Broadway street teams prove their worth in a changing ticketing landscape

Broadway News: Red tights and bowler hats. Buttons that read “Ask Me About Broadway!” Flyers brandishing show logos and discounts. These are the staples of Times Square. For those who work in theater and traverse the crossroads of the world every single day, it can be easy to see these as something to avoid. But the people who make up Broadway street teams, as they’re known, aren’t just bodies in a crowd — they are a crucial piece of Broadway advertising and a driver of ticket sales.

Hollywood’s COVID-19 Safety Protocols Will End on May 12

www.thewrap.com: Thirty months after they were first implemented, it was announced Thursday that Hollywood’s COVID-19 safety protocols will cease after May 11, the same day that the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services will end the federal COVID-19 Public Health Emergency declaration.

When Superheros Need Leather, These ‘Pop Artisans’ Go to Work

The New York Times: Patrick Whitaker and Keir Malem, both 57, founded Whitaker Malem, their leather specialty label, in 1988. They had begun dating a few years earlier, while Mr. Whitaker was studying at Central Saint Martins and fashion students were using discos as much as their college assignments to experiment with style. Nightlife was the social media of the day.

Review Roundup: Olivier Award-Winning LIFE OF PI Opens On Broadway

www.broadwayworld.com: The Olivier Award-winning West End hit Life of Pi is an epic tale of adventure. After a shipwreck in the middle of the Pacific Ocean, a sixteen-year-old boy named Pi survives on a lifeboat with four companions- a hyena, a zebra, an orangutan, and a Royal Bengal tiger. This remarkable story of hope, faith, and perseverance speaks to every generation. Told through incomparable puppetry and exquisite stagecraft, Life of Pi creates a visually breathtaking journey that will leave you filled with awe and joy. Get your tickets now to this thrilling new production.

2023 ASTC-USITT Renovation Challenge

ASTC: In person presentations by four teams of students highlighted the 2023 ASTC – USITT Venue Renovation Challenge. The student presentations took place at the USITT convention in St. Louis. Each of the four teams chose a building on their campus as the subject for renovation. Two projects were existing theatres in need of modernization and two were spaces to be converted to theatrical performance use.

Charlese Antoinette Jones On Becoming A Hollywood Costume Designer

www.okayplayer.com: It’s a freezing day in Brooklyn and Charlese Antoinette Jones is ordering food from Pies ‘n’ Thighs, a go-to fried chicken spot when we meet at the Okayplayer office. Outfitted in a white blouse, white denim pants, and white Maison Margiela Tabi boots (and topped off with a striking white milliner hat), she greets me warmly, fresh off of shooting for close to an hour in our studio space a block away.

Australian Theatre: the heat is on

limelightmagazine.com.au: At the launch of the new national cultural policy earlier this year, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said we must lift the arts beyond the economic debate, and see it as a vital part of Australia’s identity and soul.

Brooklyn's Kings Theatre Dumps Scandal-plagued Ticketmaster

www.ticketnews.com: The harsh spotlight on already unpopular Ticketmaster has cost the Live Nation Entertainment-owned ticketing giant at least one contract, as Kings Theatre in Brooklyn, NY announced it was switching vendors. Kings Theatre announced the change in a posting on the box office portion of its website, where it told customers that as of March 27, all tickets to events at the venue would be handled by ATG Tickets.

Adobe made an AI image generator

The Verge: Adobe is finally launching its own AI image generator. The company is announcing a “family of creative generative AI models” today called Adobe Firefly and releasing the first two tools that take advantage of them. One of the tools works like DALL-E or Midjourney, allowing users to type in a prompt and have an image created in return. The other generates stylized text, kind of like an AI-powered WordArt.

The Complexities and Costs of Our Plastic Addiction

Architect Magazine: Does anyone else remember a 1997 “Plastics Make It Possible” commercial? In a 30-second TV spot, a series of tweens narrate various ways that plastics are helpful: A child on rollerblades notes that plastics in his kneepads saved his patella; a kid who looks vaguely like Jonathan Taylor Thomas is stoked that plastic keeps his soda safe. Another child floats through the air holding a bright orange plastic bag. It ends with a little girl thanking plastics for saving her police–officer dad’s life with a bullet-proof vest. Sort of a dark turn, but you get it. Plastics, they make it possible.

A Well-Intentioned Hell: A Review of “Babel” at Redtwist Theatre

Newcity Stage: It’s a solid idea that drives “Babel,” Jacqueline Goldfinger’s 2020 sci-fi drama now playing at Edgewater’s Redtwist Theatre under the direction of Rinska Carrasco-Prestinary. The playwright posits a future where narcissism—the impulse to exist in the world as a constructed, idealized image rather than an actual, embodied self—is no longer merely a common psychological condition, but instead has become universal and compulsory.

Digital Inequity's Impact on Arts Participation Pt. I

AMT Lab @ CMU: Digital inequity is an issue underscored by the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic. In their Fourteenth Broadband Deployment Report, the FCC found that at the end of 2019, roughly 14.5 million Americans were living in areas without access to high-speed broadband. That same report found that nearly 83% of Americans in rural areas lack access to this speed.

London’s Riverside Studios to enter administration

Theatre | The Guardian: The arts centre, situated on the Thames in west London, is marking its 45th anniversary of operating in Hammersmith but the board of the Riverside Trust charity said that it has filed a notice of intention to appoint administrators.

Tied Up in Bows

seamracer.wordpress.com: We now have a brand new Spring season, and where I live this means it is one of the most confusing times to dress oneself. One week can span all the weather situations – from a warm up that calls for a tornado warning to a brisk windy day or some frosty flurries! Thus, it is a challenge daily to figure out how to appropriately dress for the current meteorological conditions.

Happy songs: these are the musical elements that make us feel good

theconversation.com: Music has a unique power to affect the way people feel and many people use music to enhance or change their mood, channel emotions and for psychological support.

Pittsburgh Opera's 'Il Trovatore': A Smashing Success, Let the Anvils Ring

Entertainment Central Pittsburgh: Given most any season of classic opera, there are both chestnuts and rare, yet tasty morsels to chew on. The more obscure the work, the harder is the job of the critic who must educate his reader. Fortunately for this reviewer, Pittsburgh Opera’s current production of Il Trovatore is a favorite among opera fans who adore Giuseppe Verdi’s best works.

ESG Investing: How Hollywood Courts Wall Street

The Hollywood Reporter: On Spaceship Earth, the famous ride at Walt Disney World’s Epcot Center (it’s the one housed inside the park’s signature geodesic sphere), visitors are transported through humanity’s great achievements, culminating with a projection of the Earth in the vast expanse of space.

Branson Cares 2023 Kickoff Show: Performance to raise money for pediatric wheelchairs

Entertainment | bransontrilakesnews.com: With a successful inaugural year in the books and a new year of fundraising ahead, Branson Cares is celebrating with a special showcase production next month. The Branson Cares 2023 Kickoff Show will take place at 2 p.m. on Sunday, April 2, at the Copeland Branson’s Theater and will feature more than a dozen performances from some of Branson’s biggest names in entertainment.

Following The Action: zactrack Does The Math At The Super Bowl

Live Design Online: Eric Marchwinski, founder and partner at Earlybird Visual, took on the role of lighting programmer and director for the Apple Music Super Bowl LVII Halftime Show at State Farm Stadium, Glendale, AZ. He talked to Live Design about using the zactrack automated tracking system on Rihanna’s spectacular, multi-level Apple Music Super Bowl Halftime Show.

IATSE Survey Finds VFX Workers Lack Health Care and Retirement Plans

Variety: The International Alliance of Theatrical Stage Employees released a survey Wednesday finding that visual effects workers lack access to portable health insurance and retirement plans.

How Edinburgh Fringe Is ‘Like Trying to Put an Elephant in a Suitcase’

Playbill: As Lyndsey Jackson, The Fringe Society’s Deputy Chief Executive puts it, the annual Edinburgh Fringe Festival is “absolutely bonkers.” But another way Jackson continually describes it as is magical. “It’s the size of the festival compared to the size of the city. It’s like trying to put an elephant in a suitcase. Who doesn’t want to see someone attempt to do that, right?” she jokes. Her hands mime trying to pack things into an imaginary bag as she says, “You can’t press it all in tight enough that it doesn’t just explode. It’s an overspill of people and energy and excitement, all wanting to talk about the work that made them laugh or made them quiet, the things they hated… The collective effervescence is quite magical.”

One Approach to Student Engagement in Educational Season Selection

HowlRound Theatre Commons: In 2020, students and faculty grappled with an unprecedented confluence of forces that included COVID-19’s profound impact on the performing arts and the social upheaval centered on issues of systemic racial injustice following the murder of George Floyd. Given this background and their own sense of disenfranchisement in institutional decision-making, theatre students at the University of Michigan (U-M) went on strike and provided a list of demands that centered wellness, Black, Indigenous, people of color (BIPOC) representation in the curriculum, and a student voice in season selection. Students continue to make parallel demands in theatre departments all over the country.

Don’t Miss These Shows At Without Walls Festival 2023

by Noah J Nelson | Mar, 2023 | No Proscenium: The first Without Walls Festival to be produced by the LA Jolla Playhouse on a new annual timeline, the 2023 edition (April 27–30th) is bringing one of the most dynamic immersive & interactive line-ups yet to the decade-old performing arts festival in San Diego. All of it at the The Rady Shell at Jacobs Park™ as part of the Playhouse’s partnerhip with the San Diego Symphony.

For Christine Pedi The Show Goes On, With New Challenges

Observer: Christine Pedi has always said she had a good ear—i.e., an uncanny ability to catch the nuances and inflections of famous females. She honed her skill as an impressionist in the parody revue Forbidden Broadway. Angela, Bernadette and Carol are particular specialties, and, when she tours her Great Dames cabaret act, she adds LuPone, Minnelli and Stritch to the mix.

NLRB Unseals Atlanta Opera Hair and Makeup Artists’ Union Ballots After Two Years, Revealing Unanimous Support

IATSE: The National Labor Relations Board (NLRB) unsealed and counted Atlanta Opera Hair and Makeup Artists’ unionization ballots after the ballots were impounded for nearly two years, Tuesday. The results reveal Atlanta Opera Hair and Makeup artists unanimously supported joining together with the backing of IATSE Local 798.

To launch the new musical ‘Shucked,’ a producer revives an old strategy: preview pricing

Broadway News: Looking at the weekly grosses reported by the Broadway League, one might think “Shucked” was out of luck. In its first week of previews (five performances), the original musical grossed $291,971.50 — the kind of figure that typically indicates a show is not long for this world. But the new musical’s lead producer, Mike Bosner, was prepared for this.

Review: Resilience Is in Style for the Women of ‘Steel Magnolias’

onStage Pittsburgh: Take a trip down South, or at least as far as the O’Reilly Theater, and catch up with the denizens of Steel Magnolias. No matter how familiar you are with these women and their story, Pittsburgh Public Theater’s current production allows audiences to discover new and beautiful moments in this familiar story.

Puppetry’s Moment! An Oscar, Broadway Debut, Museum Blockbuster, String of Festivals

New York Theater: “Guillermo del Toro’s Pinocchio” won an Oscar for Best Animated Feature this month, not the first movie with puppets to win an Oscar – “The Sound of Music” and “The Godfather” both featured puppets, although they got little screen time; “The Muppets” movie won an Oscar in 2012 for Best Original Song, “Man or Muppet” – but arguably the first to win for its puppetry.

How Much Money Do Broadway Actors Make?

Playbill: If you’ve ever wondered how much your favorite Broadway artists earn for the work they do, you’re in luck. Thanks to public standard union contracts, we know what the base salary is for Broadway performers, stage managers, and musicians.

Actors' Equity Ramps Up Social Media Campaign For #UniteTheRoad

www.broadwayworld.com: Actors' Equity has taken to social media along with its membership to pressure The Broadway League to renegotiate agreements relating to the compensation of actors and stage managers on touring contracts.

Actors' Equity Association Launches New Political Action Committee

www.broadwayworld.com: Actors' Equity Association has approved the launch of a political action committee, an independent organization dedicated to advancing the political interests of Equity's members. Last fall, Equity's convention delegates voted overwhelmingly to approve a resolution to create this PAC, which the union's National Council then passed into policy in February.

PlayPenn Announces New Initiatives for Playwrights

AMERICAN THEATRE: PlayPenn has announced the creation of two new programs to expand the organization’s support for playwrights. The Playwrights Cohort at PlayPenn, offered in partnership with the Dramatists Guild, will be a year-long professional development program open to emerging Philadelphia playwrights and will focus on navigating the industry. An existing program called The Foundry will continue to center on the playwright’s artistic growth, while the new Cohort will empower freelance writers to grow as entrepreneurs capable of making savvy business decisions.

Irving Azoff Boasts "The show is over" After Senate Tickets Hearing

www.ticketnews.com: In January, the US Senate Judiciary Committee held public hearings on the ticket market, seemingly committing a bipartisan body slamming Live Nation Entertainment (formerly Ticketmaster and Live Nation) for decreasing competition in the market by controlling venues, tickets and artists, leading many to speculate that it has driven higher ticket prices.

Imagining Creative Fat Futures

HowlRound Theatre Commons: Fat Fables is a performance and creation program for fat LGBT2SQ+ folks age twenty-nine and under. It was conceived in 2019 after Morgan Davis and Jules Vodarek Hunter worked on a show together with The AMY Project and recognized the gaps in arts programming for folks living at the intersection of fatness and queerness. Fat Fables was developed to build community, create opportunities, and make fat LGBT2SQ+ friends.

'A bunch of violent theater nerds': Why some of the Bay Area’s best stories are in wrestling rings

Datebook: When New Japan Pro-Wrestling barreled from Japan into the San Jose Civic to broadcast the pay-per-view “Battle in the Valley,” members of the sold-out crowd already knew who they were rooting for in the ring. Max Chang of San Leandro appreciated the out-and-out villainy of Jay White: “He will do anything to cheat, and he doesn’t care.” His sister, Elizabeth, saw it differently: “He’s a good guy — in his eyes.”

Arts, Entertainment, and Media Unions Launch Updated DEI Policy Priorities for the 118th Congress

IATSE: Unions of professionals in the arts, entertainment, and media industries affiliated with the Department for Professional Employees, AFL-CIO (DPE) announced their updated diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) policy agenda for the 118th Congress, Tuesday. The policy agenda’s legislative priorities are centered around creating diverse talent pipelines, incentivizing diversity in hiring, and strengthening creative professionals’ workplace rights.

Review: New Musical ‘Shantytown’ Shines a Bright Light on a Fascinating Pittsburgher

onStage Pittsburgh: New chapters are being written simultaneously in the Upper Hill District, each emerging from stories with deep Pittsburgh roots. The ongoing story belongs to Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company as it turns 20 and settles into its new home, a 1902 building on the National Register of Historic Places.

'Just Say No' to These 4 Interview Formats

LinkedIn: In our work helping organizations improve their hiring and interviewing processes, we have encountered just about every interview approach you can imagine. Some interview formats are great, some are “innocuous but ineffective,” and some are downright destructive. In this article we will explore four formats that are most concerning, given their widespread use.

Susan Booth ushers in a new day with a new season at the Goodman Theatre

chicago.suntimes.com: The Goodman Theatre today announced its 2023-2024 season, the first one helmed by newly appointed artistic director Susan V. Booth — the first woman to lead the 98-year-old theater. The roster reveals an eclectic mix of topics, from wrestling to opera, and includes work by artists ranging from African American playwrights Pearl Cleage and August Wilson to novelist Margaret Atwood, actress Dana Delany, Goodman resident director Mary Zimmerman and Iranian American playwright Sanaz Toossi.

VFX Workers Want to Unionize: High Risks, Low Wages, Insane Hours

IndieWire: It’s not just cutting corners on the new “Ant-Man” movie. Visual effects workers across the industry, roughly two-thirds to be precise, believe their working conditions are not sustainable due to a severe lack of health care, retirement options, overtime pay, and training in their field.

Review: A Decluttered Doll’s House Speaks to Our Alienated Times

Observer: So yeah: about that exit. If you know anything about A Doll’s House, you know it ends with housewife Nora Helmer leaving her husband Torvald with a defiant door slam. (Those crying spoiler, take it up with your high school.) In the current Broadway version, there’s no front door. Or any door. Instead, Jessica Chastain vamooses through a large portal that opens in the back wall of the Hudson Theatre. Nora steps into waning sunlight (for those at matinees), glances around 45th Street, and heads off—presumably to the M&M’s store. The visible “Museum of Broadway” signage lays it on a bit thick, but you work with what you got.

Generating 3D models and meshes from text prompts? We asked Shutterstock about its team-up with NVIDIA

befores & afters: NVIDIA’s Picasso generative AI cloud service will be relied upon to convert text into high-fidelity 3D content. The idea is, software makers, service providers and enterprises can use Picasso to train NVIDIA Edify foundation models on their proprietary data to build applications that use natural text prompts to create and customize visual content.

The state of Broadway with Charlotte St. Martin: government relations and preparing for the next crisis

Broadway News: As Broadway continues to fight back to its pre-shutdown strength in the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic, an economy rebounding from inflation and the public’s perception of New York City, Broadway News wanted to hear from one of the industry’s few visible leaders — a woman who is often considered the spokesperson for Broadway itself.

Actors' Equity Association and League of Resident Theatres Reach New Five-Year Agreement

www.broadwayworld.com: Actors' Equity Association and the League of Resident Theatres have reached a tentative agreement for a new five-year contract. The agreement remains subject to ratification by both Equity members and LORT members.

What Working on “The Marvelous Mrs. Maisel” Taught Me About the Importance of Eyelines

blog.frame.io: Film school and work experience had taught me that eyelines were simply where an actor looks while acting in a scene. They were most important in a shot/reverse shot: the viewer sees a character looking at an object or a person, and then the film cuts to that object or person from the character’s perspective. If the eyeline is off, the character’s spatial relationship to the object won’t make sense to the viewer.

Never say these 6 things in a job interview

www.fastcompany.com: For most employers, profanity and showing up late are grounds for instant disqualification in an interview. But there are also more subtle ways to raise a red flag in a hiring manager’s mind. Some common phrases that you think might be harmless, or even helpful, can, in fact, make employers question whether you’re really the right person for the job.

Are You Even Here? Or Are You Just Represented?

AMERICAN THEATRE: In a democracy, we take a certain kind of representation for granted: People in elected office are supposed to speak and act on behalf of their constituents. They represent us, and often try to show their qualifications for doing so by empathizing with our concerns and struggles. When we talk about representation in a play, we often ask another question: Is the person onstage appropriate to play this specific character? Both of these representational “acts” hinge on belief and trust.

The Greatest Show on Earth gets a second chance

www.fastcompany.com When the Ringling Bros. and Barnum & Bailey Circus—back after a six-year absence—begins its 50-city tour of North America this September, it will include 75 highly trained performers and a litany of extravagant acts. Tightrope walkers will flit across a triangular rope, 30 feet in the air. Acrobats will launch themselves between four spinning wheels suspended from stadium ceilings. BMX bikers will spring off a giant trampoline. And a 360-degree set studded with massive video screens and enhanced with sonic spatial technology will envelop audiences in the spectacle.

Highlights of the 32nd Annual IADMS Conference

Dance Magazine: Mental health led the conversation at the International Asso­cia­tion for Dance Medicine & Science’s 2022 conference, held at the University of Limerick, in Ireland. The 32nd annual conference was exuberant, with 492 dance medicine specialists, researchers and teaching artists attending in person and an addi­tional 152 participating virtually. Held in a hybrid format for the first time, the international conference returned to being an in-person event after a two-year hiatus due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

DiGiCo and KLANG take centre stage at Night of the Proms

LightSoundJournal.com: A fusion of pop and classical music from the world’s greatest composers, Night of the Proms (NOTP.com) is Europe’s biggest annually organised indoor event. With the 2022 edition including Amy Macdonald, Kool & the Gang, Bart Peeters, Axelle Red and Fine Fleur, the Antwerp Philharmonic Orchestra (AOP) and house band, NotP Backbone, the audio for this complex and demanding show was skilfully executed by a highly experienced team, who have relied on the quality, flexibility and reliability of DiGiCo consoles for many years, along with a KLANG immersive in-ear monitoring system for 2022, all supplied by PRG Belgium.

Dancing Toward Change

AMERICAN THEATRE: Throughout her career as a dancer at some of the best companies in the country, former Metropolitan Opera dancer Morgan McEwen felt undervalued, creatively stifled, and disenfranchised by the sexism, misogyny, and mistreatment she encountered. Like many other women in the field, McEwen was shut out of artistic decisions, typecast for her looks, body-shamed, and sexualized.

Enter stage right: the new wave of musicals taking on the West End adaptations

Musicals | The Guardian: Name a popular TV show or movie from the past few decades and there is a good chance that it’s recently been razzmatazzed into a musical. Bake Off? It’s a musical. Back to the Future? A musical. Groundhog Day? Returning as a musical. The Time Traveler’s Wife? Soon to be a musical. Pretty Woman? A musical, titled Pretty Woman: The Musical. In a sector so jam-packed with safe-bet adaptations of existing media, how can a new, original musical possibly hope to compete?

The 1975 sonically ‘At Their Very Best’ with Eighth Day Sound

LightSoundJournal.com: Touring in support of fifth studio album, ‘Being Funny In A Foreign Language’, The 1975 set the bar for touring ‘At Their Very Best,’ turning to Eighth Day Sound for impeccable service. “We’re collectively trying to make this the best-sounding show in any room that we go into, regardless of whether it’s an acoustically or architecturally challenging one,” says FOH Engineer, Lee McMahon.

Making Then Is Now During a Pandemic with Our Chinese Canadian Feminist Elders

HowlRound Theatre Commons: In February 2020, Keira Loughran and I began a personal community arts project rooted in our own family histories in Toronto’s Chinatown. We wanted to capture stories specifically of the teenagers in Chinatown in the 1940s through 1960s by interviewing the female elders in our families.

Broadway Bodies: A Critical History of Conformity

New York Theater: “This book is dedicated to anyone who has ever been told they were too fat,too short, too gay, too disabled, and otherwise too much or not enough to be in a musical,” Ryan Donovan writes in Broadway Bodies: A Critical History of Conformity (Oxford University Press, 336 Pages) Donovan, a former dancer who tried to increase his chances of being cast by adding an inch to his height on his resume, argues that Broadway and society at large have made insufficient progress at being inclusive, both in representation and in hiring practices.

Two River’s 2 New Leaders: A Sort of Homecoming

AMERICAN THEATRE: Two River Theater in Red Bank, N.J., gets its name from the Navesink and Shrewsbury Rivers on either side of the peninsula it sits on, and apparently the organization likes to do things in twos: It was the site of a major 2012 revival of Topdog/Underdog, starring actual brothers Brandon and Justin Dirden and directed by Suzan-Lori Parks herself; it has produced two Joe Iconis musicals; and the last two shows of the theatre’s current season feature a famous couple (Romeo and Juliet, in an adaptation by Hansol Jung) and the other, Nilo Cruz’s Two Sisters and a Piano.

BACK TO THE FUTURE North American Tour to Launch Summer 2024

www.broadwayworld.com: BACK TO THE FUTURE: The Musical will open its tour at Playhouse Square in Cleveland, OH, in June 2024 and continue to the Belk Theater at Blumenthal Performing Arts Center in Charlotte, NC, in July 2024. The tour will tech and play preview performances at Proctors in Schenectady, NY. Additional tour stops and casting will be announced at a later date.

In This ‘Peter Pan,’ Something Always Goes Awry. That’s the Plan.

The New York Times: On a recent afternoon, the actor Greg Tannahill sat perched atop a London rooftop, one leg extended, one arm outthrust. A pair of carpenters would then whisk Tannahill from his rooftop and into a nursery. And then out of it. And then back in again. A window frame would come free. Tannahill, now jerked upside down, would mewl and scream and clamber down a wall. Once he finally righted himself, the flight harness would wrench him upside-down again.

Reading Blueprints

JLC Online: Blueprints are the complete set of drawings that show what a designer wants a building to look like. These drawings are made to an exact “scale” (a ratio of size; the length of a line on the drawing equals a proportional length on the building) and include dimensions, as well as plenty of detail on material choices and installation directions.

Sound Specialist Glen Marullo Captures the Sounds of The English on Location with Lectrosonics

LightSoundJournal.com: The American Western has been among the most popular genres in movies and TV for as long as there have been movies and TV. The pantheon of stars is long: John Wayne; Tom Mix; Roy Rogers; Emily Blunt … wait, Emily Blunt? Yes, her new, gritty, no-holds-barred-realistic series, Hugo Blunt’s The English, a BBC / Amazon Prime production, stars Blunt as an Englishwoman who comes to the West in 1890 to avenge her son’s death.

The Legendary "Everyone Wins" Nominee Gift Bags Continue Legacy of Celebrating Hollywood's Biggest Night with Fabulous Gifts

www.prnewswire.com/news-releases: Distinctive Assets, the LA-based entertainment marketing company credited with transforming celebrity gifting into a pop culture phenomenon, will yet again be independently producing their legendary "Everyone Wins" Nominee Gift Bags, which have become the most buzzed-about swag in history!

Trading Places: How Actors Go Between the West End and Broadway (Or Not)

Playbill: When productions transfer from the West End to Broadway (or vice versa), the theatre community is often abuzz with speculation as to who will star. Will the original lead replicate their performance to great acclaim? Will a newcomer step in? While the word "transfer" implies a one-to-one comparison, it is exceedingly rare for a full transfer to take place. The majority of transfer productions—such as Leopoldstadt, Bad Cinderella, or Six on Broadway (or Hamilton and Pretty Woman on the West End)—select new cast members for the new market.

Visa fees may be hiked for performing artists traveling to the U.S.

NPR: Traveling to the U.S. could get more expensive for some folks later this year. U.S. Citizenship and Immigration Services has proposed raising the cost of visa applications by some 250%. NPR culture correspondent Anastasia Tsioulcas says while these fee hikes would affect sectors from tech to agriculture, musicians have been among the loudest critics.

Christopher Wheeldon Brings Like Water for Chocolate to the U.S.

www.dancemagazine.com: Christopher Wheeldon has grown into an expert storyteller. After starting out more as a choreographer of abstract neoclassical ballets, the New York City–based Brit has showcased his narrative prowess in ballets like Alice’s Adventures­ in Wonderland, Cinderella and The Winter’s Tale, and on Broadway, in the Tony Award–winning An American in Paris. His latest work is a retelling of Mexican author Laura Esquivel’s magical-realist novel Like Water for Chocolate, portraying the intense­, doomed love between Pedro and Tita, a young woman who pours her unrequited emotions into her cooking.

Disney Layoffs Hit TV Production, Acquisitions Departments

The Hollywood Reporter: Sources tell The Hollywood Reporter that Monday’s layoffs focused production and acquisitions. Among the notable staffers let go Monday are Jayne Bieber, senior vp production at Freeform/Onyx Collective; Mark Levenstein, head of production and postproduction at Hulu; and Elizabeth Newman, head of Disney’s acquisitions department.

Here Lies Love Has Taken All the Orchestra Seats Out of the Broadway Theatre

Playbill: The upcoming Broadway production of Here Lies Love is giving audiences an early look at the Broadway Theatre—which no longer has orchestra seats. Producer and guest star Tony and Olivier winner Lea Salonga and three-time Tony-nominated scenic designer David Korins stopped by the theatre to look at its current transformation into a dance club.

Hansol Jung's Romeo & Juliet Will Transfer Off-Broadway From Two River Theater

Playbill: Hansol Jung's previously announced modern verse translation of Romeo and Juliet will be transferring to Off-Broadway's Classic Stage Company this spring. Not-for-profit Play On Shakespeare has announced the production's transfer from New Jersey's Two River Theater as part of its spring 2023 season.

‘I’ve been spat at’: half of UK theatre staff consider quitting over audience behaviour

Theatre | The Guardian: UK theatre staff have been attacked, sexually harassed and abused by drunken audience members during performances, a new survey has revealed. Front of house staff facing violent assaults, theatregoers urinating in fire exits and mass brawls breaking out in auditoriums were among the incidents uncovered by the report from the Broadcasting, Entertainment, Communications and Theatre union (Bectu).

What's good (and bad) about ‘Bad Cinderella’ at Broadway’s Imperial Theatre

DC Theater Arts: Set in the “exceptionally beautiful kingdom of Belleville” (French for “beautiful city”), Bad Cinderella – the updated reimagined take by Andrew Lloyd Webber (music), Emerald Fennell (book), and David Zippel (lyrics) on the popular folk tale dating back to antiquity, included in the collection of Grimms’ Fairy Tales published in 1812, and adapted for a TV musical by Rodgers and Hammerstein in 1957, based on Charles Perrault’s 1697 French version of the story – has transferred from London’s West End (where its pandemic-delayed run played under the original title Cinderella) to Broadway’s Imperial Theatre, with an adaptation of Fennell’s book by Alexis Scheer, for a limited engagement now scheduled through September 3.