With a youthful cast under Michael Baron’s direction comes a highly satisfying Oklahoma premiere. In the much-lauded Spring Awakening, Steven Sater and Duncan Sheik have adapted Frank Wedekind’s 1891 German tragedy about teenage angst and sexual awakening into a musical. Employing contemporary slang and combining the 19th-century setting with a rock score, the show attempts […]
theater
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Shine on
Melanie Marnich’s docudrama These Shining Lives is meant to be taken both literally and figuratively: Women whose jobs literally cause their bodies to glow from radium poisoning provide shining examples of lives nonetheless well lived. Based on actual events and people, the play takes place between 1922 and 1938 in Chicago and Ottawa, Ill. Catherine […]
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Sex ed
An entire category of theater instruction exists to coach actors in what may or may not come naturally. Ironically, techniques used in stage combat apply to intimate scenes. Tonia Sina Ellis, adjunct professor at the University of Oklahoma’s drama school, specializes in choreographing sexual intimacy for the stage. She wrote her master’s of fine arts […]
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Spring fling
Set aside the electronic gadgets and the technological advances, and you’ll see that the modern-day teenager isn’t too different from a 19th-century one. And Spring Awakening, showing at the Lyric at the Plaza, is a Tony Awardwinning musical that explores the enduring theme of young love. Awakening is the adaptation of a 1891 play written […]
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‘Immortal’ engagement
One of my memories that is most dear includes the blasting of “Bad” and dancing around the kitchen while baking cookies with my mother. While I’m aware that everyone has their own opinions on the King of Pop, I always have been and always will be a fan. So when I heard about Cirque du […]
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‘Strange’ and ‘Normal’
At a time when some theater companies hunker down with old musicals and tired comedies, Guthrie’s Pollard brought us a rousing, bluesy “Passing Strange.” During the show, I kept thinking, “This is fresh!” It featured an excellent ensemble cast (led by W. Jerome Stevenson and Gerrin Mitchell), sharp staging (Timothy Stewart) and smart choreography (Christopher […]
Posted inArts & Culture
‘Strange’ and ‘Normal’
At a time when some theater companies hunker down with old musicals and tired comedies, Guthrie’s Pollard brought us a rousing, bluesy “Passing Strange.” During the show, I kept thinking, “This is fresh!” It featured an excellent ensemble cast (led by W. Jerome Stevenson and Gerrin Mitchell), sharp staging (Timothy Stewart) and smart choreography (Christopher […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Collective endeavor
Co-founders Daniel Leeman Smith, Rick Foresee and Robyn Mitchell met while working on Ghostlight Theatre Club’s “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” earlier this year and discovered they shared a similar vision for theater performance and education. “We talked about what was missing in the community and about what theater should be,” said Smith. “We […]
Posted inArts & Culture
Collective endeavor
Co-founders Daniel Leeman Smith, Rick Foresee and Robyn Mitchell met while working on Ghostlight Theatre Club’s “The Last Days of Judas Iscariot” earlier this year and discovered they shared a similar vision for theater performance and education. “We talked about what was missing in the community and about what theater should be,” said Smith. “We […]
Posted inArts & Culture
‘Coat’ of charms
From Andrew Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, the biblically inspired “Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dreamcoat” is a family-friendly musical opening Friday at Sooner Theatre about the Old Testament story of Joseph and, yes, his coat of many colors. The favorite son and prone to prophetic dreams, Joseph is sold into slavery as a boy […]