Author Archives: Christopher Arnott

Two separate readers sent me two separate theater news items regarding Long Wharf Theatre Associate Artistic Director Eric Ting. One is about Berkeley Rep’s elaborate new new-works development extravaganza, The Ground Floor, which will encompass 13 workshop projects in a single month. Eric Ting received one of dozens of Ground Floor residencies, and he’ll be … Continue reading »

Netflix thinks I’ll like Macbeth because it knows I like Monty Python’s Flying Circus. But it doesn’t mention, say, Strindberg in the context of me liking Bergman. What does Monty Python have to do with Shakespeare? Well, John cleese appeared in a TV production of The Taming of the Shrew, and the Python show was … Continue reading »

Barry McGuire (a veteran of the original Broadway production of Hair) played Peter in this 1978 musical by Jimmy & Carol Owens, about the resurrection of Jesus. So does that make McGuire’s solo ’60s hit “The Eve of Destruction” a second-coming riff? The whole freakin’ Witness soundtrack can be found on YouTube. The Jimmy & … Continue reading »

From an excellent anthology of F.B. Opper’s century-old Happy Hooligan comic strips, published by NBM’s Forever Nuts Classic Screwball Strips series and edited by Jeffrey Lindenblatt.

The Irish Literary Landscape from International Festival of Arts & on Vimeo. Arts & Ideas got into the podcast game a couple of years ago, releasing audio versions of various lectures and discussions held during recent festivals. Having just announced its 2012 festival, A&I recently posted two new podcasts with content from last year’s event, … Continue reading »

We did a five-minute rendition of Menaechmi, with eight kids aged 6 to 12. It was our second Plautus; one of the first Play in a Day projects was The Haunted House. Above is a four-second outtake where co-narrator Rosie has forgotten that she’s supposed to be talking in gibberish. The complete five-minute production is … Continue reading »

What we need in the American theater is more impulse decisions like in panel two of this story from Veronica comics #145 (December 2003). The story is scripted by Kathleen Webb, pencilled by Dan Parent and inked by Jon D’Agostino.  

Bell, Book and Candle began previews at Hartford Stage last night. The same production, with the same cast and designers, just left the Long Wharf Theatre, where it ran March 7-April 1. Before that, the same director, one of the actors, and the set and lighting designers did Bell, Book and Candle in 2007 at … Continue reading »

I know, I know. Education stories are so fascinating. But here’s another one. I posted yesterday that Long Wharf Theatre’s a finalist for a $10,000 check earmarked for theater education programs, from the National Corporate Theatre Fund. Today, the same theater’s announced that it’s getting $224,500 from the Werth Family Foundation to “fund the development … Continue reading »

Can’t let the Yale Rep production of The Winter’s Tale close without praising its program notes, which match the upbeat silliness of the show’s best Bohemian scenes and also offer sober refelction on a famously difficult text. The program includes several pages of a parody travel guide leading readers through the fantastical Shakespearean countries of … Continue reading »