by Mark G. Auerbach
Harriet Harris
The Skin of Our Teeth Opens Berkshire Theatre Group’s Fitzpatrick Main Stage Season
Berkshire Theatre Group opens its Fitzpatrick Main Stage season in Stockbridge with Thornton Wilder’s award-winning epic comedic drama, The Skin of Our Teeth, July 11-August 3. David Auburn, author of Proof and Lost Lake, directs. The cast features Harriet Harris, a Tony Award winning area favorite, who starred in last season’s Sister Mary Ignatius Explains it All For You, heads the cast along with Lynnette Freeman, who starred in Auburn’s Lost Lake at BTG.
Lynette Freeman
Thornton Wilder, author and playwright, won the Pulitzer Prize three times, once for his novel The Bridge of San Luis Rey, an once each for his plays Our Town and The Skin of Our Teeth. Another play, The Matchmaker, was turned into the musical Hello, Dolly!
The Skin of Our Teeth chronicles the history of mankind through the life of the Antrobus family who live in the New Jersey suburbs. After a tryout at New Haven’s Shubert Theatre, the show, directed by Elia Kazan, opened on Broadway in 1942. Frederic March, Montgomery Clift, and Tallullah Bankhead led the cast. The play was made into a successful Australian TV movie, and Kander and Ebb adapted the play into a musical, Over and Over, which never reached Broadway.
For details: www.berkshhiretheatregroup.org.
Of Note:
Patti LuPone has postponed her July 20 performance of Don’t Monkey with Broadway at Great Barrington’s Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center, due to hip replacement surgery. She hopes to return to the Berkshires next summer. For ticket exchange credit or refunds, please contact the Mahaiwe box office at 413.528.0100
Jayne Atkinson WAM
WAM Theatre’s production of Holland Taylor’s Ann is hitting the road with Jayne Atkinson starring as Texas governor Ann Richards. The Kristen Van Ginhoven helmed production, which played in Dorset VT and The Berkhires last fall, opens at Washington, DC’s Arena Stage this month, and then heads to the Dallas TX Theatre Center and Laguna CA.. WAM Theatre celebrates its 10th season this year. For details: www.wamtheatre.org.
You’re A Good Man, Charlie Brown (Revised), has been added to Berkshire Theatre Group’s summer schedule. The musical, featuring BTG’S 2019 Acting Intern company, plays the Colonial Theatre in Pittsfield on August 17, directed by Alan Filderman, with music direction by Andrew Baumer and choreography by Tim McGarrigal. For details: www.berkshiretheatregroup.org.
Road Trip! Billy Porter, Tony and Grammy Award winner, star of Broadway’s Kinky Boots and FX1’s Pose, and fashionista at the Oscars, Met Gala and Tony Awards, will direct the world premiere of Dan McCabe’s The Purists at Boston’s Huntington Theatre, August 30-September 29. For details: www.huntingtontheatre.org
Keep in Mind…
Lilli Hokama
Now Circa Then, Carly Mensch’s play, set in New York’s Tenement Museum, dances between the tale of two young immigrants, Josephine and Julian, making their way in their new country in the 1890s, and the developing relationship of Margie and Gideon, a mismatched pair of re-enactors hired to portray them. Sean Christopher Lewis direct the Chester Theatre production, July 4-14. Lilli Hokama, who starred in Lauren Gunderson’s I and You at Chester a couple o seasons ago, returns to tar in this production. For details: www.chestertheatre.org.
No Boundaries in Art, Berkshire Theatre Group’s free readings at The Unicorn Theatre on BTG’s Stockbridge campus, include: So This Is My Family: Mr. Green Part 2, Jeff Baron’s Continuation to the award-winning Visiting Mr. Green on July 12. The author directs. Katie Forgette’s Evidence of Things Unseen will be performed on July 26. For details: www.berkhiretheatregroup.org.
MOMIX. Photo by Charles Azzopardi
MOMIX, the innovative mordern dance company returns to the Mahaiwe Performing Arts Center in Great Barrington on July 5-6 with Opus Cactus, their work by Moses Pendleton, which brings the the landscape of the American Southwest to the Berkshires. Originally created as a 20-minute piece in 2001 for the Ballet Arizona, Opus Cactus was then brought back into the MOMIX repertoire and a full-evening work was created. For details: www.mahaiwe.org.
Sevenars Concerts opens its 51st anniversary with a Bastille celebration, July 14 in Worthington, MA. The French-accented program, featuring Schrade and James Family musicians showcases Carnival of the Animals by Camille Saint-Saens -with special guest Magee Hickey narrating. For details: www.sevenars.org
The Merry Wives of Windsor, Shakespeare’s comedy will be performed by Hartford’s Capital Classics, as part of the Greater Hartford Shakespeare Festival for three weekends (July 11–28), and it’s outdoors, on the campus of University of Saint Joseph in West Hartford. This annual summer Shakespeare festival also features pre-show entertainment, which includes the music, food, gallery viewings, lectures by local professors, and more. For details: http://autorino.usj.edu/
The Hartford Symphony Orchestra salutes the music of Frank Sinatra in a program, Come Fly With Me, at the Talcott Mountain Music Festival, on July 12 in Simsbury, CT. Adam Boyles conducts and Rob Zapulla is guest soloist. It’s a rain or shine concert. For details: www.hartfordsymphony.org
The Capitol Steps put the mock in democracy nightly except Tuesdays at Cranwell in Lenox through August. Their 4th of July Politics Takes A Holiday radio special airs on public and community radio stations coast-to-coast on Independence Day. For details:: http://www.capsteps.com/radio/ In our neck of the woos, you can tune in or stream the program on 89.7fm/WTBR in Pittsfield, MA at 30AM on the Fourth. For details: https://wtbrfm.com/
———————–
Mark G. Auerbach studied theatre at American University and the Yale School of Drama. He’s worked for arts organizations and reported on theatre for newspapers and radio. Mark produces and hosts ArtsBeat Radio for 89.5fm/WSKB.
