Apply to Be 1 of B’way’s Young Professionals

Backstage: Applications are now being accepted for the 58-member Young Professional and Student Programs in “The Loft” as a part of TEDxBroadway.

Chiwetel Ejiofor on Hollywood diversity

Business Insider: British actor Chiwetel Ejiofor, 38, had been a steadily working character actor for most of his career until he scored the lead in 2013’s “12 Years a Slave,” and shifted higher up the Hollywood food chain as his powerful performance led to a Best Actor Oscar nomination.

Since then, he's had a major role in the fall hit “The Martian,” and he co-stars opposite Julia Roberts in the upcoming thriller “Secret in Their Eyes” (in theaters November 20). He’s also currently shooting the upcoming Marvel adaptation “Doctor Strange,” in which he plays the evil Baron Mordo.

Top Ten Musicals for Stellar High School Drama Clubs

Breaking Character: Here at Samuel French, we know better than anyone that the high school drama club musical is a Big Deal. So how do you choose the right one?

Maybe a guitar-shredding rock musical? What about a cult-classic movie turned musical? Or a show with an emotional score that will leave the audience wanting more? The following are part of a curated list of the some of the best musicals for any high school.

A new “Happy Birthday” boss? Charity claims it owns famous song’s copyright

Ars Technica: In September, a judge ruled that music licensor Warner-Chappell doesn't own the copyright to "Happy Birthday." The question now seems to have become who does?

A charity called the Association for Childhood Education International (ACEI) has now stepped forward to say that if Warner loses the copyright, it should become the rightful owner. Earlier this week, ACEI filed court papers (PDF) asking to intervene in the copyright dispute.

TEDxBroadway Announces Young Professional and Student Programs 2016

Breaking Character: When the fifth annual TEDxBroadway returns Monday, February 22, 2016 to New World Stages in New York City, so too will the Young Professional and Student Programs in “The Loft.” The organizers of the one-day event that asks “What is the Best Broadway Can Be?” invite the next generation to help shape the future of Broadway.

Systemic Change in Hollywood: So What Do We Do Now?

Women and Hollywood: Earlier this week, Reese Witherspoon spoke at the Glamour Women of the Year event, and in her fantastic, passionate, feminist speech, she talked about why she started Pacific Standard, her production company. Witherspoon talked about how she would see scripts on a regular basis, and the common theme for the female characters was that they were always asking the men in times of need, "What do we do now?" That is her most hated line, she said, because it suggests that women don't have agency in their own lives. That they constantly need to be saved by men. That they can't save themselves or others.

Noah's Ark religious attraction to open in July in Kentucky

Business | Kentucky.com: Construction of a Noah's Ark attraction in northern Kentucky is sailing along, and the builders say it will open next year.

Answers in Genesis, the Christian ministry leading the project, announced Thursday that the attraction will open to visitors July 7.

Clarion University forced to cancel play over actors’ race

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette: Student actors and the stage crew at Clarion University arrived Tuesday evening for one of the final rehearsals before next week’s campus opening of “Jesus in India” only to learn the off-Broadway production they had spent months on had been canceled.

The reason they were given was race: theirs.

Three of the five characters in the production are Indian, but on the mostly white state university campus, two of those characters were to be played by white student actors and a third was being portrayed by a mixed-race student.

One Way for Nonprofit Theatre to Go National: Via the Small Screen

AMERICAN THEATRE: It all began when John Fox sat next to John Guare at a gala. The television producer and the playwright got to talking about the dearth of theatre on television, and why that was in a world where technology is constantly advancing.

“It just started this idea in my head,” explains Fox, who serves as an executive producer for “Onstage In America.” The new series aims to nationally broadcast regional productions at nonprofit theatres, and the pilot, a filmed version of San Diego Repertory Theatre’s production of Greg Kallares’s Honky, aired on Friday, Nov. 6 on PBS. The show is still awaiting a series order.

Why The Count Matters

Breaking Character: The Count is an ongoing study that asks the question, “Who Is Being Produced In American Theaters?” It is presented here for the first time using three years of data from productions in regional theaters in America. As you will learn later, only 22% of those productions were written by women. This means that if life worked like the theater, 4 out of 5 things you had ever heard would have been said by men. That means you would have missed a lot, given the kinds of things you learn from women. And why are we missing the voices of women in the theater? There is one simple answer: artistic directors and producers choose not to present their plays. Our task from here on is to determine how best to change the way people make the choices that silence the voices of women.

A Visit to the Strange, Secretive World of David Bowie’s ‘Lazarus’

The New York Times: “Lazarus,” which begins performances on Wednesday, Nov. 18, and opens on Dec. 7, is one of the most anticipated works of the fall season and easily the most closely guarded. Few details have emerged, but the involvement of David Bowie, who has composed several original songs, revamped old ones and written the book with the Irish playwright Enda Walsh, guaranteed avid interest.

Training to Become a Fall ‘Pro’ Is a Never-Ending Journey

Occupational Health & Safety: Gravity doesn't need to go to school. She is a master at pulling all objects toward the center of our blue planet and has been doing so since the dawn of time. So, yep, she is the grand master. Whereas we mere mortals are still learning how to counter her effects. Part of our learning is how to protect our workers at height from falling into her grasp. And OSHA recognizes we are still learning and thus requires employers to provide appropriate training to protect their workers at height—as well as from the grand master's constant grip.

Live Sound: In Profile: Riley Vasquez

Pro Sound Web: Riley Vasquez has deep roots in the music business and production work. The grandson of Bill Hardin, founder of Bill Hardin Music stores, he grew up in Georgia surrounded by instruments, gear and musicians, and with a foundation in church production, he quickly learned the ropes and discovered a passion for mixing live shows at front of house.

Big-Budget TV Show Threatening To Leave Pittsburgh If Pa. Budget Stalemate Continues

CBS Pittsburgh: Some fear the budget stalemate in Harrisburg could end up costing Pittsburgh thousands of jobs and millions of dollars in revenue.

Pittsburgh has been called “Hollywood East” because of the movies and TV shows filmed here in recent years. Each one creates jobs and pumps money into the economy.

Mike Bartlett Turns to Shakespeare to Voice His ‘King Charles III’

The New York Times: How do you write a play about the British royal family without making its members seem risible, banal or irrelevant? Except for Queen Elizabeth, who orbits in her own special universe, today’s royals often appear to be trapped in a dreary reality show whose ostensible dramas (Who did Kate wear? What did Charles say?) are anything but dramatic.

Community Spotlight: Josh Ruben

EdTA - Educational Theatre Association: One of the main goals for our Theatre Education Community is to help theatre students and professionals from all over connect and identify with each other in order to build resources and support the theatre education field. We shine a spotlight on a different member every other week by conducting a simple interview.

Our latest Spotlight Member is Josh Ruben, a high school Thespian troupe director and the Fine Arts Head at Northwest Whitfield High School, Troupe 7290, in Tunnel Hill, Georgia. Josh has earned his Bronze Most Valuable Member ribbon for regularly contributing his thoughtful and intelligent advice to our Community.

You're Not As Creative As You Think

Money Talking - WNYC: Everyone can be a creative genius. Right?

In the workplace, that's a dangerous proposition, according to Tomas Chamorro-Premuzic, CEO of Hogan Assessments and professor of Business Psychology at University College London. Describing an article he wrote for the Harvard Business Review, Chamorro told Money Talking host Charlie Herman that to some degree, creativity levels are hard to change. And that's a good thing.

"Most people, as much as they may not like hearing this, have average creativity," he said.

Former Colonial Theatre Owner Calls Emerson Administration “Mindless”

Luner on Theatre: We’re headed back to Boston today as we continue our coverage on Emerson College and it’s plan to destroy the historic Colonial Theatre continues. While the Boston theatre community, Tony Award winning producers and artists as well as students and faculty continue to speak out against the plan, no new agenda or blue prints for the historic playhouse have come forward. While many worry about the theater’s future, more leaders continue to speak up and against the current plans.

Why is so much of design school a waste of time?

Dear Design Student — Medium: So here’s the secret that I didn’t put into practice until after I graduated: you’re a gold miner, not a customer, and if you don’t get good at mining for gold, you will never be a good designer. Especially once you make it past the first year or two of working, you spend less time wrestling with making things and more time listening to people in person, on the phone, in slack, in texts, in email, pretty much everywhere where they can find you. They are redundant, inarticulate, inefficient, vague, and inconsistent, and they are constantly going on and on about something. And god bless them.

Shakespeare 400 arts festival will make Chicago all the world's stage

Chicago Tribune: In celebration of the 400th anniversary of the death of William Shakespeare, Chicago will host a huge interdisciplinary arts festival in 2016, dubbed "Shakespeare 400." Led by the Chicago Shakespeare Theater, the extravaganza will encompass more than 60 local and about a dozen international cultural organizations and entrepreneurs, ranging from the Royal Shakespeare Company of Stratford-upon-Avon to the Lyric Opera of Chicago, the Shanghai Peking Opera to the Joffrey Ballet, and from the Pushkin Theatre of Moscow to celebrity chefs and restaurateurs like Rick Bayless and Alpana Singh.

Directors, diversity and TV: The directors speak out

Variety: For a long time, I thought, “I’m never going to go with the excuse that being a woman makes any difference.” But what that meant was, I internalized it if anything went wrong. I would think it was my fault. I would just think, “I screwed up,” even if everyone was happy with my work and it was only something I noticed. But now, the last few years, I’ve had many male crew members tell me, “They treat you differently. If a man had made that suggestion they would have acted on it. They treat you worse.”

Cindy Holland of Netflix talks diversity and diversity

Variety: Over the last year or two, Netflix corporately has been talking much more about diversity than we have historically in the past. Not just with an eye toward diversity in Silicon Valley, but certainly here in our own offices in Los Angeles. We like to extend our entire corporate culture to the producing teams that we work with, whether it be our “freedom and responsibility” culture, or our commitment to diversity.

TV Directors and Diversity: Julie Plec, Greg Berlanti Speak

Variety: What’s funny is, I was always certain that I couldn’t be a director because there are things about the physics of camera and lighting that I fundamentally cannot wrap my head around. And so I thought, “Well, if I can’t be great at every aspect of that job, then why would I do it?”

‘Homeland’s’ Lesli Linka Glatter on TV Diversity: Nothing’s Changed

Variety: One thing I heard from a woman of color director who has directed an indie feature — she can’t get representation, she can’t get her first TV directing job. I talked to a few who said similar things — that it’s hard to see someone who hasn’t done a feature or who has done less than them getting opportunities to direct.

‘Empire’ showrunner Ilene Chaiken on her diverse TV director roster

Variety: Most of “Empire’s” directors were African-American and female in season 1. Can you talk about how you got there? Because “Empire’s” stats are basically the opposite of how most shows’ stats look.

Two Shows High Schools Should Avoid Performing

OnStage: With the school year underway, it's a great time to see the incredible talent that's being fostered in our schools with their annual musicals. It's always fantastic to see schools take on bold and challenging work. But there is a point where things can go too far.

Here are two musicals that should not be gracing high school stages for a variety of reasons ranging from content to messages within the shows themselves.

Charity Pops Up Claiming That It Holds The Copyright On Happy Birthday

Techdirt: It ain't over yet, folks. While many in the press went on and on back in September that the song "Happy Birthday" had been declared in the "public domain," as we pointed out, that's not what the judge said. He only said that the Summy Co. did not hold the copyright, because it seemed clear from a lawsuit back in the 1940s that the Hill Sisters (who sorta wrote the song -- long story) only assigned the rights to the music and not the lyrics -- and everyone agrees the music is now in the public domain. As we pointed out, this actually made the song an "orphan work", which created a new kind of mess, and as we noted, it was entirely possible that a third party could now make a claim to holding the copyright -- though we thought it was unlikely.

Oh, how naive of us.

Nine Green-Product Databases for Architects, Specifiers, and Consumers

Architect Magazine: Green-product databases can be a boon when you’re working on a sustainable design project, but not all are created equal. Some are incomplete or lack rigor while others may be outdated or defunct. Determining what’s useful is not always easy. To get you started, here are nine resources that are still going strong.

Independent Contractors and the American Theatre

HowlRound: Very early in my career, I accepted a summer job with a large producing organization. Happy to be working, I didn’t mind that the compensation totaled less than $100 per week. I assumed it was the cost of “getting my foot in the door” and was still young and idealistic enough to not mind living on beans and rice. Several months later, navigating the world of income tax for the first time, I received a tax form from this organization unlike the W-2’s I had received from my other employers: IRS Form 1099-MISC. Mystified, I turned to tax preparation software and plugged in all of the endless data required.

Hollywood Gender Pay Gap: Women Wage War on Inequality

Variety: Kathy Griffin was an unknown comedic actress when she landed her breakout role on NBC’s 1996 sitcom “Suddenly Susan.” But three seasons in, she discovered a sobering truth after grilling her co-stars about their wages. “I had the second-lowest salary on the cast,” she says. “Judd Nelson made four times what I made, and he ended up getting fired.” When her agents balked at securing her a pay hike, she marched up to the office of Warner Bros. TV chief Peter Roth to demand a raise. “It was an all-out brawl,” says Griffin, who wrote down a number on a napkin and slid it over to Roth, channeling a used-car salesman. “I got a raise,” she says. “I still didn’t make equal to what the guys were making.”

Women’s Voices Theater Festival: A Weekend in the Emerald City

HowlRound: Was it Oz? Well, it took me about as long to recover from my weekend in DC as I imagine it took Dorothy to settle back in to Kansas. I was on a theatre high for weeks after a visit to see as much of the Women’s Voices Theater Festival as I could over three days—which is actually not much given that forty-eight women have new plays in this festival.

What You Can Learn From Cynthia Nixon's Creative Process

www.fastcompany.com: Cynthia Nixon may have played a seminal character on HBO's Sex and the City for six years, but a résumè full of serious onscreen roles—as well as experience directing for the stage—have helped make her a bona fide storyteller.

Nixon plays a seriously ill mother in the critically acclaimed film James White, which premiered earlier this year at Sundance and will hit theaters November 13. Steve—the off-Broadway play she's directing—opens November 18.

From the Fast Company Innovation Festival stage in New York City on Monday, Nixon shared how she translates her own experiences into ultra-authentic performances—and manages to leave work behind to live a real life.

First look at new Cincy Shakes theater

www.cincinnati.com: An application for the Historic Conservation Board reveals the first look at the proposed new Over-the-Rhine home for the Cincinnati Shakespeare Company.

The company presented an application for a Certificate of Appropriateness and zoning variance from the Historic Conservation Board Monday afternoon, where the design was approved. More details of the plans will be revealed next week.

Reese Witherspoon and female-led movies

Business Insider: While giving her speech at Glamour's Women of the Year Awards Monday, actress and producer Reese Witherspoon put a spotlight on female-driven movies.

"Female-driven films work," she said at the event, according to The Hollywood Reporter. "Films with women at the center are not a public-service project, they are a big-time, bottom-line-enhancing, money-making commodity."

And she has first-hand experience that it's true.

Sandra Bullock on Hollywood Sexism, Her Career Worst Experience

Variety: As part of this week’s cover story on income disparity for women in Hollywood, Sandra Bullock spoke to Variety about the first time she became aware that she was being treated differently at work because of her gender. As Bullock recalled, it was on the set of a movie she made 10 years ago, which she didn’t name. :”It was the worst experience I ever had,” Bullock said.

The tech of the Jabba the Hutt puppet

Business Insider: One of the big factors Star Wars fans cite when explaining why the “old” films are better than the more recent prequels is the loss of the charming practical effects, anchored by old-school puppets. Puppets like Yoda set the tone for the series, and were an integral part of its soul.

The creation of Star Wars' puppets was helmed by visual effects wizard Phil Tippett, who won Oscars for “Return of the Jedi” and “Jurassic Park.”

California’s Fair Pay Act: Will it Make the Difference for Women?

Variety: California Gov. Jerry Brown recently signed one of the country’s strongest equal pay laws — a measure that gained momentum after Patricia Arquette talked about gender pay disparity in her Oscar speech.

But there are doubts as to how the law will apply to the entertainment industry, particularly compensation for top-tier stars. There is also a question of how studios and production companies will defend themselves if hit with litigation.

A Musical Envisions the Impossible

The Leonard Lopate Show - WNYC: Cesar Alvarez and Sarah Benson discuss their new musical, "Futurity." Alvarez wrote the lyrics and book, and co-wrote the music with his band, The Lips, while Benson, the artistic director of the Soho Rep, directed. The play revolves around Julian, a Civil War soldier dreaming of a technological utopia, and Ada, a mathematical genius thousands of miles away. Together, they're going to invent a machine to end one of the darkest periods in our history.

The White Version of MLK in 'The Mountaintop'

The Root: “I remember he had the prettiest skin I had ever seen. Flawless. So chocolate you could see yourself reflected in it,” Carrie Hall, my mother, recounted wistfully. On March 28, 1968, she had caught a glimpse of Martin Luther King Jr. when he came to Memphis, Tenn., to lead a march for sanitation workers. It quickly descended into a police-provoked riot fueled by tear gas and bullets. My mother remembers fleeing for her life to the safety of her home, mere blocks from the Lorraine Motel. Seven days later, King would be murdered at that very motel, a sniper’s bullet piercing his flawless brown skin.

Pinterest Unveils New Image Search

www.fastcompany.com: Pinterest is making big changes to its search functionality that involve machine learning and image recognition techniques. In a blog post, engineering manager Kevin Jing unveiled what the company calls their "Crazy-fun new visual search tool," which lets users of the company’s mobile app search for aspects of individual pictures.

Infographic: Hollywood Sexism On Screen, Behind the Camera

Women and Hollywood

Operatic Analytics

AMT Lab @ CMU: It is easy to see the ways that the production and consumption of opera have changed to match the needs of the 21st century consumer. However, it is difficult to identify similar changes reflected in the way that opera is managed.

Since the 1980s, the opera industry has seen a significant increase in attempts to “modernize” opera--hoping to increase ticket sales by breaking from the traditional productions that have been seen for hundreds of years.

George Takei Debuts On Broadway In 'Allegiance'

NPR: George Takei has, over the years, lent his gently charismatic presence to many stages — the original Star Trek soundstage, where he played the USS Enterprise's Mr. Sulu, then the social media stage, where he emerged as a leading activist for gay and lesbian rights. Now, Takei is making his Broadway stage debut in Allegiance, a musical inspired by his childhood experience in Japanese-American internment camps during World War II.

SeaWorld intends to replace Shamu show with a new orca experience in 2017

SanDiegoUnionTribune.com: SeaWorld, in a move to rebuild its brand and combat declining attendance, will phase out its traditional Shamu show in San Diego and replace it with one that is less about tricks and more about orcas' natural behaviors in the wild.

Contender – Costume Designer Sandy Powell, Carol

Below the Line: Had Todd Haynes’s film Carol been made when it was first developed 15 years ago, it would have been a very different looking film. Based on The Price of Salt, a 1952 semi-autobiographical novel by Patricia Highsmith, Carol owes much of its aesthetic, richly interpreted by Haynes in 16 mm, to the New York street photography of Vivian Maier, an unknown until her vast collection of negatives was discovered in 2007.

Genres Ripe for Women of Color Protagonists

The Clyde Fitch Report: Lately, we’ve been starting to see more women of color in lead roles on television. There’s Viola Davis as the beautifully messy Annalise Keating on ABC’s noirish legal drama How To Get Away With Murder. There’s Nicole Beharie as Abbie Mills on Fox’s supernatural investigation show Sleepy Hollow. There’s Taraji P. Henson, also on Fox, playing Cookie Lyon on the quasi-Shakespearean hip-hop drama Empire. There’s also Meagan Good on Fox’s Minority Report and Priyanka Chopra on ABC’s Quantico. Not to mention Mindy Kaling on The Mindy Project. (The irony of so much diversity on Fox is not lost on me.) I’m sure there are more that I’m not listing here, but I’m sure you get the picture.

Cirque Goes Cruising Again, with MSC Cruises

www.cirquefascination.com: MSC Cruises — the Geneva, Switzerland-based global cruise line — today announced a long-term partnership with Cirque du Soleil — the Quebec-based world leader in artistic entertainment — that will set new standards in live entertainment at sea. In a first at sea, brand new Cirque du Soleil shows will be created exclusively for MSC Cruises guests aboard the cruise line’s next-generation Meraviglia ships in a multi-million dollar, ground-breaking entertainment and dining venue, designed in collaboration by MSC Cruises and Cirque du Soleil.

Transform search terms into textiles with Print All Over Me

www.dezeen.com: Google data and mouse movements become customisable textile patterns in Print All Over Me's fashion collaboration with artist Lia and studio Sosolimited.

The story behind NYC's only backlot

Business Insider: The Kaufman Astoria Studios are located in the Astoria neighborhood of Queens, about a 20-minute subway ride from Times Square, and they're one of the biggest and most complex production centers along the East Coast.

Why I Will Never Produce Another All-Female Outdoor Show Again

HowlRound: This summer, my company Maiden Phoenix Theatre Company produced an all- female version of The Winter’s Tale by William Shakespeare. The production was free to all and produced in a local city park. And after that experience I know one thing for sure: I am never producing another outdoor all-female show again. Ever. And neither should you.

Let me explain.

'Thanks Ray', a Stop-Motion Tribute to Ray Harryhausen

Tested: From director Payton Curtis, "A stop motion tribute to the legendary special effects master, Ray Harryhausen. Ray's creations and imagination had an immense influence on my early life. Unfortunately, Ray passed away on May 7th 2013

O Be Careful, Little Eyes, What You See: Combatting Censorship as a Christian Theatre Artist

HowlRound: Acclaimed actress and acting teacher Stella Adler wrote in The Art of Acting: “The theatre was created to tell people the truth about life and the social situation.” Theatre artists utilize the stage in a pursuit for truth¾the truth of the human condition, of existence, of the realities, triumphs, tragedies, and perhaps, the iniquities of life. Playwrights, directors, and designers use theatre to create worlds, teach lessons, and most importantly, to tell stories. Actors bring these stories to life, manifesting redemption or justifying its absence. Nevertheless, theatre always invokes a response, be it visceral or cerebral, hopeful or hopeless.

Black Lives Matter, Ferguson, and Troy Davis: Writing about a Moving Target

HowlRound: In 2011, when Troy Davis was executed for the murder of white police officer Mark McPhail, the protests stretched from New York to Morocco to Paris. After the execution, Synchronicity Theatre commissioned me to write a play about race and justice as seen through the lens of the Troy Davis case. The commission asked that all current, particularly conflicting, perspectives be presented equally. Beyond Reasonable Doubt: The Troy Davis Project is the result of that commission.

SketchUp for Woodworkers

www.popularwoodworking.com: So what is SketchUp and why should woodworkers use it? Simply put, SketchUp is a 3D sketching, modeling, rendering and design documentation tool. However, SketchUp is much more powerful than this simple description implies. SketchUp derives its name for a task it does quite well, drawing sketches.

First Look at the Ghost in the Shell Theatrical Play

kotaku.com: While the Hollywood Ghost in the Shell movie with Scarlett Johansson lurches forward, a new GiTS stage play recently opened in Tokyo.

It’s called Ghost in the Shell Arise: Ghost is Alive. It’s totally official, and the poster looks totally terrific

Accounting for Media in the Production Schedule—Part 2

HowlRound: Depending on the type of design, the look may come together more in the theatre, than in finished assets delivered before tech. So, as the master scheduler, you need to know your production. Is the media design mainly about creating pre-recorded movies? If it is, firsts, seconds, and finals are more reasonable to require. However, please note it is extremely rare that a pre-recorded movie is not tweaked somehow during tech. I can’t remember the last time I made a movie and it was in the final form without any changes after the finals due date before tech.

It's More Than Just the Show

Dimmer Beach: I don’t care how bad ass any of you think you are when it comes to a show, it doesn’t mean you will get every gig. There is more to gigging than the gig itself. Numerous factors come into play when forming a crew, so let’s take a few minutes and look at some of the factors when people look to build a crew.

Pittsburgh Public Theater's 'Servant' serves up 'sunshine and shenanigans'

TribLIVE: “A Servant to Two Masters” has been entertaining audiences since the 16th century, when it was a staple of commedia dell'arte troupes.

These mask-wearing street performers, who invented slapstick comedy, were known for generating big laughs with their broad characters, improvised plots, gags, satire and lots of physical comedy.

The Business of Show Biz: Costume Fitting Etiquette for Actors

Theatre Bay Area: Maybe the answer is obvious to others, but I’m not sure how I’m supposed to interact with costume designers when I go in for a fitting. I don’t know when (or whether) I should voice my opinion about what they are fitting on me. I know they want to me to say I like it, but what if I don’t? Also, are there certain things that actors are expected to bring with them, or expected to do? The whole thing is often just awkward and embarrassing. Is there professional etiquette for costume fittings?

"I Was Fed Up" — The 180-Degree Decision to Stage Shakespeare With Only Women

Playbill.com: Phyllida Lloyd, director of the all-female Henry IV playing St. Ann's Warehouse, reveals the moment she decided to disrupt the status quo by casting a Shakespeare play completely with women and how female prisoners can relate to Margaret Thatcher and Hillary Clinton.

Georgia's Film Industry Faces Major Film Crew Shortage

www.projectcasting.com: According to the report, producers were asked last year about the number and quality of Georgia’s film and TV workers. About 50% of producers were unable to hire all the workers they needed to work on their productions locally.

Why is talking about race so hard?

HowlRound: I thought I was writing a simple holiday play for young audiences, the story of a young homesick girl who misses her mom and fights with her grandmother over the politically incorrect holiday character Zwarte Piet, or “Black Pete.” I didn't realize I had touched the third rail of American theatre: blackface.

Review: Pittsburgh Opera's 'Cosi fan tutte' delights

TribLIVE: Smart staging and effective musical performances are wed in Pittsburgh Opera's delightful production of Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart's “Cosi fan tutte,” which began a run of four performances Nov. 7 at the Benedum Center, Downtown.

All Eyes on Me (whether I like it or not): Tourette Syndrome in the Theatre

HowlRound: At this point, most of us have heard plenty about the event at a recent performance of the Broadway production of The King and I, in which an audience member began making loud noises, which prompted those around him to rally against the boy’s mother and yell for him to be removed. The actor onstage, Kelvin Moon Loh, who posted the much-viewed Facebook post describing the event, determined that the boy had Autism and denounced the audience’s close-minded behavior. It was exciting to witness his defense of the mother and son and the ensuing support as his message went viral.

Everything I Love Is Problematic

The Mary Sue: Everything I love is problematic, I’m realizing. Star Wars and Harry Potter don’t have enough diversity. Every person in the comedy group Monty Python is a white man. Pitch Perfect 2, Mean Girls, and Family Guy have jokes that are offensive to many groups of people. Bill Cosby, H.P. Lovecraft, and Marion Zimmer Bradley were not good people. I can’t wear my Jayne hat without worrying a little hate will leak into my ears through that adorable pompon. In short, just like people, no media is perfect.

Schools of the Stars: Where Allegiance Cast and Creators Went to College

Playbill.com: What does it take to write, create or star in a Broadway musical? Hard work, talent, luck—all backed up by a good education. You have to supply the first three yourself, but PlaybillEDU™ can help you find the fourth.

NFTRW Weekly Top Five

Here are the top five comment generating posts of the past week:

Is Working For Free Ever Worth It?

The [Legal] Artist: For years I’ve advocated to anyone who’d listen that unpaid work is tantamount to a slap in the face; that experience and exposure aren’t sufficient compensation for people whose livelihoods depend on their art. Three years ago I said:

“[B]eing paid for your work is a statement about your worth to yourself and to the project. Directors, producers, and publishers don't work for free; neither should you.”

Posted by David at 33 comments here

What We Owe the MythBusters

NYTimes.com: WHEN the reality TV show “MythBusters” debuted on the Discovery Channel in 2003, its producers weren’t on a mission to transform science and education in America. They just wanted to entertain. In each episode, the hosts would try to debunk or confirm a few classic urban legends. Could a penny dropped off the Empire State Building really kill a person? Could eating a poppy-seed bagel actually make you test positive for heroin? The producers cast two San Francisco-based special-effects artists, Jamie Hyneman and Adam Savage, as hosts. The show was a surprise hit — pulling in as many as 20 million viewers a season — and it helped changed our culture.

Posted by David at 28 comments here

How to tell good acting from bad acting

Business Insider: If anyone tells you there are objective standards, they're full of s--t. This is a matter of personal taste. There are trends. There are many people who loved Philip Seymour Hoffman's acting. But if you don't, you're not wrong. At worst, you're eccentric.

Posted by David at 20 comments here

Negotiating a pay rise: what I wish Jennifer Lawrence had known

Women in Leadership | The Guardian: US actress Jennifer Lawrence penned an insightful essay this week which included her thoughts as to why she was paid less than her American Hustle co-stars. What stood out was that she knows she didn’t negotiate as hard as she could for fear of being labelled difficult or unlikeable, fears that her well-paid male co-stars clearly did not suffer from.

Posted by David at 17 comments here

Public Theater Adds Transgender-Themed Musical to Season

The New York Times: The Public Theater is adding a musical about a transgender group of friends to its winter schedule, and putting out a direct call for transgender actors to audition.

The prestigious Off Broadway nonprofit said Thursday that it would stage a production of “Southern Comfort,” a musicalization of a 2001 documentary of the same name, which tells the story of Robert Eads, who transitioned from female to male, was diagnosed with ovarian cancer, had trouble finding medical treatment and relied on friends for community as he died.

Posted by David at 16 comments here