stores across the U.S., a testament to the growing popularity of the Pudgy Penguin brand.
The Art Basel announcement marks Pudgy Penguins’ entry into the gaming space. They are no longer just an NFT company or toy company, and are continuing to innovate and evolve as they head into 2024.
The “Big Bang Theory” actress and Hanukkah ambassador Mayim Bialik new YouTube video breaks down myths and facts about the holiday of lights.
Bialik, known for her role as Dr. Amy Farrah Fowler on “The Big Bang Theory” released this video 4 years ago. This video has earned over 13K million views.
Thought Hanukkah was all about the presents? False. Pajamas, calendars, stickers, socks, chocolate coins and spinning tops are all fair game for gifts but it’s about so much more than presents.
“It’s about finding light in darkness, about facing adversity, it’s about fighting for what you believe,” Bialik explains. These are the real presents of Hanukkah.”
EGEYAPI GLOBAL has officially open their new international headquarters in the heart of Miami’s Design District.
A VIP event hosted by visionary developer Cagri Kanver took place in early December 2023 with notable attendees from the realms of real estate development and the investment community. Powered by Red Connect, which is a real estate development networking event organization, and VV Global Partners for Podcasting, the invite-only list was a bevy of Who’s-Who in the Florida real estate industry.
The event in the 2,000 square foot interior space celebrated the groundbreaking work of EGEYAPI GLOBAL and their revolutionary concept to make the work-life balance something finally achievable. Offering a more sustainable office model that provides a launching pad for consistent high-quality developments, the coveted collection of work byEGEYAPI GLOBALsets an unrivaled level of consumer gratification as displayed in the office building that is replicated after the most comfortable and luxurious home environment.
Positioned in the heart of Miami Design District, the workspace captures the flow of positive energy. Gone are the days of cramped cubicles and sitting in traffic for hours to get to a stuffy building to slave away between 9:00am and 5:00pm.
The business space offers a warm and hospitable atmosphere that thrives off an open-air design concept in a well-positioned home. Elaborate decor is showcased with an expansive creative collection of artworks throughout the property.
Guests attending the event were able to view this visionary space and enjoy live music, thrilling conversations and networking along with award-winning small bites from the design district’s renowned El Turco Turkish Food during this grand soiree.
How To Dance In Ohio Shows How Broadway Musicals Should Be Done
The Glorious Corner
Countdown to Christmas: A New Musical Song Cycle Well-Behaved Women
-
Family1 day agoCountdown to Christmas: Own The Moon
-
Events3 days ago
Happy Chanukah Day 2: Light One Candle With The Carney’s
-
Events1 day ago
Happy Chanukah Day 4 Big Bang Theory’s Mayim Bialik Explains The Holiday
-
Events2 days ago
Happy Chanukah Day 3: Food For Thought
-
Family3 days ago
Countdown to Christmas Day: Map The Song Of Your Life
-
Family2 days ago
Countdown to Christmas Day Our Holiday Gift Guide: A Portable Campfire
-
Off Broadway4 days ago
T2C Talks to Patrick Olson About Emergence
-
Cabaret3 days agoHave You Begun Dreaming of It Yet? (PART I)
