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Stagefright

Nilo Cruz

In celebration of Hispanic Heritage Month, BUA will present a staged reading of the 2003 Pulitzer Prize winning play Anna in the Tropics by Nilo Cruz . Born in Cuba in 1960, Cruz became the first Hispanic American to ever receive the Pulitzer for drama. Directed by Sheila Lopez, and starring Rolando Gomez, Adrian Guadalupe, Andrew Kottler, Sarielys Matos, Victoria Perez, Julian Perez, Rebecca Ward, and Natalie Zawada, the reading will be take place on October 14 at 7:30pm at the BUA Theater.

Prior to that, on October 12 at 8pm, BUA will present The Laramie Project: 10 Years Later. This epilogue to the landmark play will be performed simultaneously at over 100 theaters in all 50 states and internationally in 14 countries. Visit www.laramieproject.org for more details.

The Jewish Repertory Theatre will open its seventh season on October 15 with Rose, the one-woman play by Martin Sherman, starring Christina Rausa, directed by Saul Elkin. The production will run at the Alleyway Theatre through November 1. Rose had a brief run on Broadway in 2000, starring Olympia Dukakis. Sherman is best known for his play Bent. Calling this their “Season for Women,” the JRT’s other show for this season will be From Door to Door (May 13-June 6), starring Sheila McCarthy, Eileen Dugan, and Anne Roaldi.

Road Less Traveled Productions is holding its First Annual 10 Minute Play Contest. The contest is open to playwrights between the ages of 17 and 22 who are currently attending high school or college. Deadline for submissions is December 15, and the winner will be announced on January 9. For further information, check out the company’s Web site at www.roadlesstraveledproductions.org.

Playhouse of American Classics begins its 2009-2010 season with I Remember Mama by John Van Druten, starring Pamela Rose Mangus, Jon Summers, Suzanne Fitzery, and Ryan Berkun as the Hensons, a Norwegian family living in San Francisco in the 1910s. Running November 13-15, the production will also star Keith Elkins, Elaine Fantini, Katy Clancy and Ellen Gallagher. The play was first produced on Broadway in 1944, with Marlon Brando making his Broadway debut as Nels. In 1979 the play was made into a short-lived musical with a score by Richard Rodgers, starring Liv Ullmann as Mama. Later in the season the company will present The Heiress and Morning’s at Seven.

Mackenzie Phillips

And for a somewhat different Christmas offering, you should check out A Christmas Twist coming to the ALT Theater in December, directed by Peter Michael Marino. Described as a “head-on collision” of A Christmas Carol and Oliver Twist, the production will star Tim Newell as Ebenezer Scrooge, and David Butler and Constance McEwen as Mr. and Mrs. Cratchit.

Girls Night, the Musical returns to Shea’s Smith Theatre October 27-November 8. Tickets are now on sale too for the touring production of Fiddler on the Roof which plays Shea’s November 17-22. The production stars Topol (who turned 74 a couple of weeks ago) and is being billed as his “farewell tour.”

It has been a busy week for Mackenzie Phillips with the release of her book High on Arrival. When we met a couple of years ago, she wanted to do something on the stage and was looking for the right project. Well, could a one-woman show be in the works? Carrie Fisher just opened on Broadway with her one-woman play, Wishful Drinking.

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