January 2012
32 posts
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Single Carrot and Everyman Join CENTERSTAGE in... →
Pub Reads on Broadway World…
Interview with Lydia Diamond →
The writer of Stick Fly shares her thoughts on women of color in theater, now and to come.
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FREE pub readings - Martin Mcdonagh plays →
With A Skull in Connemara finishing up tech, we’ve invited local actors from Single Carrot and Everyman (and others) to join us at Liam’s 8pm this Sunday and next, Jan 22 & 29, to read the other two plays from the Leenane trilogy. And yes, it’s free - but your bar tab is your business. So show up at 22 E North Ave in Baltimore for some booze and brogues. Follow the link...
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“I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter which were...”
– ~ from Ralph Waldo Emerson, “Self-Reliance”
Essays: First Series/Self-Reliance - Wikisource
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Suspicion of Stories →
As theater-makers, we are constantly thinking about, battling, embracing, in some way engaging with the recognizable narratives that Mr. Cowen mentions. They are our sworn enemies and our daily bread. Damn them. God love them. What do you think of them?
The Future of Theater? →
Harvard Mag and Robert Brustein wonder if “the play’s still the thing” in a digital age.
The new play stand-off →
Read Olmos’ entire post—prompted by cancellation of his own play—at the link. It’s a widespread conundrum for sure…
“And so there is this disconnect between the people and those that provide for the people; each of them waiting on the other to make some sort of move that will allow them both to get what they want. Specifically in the arts, we have people...
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WatchCENTERSTAGE - BEHIND THE SCENES (by drury bynum)
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WatchCENTERSTAGE patrons talk about their relationship with the theater and recall memories of favorite shows.
CENTERSTAGE - MY CENTERSTAGE (by drury bynum)
Create Baltimore 2 →
“What: CreateBaltimore is a participant-created conference for artists, cultural workers, entrepreneurs, and technologists interested in building a creative community in Baltimore.”
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Liam Flynn's Ale House & the Free "Pub Readings"... →
So says Liam of his newly opened pub:
Liam Flynn’s Ale House is a new public ale house in the Station North Arts & Entertainment District of Baltimore City. Informally known as the Pub or Liam’s, The Ale House has 15 taps. 2 being for locally brewed, cask-conditioned “Real Ale”. We specialize in British Isles Ales, Whiskeys & Ciders. We have a growing range of Scottish beers and English...
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Dramaturgy Defined
A facebook post from our Events Coordinator, Brad Norris:
Kellie Mecleary is a beast! She gave me $10 in support of my Polar Plunge efforts, which is probably like 90% of her hourly wage before taxes. That means Kellie worked her butt off Dramaturging for an hour so she could help out the Special Olympics! And if you don’t know, dramaturging is akin to digging tunnels in solid rock...
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Interview with Steven Sapp of Universes →
Great interview with Steven from Universes ensemble — reflecting on 16 years of collaborative creation.
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Director's blog, SKULL-date 1.10.12
It’s eerie. Sitting in my apartment on Calvert Street in Baltimore, I am rereading a play that I directed 10 years ago, laughing at it again, saddened by it anew, finding new nuance or perhaps the same inflections which are subjected to “halzfheimers,” as CENTERSTAGE’s Associate Artistic Director Gavin Witt calls it.
Si Osborn is back with me to remember that which I don’t, and three new folks...
You've Come a Long Way, Station North →
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Trailers to Tempt the Theatergoer →
How do you make the experience of live theater pop on film in a way that makes a potential ticket buyer say, “I’ve got to see that”? Television commercials are a mainstay, but expensive. Trailers — which can run longer than 15 or 30 seconds and be widely distributed — are increasingly being used to promote theater, but producing them is still a challenge in terms of style, access and cost.
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Theater Mash Up →
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Rethinking the Baltimore Arts Scene →
Our fearless leader Kwame Kwei-Armah joins several other Baltimore arts leaders to talk about where we’re headed.
December 2011
72 posts
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Borges, McDonagh, Everywhere, Nowhere, Everything,...
I posted this Borges short story awhile back, as Borges is a favorite of McDonagh’s, (playwright of A Skull in Connemara, which starts rehearsals next week) and this story is a favorite of mine. I’m re-posting now in order to put it up against a description of McDonagh, which describes the playwright in a way eerily similar to Borges’ description of his subject.
“McDonagh...
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Dance and Science →
We at CENTERSTAGE are thinking about how to collaborate with other disciplines, for richer, more complex conversation and discovery. Looks like we’re not the only ones!
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Something Borrowed . . .Something Blue: New Voices...
If the stage of the Abbey Theatre is seen as the heart of the National theatre, then its Literary Department is very much the pulse. Tucked away on the upper floors of the Abbey Street theatre, the Literary Department is very much a haven for new writers, for new stories and for new voices. Aideen Howard, Literary Director, talks to Barry Houlihan and Writing.ie about the work of the Literary...
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Irish culture and Irish customs - World Cultures... →
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Exhumation of the remains of a deceased person →
Getting ready for the macabre fun that is McDonagh’s A Skull in Connemara, with Irish regulations regarding “Exhumation of the remains of a deceased person.”
Christmas, Pogues style →
Mr. McDonagh’s a fan of this band, and they’ve inspired and influenced his work. Hard to imagine the playwright listening to “Frosty the Snowman,” but maybe he digs this Christmas song. Hope you do too. Merry Christmas!
“We’ve had only one criterion in choosing a play & that is - does it...”
– ~Theresa Helburn, NY Theatre Guild
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“On 30 January 1661, (symbolically the 12th anniversary of the execution of...”
– Now that is some serious payback. And sets a new standard for disposing of formerly buried crania that some of the folks in A Skull in Connemara might want to heed.
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Burials and Ancestors are for the living: two...
“Humans bury not simply to achieve closure and effect a separation from the dead but also and above all to humanize the ground on which they build their worlds and found their histories…[Humanity] is a way of being mortal and relating to the dead. To be human is above all to bury.”
- Robert Pogue...
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The Long Goodbye →
In thinking about the cultural importance of burials around our upcoming production of A Skull in Connemara, I remembered talk of this book by Meghan O’Roarke.
Says Alice Gregory, “The Long Goodbye might be marketed as a memoir and written in an unflinching first-person voice, but it’s just as much a historical account of mourning rituals and a polemic against a society that...
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Padre Pio relatives protest saint’s exhumation →
Exhumation-related controversy in the Catholic community. As in Skull, it’s the Church looking to enact the exhumation and the family protesting.
Be sure to read to the end, or you’ll miss the best part - that is, the reason this guy’s a Saint…
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“It is a melancholy object to those, who walk through this great town, or travel...”
– ~A Modest Proposal, by Dr. Jonathan Swift
Acerbic Dr. Swift. Surely someone who’d find much to relate to in the world and people of McDonagh’s A Skull in Connnemara.
Big Questions →
“…how can we imagine a new future for theater? How will we make art that speaks to the increasingly diverse and fractured communities that make up our cities? What do people want and need now, and what is the role of art?”
-Howlround piece by Deborah Cullinan; click link for more questions and thoughtful speculation.
Poteen rears its potent head in Baltimore →
“Depending on your level of sobriety, potcheen can be your best friend or your worst enemy.”
With the bleak comedy of McDonagh’s A Skull in Connemara starting rehearsal shortly at CENTERSTAGE, here’s a nice mix of local flavors to consider, or sample in tandem.