🎭Troupes ponder future of Pittsburgh theater

wesa.fm: For the roughly 200 actors, playwrights and other behind-the-scenes talent who gathered at the O’Reilly Theater for a Theater Artists Town Hall on the matter this past Monday, stage work is their passion and their livelihood. One attendee told me before the event he expected “fireworks.”

Production Futures launches 24|7 global online community platform

TPi: In support of its aim to increase knowledge and accessibility in the sector, Production Futures has just launched its eagerly anticipated global online community platform.

Remembering Lavina Jadhwani 1983–2025

Chicago Reader: avina Jadhwani built what was by any measure an admirable career on Chicago stages and beyond. Locally, she directed for a range of companies large and small, including Silk Road Rising (now Silk Road Cultural Center), Writers Theatre, Oak Park Festival Theatre, and Rasaka Theatre Company. Nationally, her productions could be seen at Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Asolo Repertory Theatre in Florida, and the Guthrie Theater in Minneapolis. Her adaptation of Charles Dickens’s A Christmas Carol also graced the Guthrie stage every year starting in 2021 and returns this season.

How Can Theatre Fandoms Be Less Toxic

OnStage Blog: Let’s get real. Theatre fandoms are some of the most passionate groups you’ll find anywhere. We obsess over every note, every costume detail, every twist and turn in the story. That kind of passion is awesome. But sometimes it goes sideways and turns into straight-up toxicity. When that happens, what should be fun ends up full of drama.

At Geffen Playhouse's 'Witch,' laughing women get a scolding

Los Angeles Times: “Witch” begins with Maura Tierney facing downstage and speaking directly to the Geffen Playhouse audience, some of whom are seated not more than 2 feet away. She is playing Elizabeth Sawyer, the town’s outcast, whom the devil assumes will be an ideal customer for his offer: Why not get a little revenge on the residents who’ve wronged you for years — in exchange for your soul?

Flirting with the Taboo at the Cairo Festival for Contemporary & Experimental Theatre

HowlRound Theatre Commons: We are driving out of the parking lot of El Gomhoureya Theatre in downtown Cairo. It’s 9:55 p.m. on the 18th of September, day nine of the Cairo International Festival for Contemporary & Experimental Theatre (CIFCET). My dad had decided to join me at the last performance of the evening, a Moroccan adaptation of Jean Genet’s 1947 one-act play, The Maids, by Iraqi director Jawad Al-Asaadi. In this production of the Genet classic, the tension is high as the two maids (Jalila Al-Talmasi and Rajaa Khirmaz) take turns pretending to be their mistress. Their relationship oscillates frantically from beat to beat: one minute, one of them sadistically attempts to choke the other to death; the next, they straddle each other, discussing the mistress’s last sexual encounter. It’s undeniably homoerotic.

Stars and Spectators on How Theatre Has Changed Their Lives

Theatre Development Fund – TDF: It's been a year of celebrations at TDF: Our not-for-profit organization turned 50, our Times Square TKTS Booth turned 45 and October 16 is the 10th anniversary of our iconic "red steps." (They don't look a day over nine.) To mark these milestones, we asked the most devoted theatre lovers in town, our TDF Stages readers, to share their favorite TKTS moments and they did not disappoint. We've compiled 10 amazing memories that will spark nostalgia or envy, depending on which legendary productions you were lucky (or old) enough to have seen. A few poignant recollections may even make you teary-eyed and serve as potent reminders that sometimes, seeing a show can be a life-changing experience.

How Chicago Is Changing Theater, One Storefront at a Time

The New York Times: I was taking a tour of the Den, a warren of performance spaces carved out of a row of former furniture and clothing stores, when one of my guides opened a door to what I felt sure was a broom closet.

Wrong! It was another performance space. Inside, crews from WildClaw Theater were preparing the tiny black box for that evening’s offering, a play called “Second Skin” that local reviews had called eerie and creepy.

Those were compliments; WildClaw’s aim is to “bring the world of horror to the stage.”

5 Theatres You Need to Know: Asian-American Companies in NYC

Theatre Development Fund – TDF: Did you see Crazy Rich Asians and think, "I want to see more Asian stories." You're in luck! New York City has multiple Asian-American troupes dedicated to mounting shows about -- and starring -- Asian-Americans. Here are five Asian-American theatres you need to know

Theatre's Part in the Quest to Save Public Land

HowlRound Theatre Commons: My organization, Notch Theatre Company, seeks to engage communities that our brick and mortar theatres are not reaching—connecting in their neighborhoods, in their language, and around the issues that matter to them. Our nation seems stalled in an ever-polarizing inability to engage in productive dialogue, and I believe this requires us artists and cultural workers to find ways of being in proximity to communities with which we might not normally interact. This includes bringing the theatre experience to geographically marginalized and rural communities.

Michael Kahn's successor named: London visionary director Simon Godwin

DC Theatre Scene: The Shakespeare Theatre Company has ended its nearly year-long hunt for Artistic Director Michael Kahn’s successor with the appointment of London’s National Theatre Associate Director Simon Godwin, the company announced yesterday.

Five Grounding Techniques to Cultivate Resilient Ensembles

HowlRound: In 2008, I began creating performances about sexual violence. Following the final dress of the first performance in 2008, a member of the ensemble raised his hand and exclaimed, “I feel like shit.” He went on to discuss how the show was starting to influence his life outside of the rehearsal space. Other performers shared they had nightmares about being raped or reaching out to help someone in trouble only to see their hands turn to dust. I came to find out later, they were exhibiting signs of secondary trauma stress or vicarious trauma—something that happens when people take on others’ traumatic experiences.

Theatre Is a Part of Community!

Footlights: There is no short supply of great theatre in Los Angeles. Better than great, brilliant! Earth shaking, soul transforming, awe inspiring theatre! I’m not just talking about Hamilton. Nor is it limited to The Center Theatre Group, The Geffen, or the other regional theaters here is southern California. Los Angeles is home to somewhere around 300 intimate theatre companies. And while many of these produce great theatre there are a dozen or so that consistently produce exceptional world class theatre.