Pasadena Playhouse's new season: 'Sleepless in Seattle' will stir

The postponed world premiere of "Sleepless in Seattle" is among the highlights of the Pasadena Playhouse's 2012-13 season, which was announced Friday.

The season also will feature the world premiere of what the theater is calling the Broadway-bound comedy "Under My Skin" on Sept. 11, and a yet-to-be named "surprise production" set to open in March. 

The musical based on the 1993 romantic comedy film "Sleepless in Seattle" was set to open June 12, but officials said the the project needed more time. The show -- which features a book by Jeff Arch, who wrote the original story and co-wrote the screenplay -- will open in June 2013.  

Other works to be offered in the upcoming season are Pulitzer Prize-winner Lynn Nottage’s "Intimate Apparel" (Nov. 6), the family-friendly "A Snow White Christmas" (Dec. 13) and Noël Coward’s comedy "Fallen Angels" (Jan. 29).

The historic playhouse closed for eight months in 2010 as it went in and out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy. 

Thanks to “Snow White,” in partnership with A Lythgoe Family Production, the new season marks the first expansion in two years. “We are hopeful this partnership … continues in future years with different shows every year," managing director Charles Dillingham said Friday. 

“This is the second full subscription season since the bankruptcy, the first season was mostly pickup shows,” Dillingham said, adding that the Playhouse has increased subscribers by 10% since 2010. “We're in good financial health,” he said. 

Subscriptions for the 2012-2013 season are available for purchase Friday; the five-show series ranges from $99 to $290.

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Theater review: 'Lincoln: An American Story' at Pasadena Playhouse 

-- Jamie Wetherbe

Above: Meg Ryan in the movie "Sleepless in Seattle." Credit: Bruce McBroom

Theater review: 'Lincoln: An American Story' at Pasadena Playhouse

On April 14, 1865, Union Army medic Charles Leale went to Ford’s Theatre to see “Our American Cousin,” and became the de facto presiding physician in the aftermath of President Lincoln’s assassination. He was 23 years old. Leale’s extraordinary story is the heart of “Lincoln: An American Story for Actor and Symphony Orchestra,” Hershey Felder’s schmaltzy, stirring solo show with live music, now at the Pasadena Playhouse.

Basically, this is a one-man oratorio: Writer-performer-composer Felder, dressed in a Civil War uniform, is accompanied by a 45-piece orchestra playing his own score as well as such classics as “My Old Kentucky Home” and “Beautiful Dreamer.” It is quite grand, if not perhaps a little grandiose, especially under the epic direction of Joel Zwick (“My Big Fat Greek Wedding”).

Felder, whose canny stage portraits of Beethoven, Chopin and Leonard Bernstein seem to be keeping some of L.A.’s larger nonprofit theaters afloat these days, is a natural ham. He is not so much an actor as a performer, and his florid gestures and pantomime feel very 19th century indeed.

If he oversells his tale, there’s certainly no need -- “Lincoln” has an irresistible hook. The step-by-step account of the shooting, the immediate aftermath at Ford’s Theatre and Lincoln’s deathbed are all the more absorbing for their minute details. Other sections, such as Walt Whitman’s vigils at the bedsides of wounded soldiers, or a brief description of minstrelsy, play like ideas that haven’t been fully integrated.

Pasadena Playhouse postpones 'Sleepless in Seattle' musical

The musical based on the 1993 movie “Sleepless in Seattle” scheduled to open June 12 at the Pasadena Playhouse has been postponed until the theater's next season.

The new musical features a book by Jeff Arch, who wrote the original story and co-wrote the screenplay for the romantic comedy directed by Nora Ephron. The songs are by Michelle Citrin, Michael Garin and Josh Nelson. No casting for the musical had been announced.

A statement from artistic director Sheldon Epps said that “our desire to ‘get it right’ led us to the wise decision to give this project additional time for further creative development.”

A replacement for the musical in the Playhouse schedule is still to be announced.

A new opening date for" Sleepless in Seattle" was not announced. The Playhouse's next season begins in September.

ALSO:

Theater review: 'Art' at Pasadena Playhouse

Pasadena Playhouse gets direction from Sheldon Epps

-Kelly Scott

Above: Meg Ryan in "Sleepless in Seattle." Credit: Bruce McBroom

 

 

Pasadena Playhouse names Charles Dillingham to interim post

The Pasadena Playhouse is gaining the services of a name familiar to the Southern California theater community. Charles Dillingham, who worked for nearly 20 years at Center Theatre Group as managing director before leaving in 2011, will join the company on an interim basis as executive director.

A spokesman for the Pasadena Playhouse said that Dillingham will stay with the company until a  permanent hire is named. Stephen Eich stepped down from the executive director position earlier this month after serving 2 1/2 years.

Dillingham is a vice president of Arts Consulting Group, a national company that provides management services to creative organizations. A Pasadena Playhouse spokesman said Dillingham’s services are being provided through Arts Consulting Group.

The spokesman said that Arts Consulting Group's relationship with the playhouse officially began Tuesday, the same day Dillingham began his new position.

Stephen Eich resigns as Pasadena Playhouse executive director

Stephen Eich, who played a leading role in helping the Pasadena Playhouse survive a financial near-death experience during more than 2 1/2 years as its executive director, has resigned, saying he feels “a great sense of satisfaction in what I’ve accomplished” as he moves on to other ventures, including independent theater production.

Playhouse officials announced his departure Thursday, saying the parting is amicable and that they appreciate Eich’s work as the Playhouse -- L.A.’s third-biggest nonprofit stage company after Center Theatre Group and the Geffen Playhouse -- went through a turbulent 2010 that saw it close for eight months and go through a Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Sheldon Epps, the Playhouse’s longtime artistic director, said he’s grateful to Eich (pictured above at right, with Epps and Playhouse board chair Michele Dedeaux Engemann) for staying when “he could have cut and run” after realizing shortly after his hiring in mid-2009 that the Playhouse was in woeful fiscal shape. When it filed for bankruptcy in May 2010, it was $2.3 million in debt, with just $102,000 in cash and savings.

“He gave stalwart service to the theater with real dedication and intelligence and passion, and served us extremely well during a tough time,” Epps said Thursday.

Theater review: 'Art' at Pasadena Playhouse

“Art,” Yasmina Reza’s commercial hit that won the 1998 Tony Award, is a canapé for theatergoers who haven’t the appetite for a whole meal. Less than 90 minutes in length, this urbane French comedy is elegantly drawn yet utterly evanescent — as superficially tantalizing as the soft bristles of a makeup brush.

The cast bears the responsibility of keeping this lightweight play, which is as seductively slight as Reza’s more recent “God of Carnage,” from floating off into the ether. The Pasadena Playhouse’s revival, which opened Sunday under the guidance of veteran stage and TV director David Lee, has assembled a fairly solid one. The production won’t have you reassessing the work’s depth, but it will do its lively best to keep your spirits raised.

Three accomplished performers — Bradley Whitford, an Emmy winner for his work on the NBC series “The West Wing,” Michael O’Keefe, who was nominated for an Oscar for his performance in “The Great Santini,” and Roger Bart, a scene-stealer in two Mel Brooks musicals, “The Producers” and “Young Frankenstein” — portray the play’s middle-aged buddies thrown into crisis after one has bought a stark modernist painting for an exorbitant sum that challenges not just their value systems but the viability of their friendship.

Hershey Felder's new musical play will dramatize Lincoln's death

Hershey Felder, the actor-pianist-composer who has carved a niche for himself creating and performing one-man shows about Chopin, Beethoven, Leonard Bernstein and George Gershwin, is taking on a musical dramatization of April 14, 1865, the night Abraham Lincoln was shot during a performance at Ford’s Theatre in Washington, D.C.

“Lincoln –- An American Story for Actor and Symphony Orchestra” will have its premiere March 28 to April 7 at the Pasadena Playhouse. The story is told from the viewpoint of Charles Leale, the young Army surgeon who attended the fateful performance of “Our American Cousin” partly to gawk at the president he revered and wound up pronouncing him dead the following morning.

Speaking from Chicago, where he's performing "Maestro: The Art of Leonard Bernstein," Felder said Tuesday that he has composed enough music, including variations on melodies from Stephen Foster, to run the entire 90 minutes with an onstage 45-piece orchestra. He'll also incorporate performances of songs by Foster and original songs he's written in the style of 19th century burlesque.

Until now, the music-and-drama hybrids that Felder has collaborated on with director Joel Zwick have not used other musicians.

Michael O'Keefe, Roger Bart join Whitford for Pasadena's 'Art'

It wasn't long ago that the Pasadena Playhouse was struggling to survive, and Friday it's announcing a solid team for its revival of Yasmina Reza's 1998 Tony-winning play, "Art." Michael O'Keefe and Roger Bart are joining the previously announced Bradley Whitford.

"With Bradley, Michael, and Roger I have what can simply be referred to as a director's dream,"  director David Lee said in the announcement.

O’Keefe is best known from his TV and movie performances, including in "Caddyshack," "Michael Clayton" and "The Great Santini." His television credits include a long stint on "Roseanne."  On stage O'Keefe has appeared in the national tour of the Aaron Sorkin play "A Few Good Men" and in the Broadway productions of "Reckless," "Side Man" and "The Fifth of July."

Perhaps Bart's most indelible role was as Carmen Ghia in the original Broadway cast of "The Producers." On screen he has appeared on TV's “The Event”  and “Desperate Housewives,” among many film and television roles.

Whitford is best known for his role as Deputy White House Chief of Staff Josh Lyman on TV's “The West Wing”  and recently may have been Red John in the series “The Mentalist.”  In 2008, he also starred in the Broadway production of "Boeing Boeing."

Theater review: 'Blues for an Alabama Sky' at Pasadena Playhouse

Never mind the A train -- you can get to Harlem on the 134 to catch Pasadena Playhouse’s jubilant, stylish revival of “Blues for an Alabama Sky.” In director Sheldon Epps’ confident hands, Pearl Cleage’s 1996 dramedy set in the Harlem Renaissance feels as smart and tart as star Robin Givens’ sequined flapper shifts.

“Blues” made its away around the regional circuit a decade ago, but somehow it feels fresh. Maybe that’s because uptown New York circa 1930 looks awfully familiar: rampant unemployment, culture wars and fierce battles over gay rights and abortion. But people dressed a lot snappier in the Jazz Age, or at least they do in this production, with Karen Perry’s knockout costumes central to the story.

Guy (Kevin T. Carroll) dreams of designing outfits for Josephine Baker, but in the meantime he’ll settle for dressing Angel (Givens), a jobless chanteuse recently dumped by her gangster beau. Angel sets her cool eye on recent transplant Leland (Robert Ray Manning Jr.), a solemn widower looking to fill a hole in his heart. Across the hall, Delia (Tessa Thompson) wants to open a family clinic with the help of Sam (Kadeem Hardison), a doctor who delivers bootleggers’s babies when he’s not pulling long shifts at Harlem Hospital. Everybody has a dream, but the rent money’s running out. How long can a wish be deferred?

Sheldon Epps puts his director's hat back on in Pasadena

Sheldon Epps is in his 15th season as artistic director of the Pasadena Playhouse, but it has been more than two years since he last directed a show there.

For much of that time, his primary concern went from overseeing plays to engineering the theater’s survival. The playhouse closed for eight months in 2010 as it went in and out of Chapter 11 bankruptcy.

Now a degree of normalcy is back, and theater leaders say that all six shows since the October 2010 reopening have met or exceeded their box-office targets. Epps has been able to refocus on artistry along with finances, and his staging of “Blues for an Alabama Sky” opens Sunday.

Read a profile of Epps (pictured in a rehearsal with actress Tessa Thompson), including how he handled the playhouse’s hard times and is shifting now to shepherd Robin Givens and other cast members in the current production of "Alabama Sky," Pearl Cleage’s 1995 drama about people’s aspirations during hard times in Depression Era Harlem. He picked the play because of how it resonates with widespread anxieties in today’s America -– conditions that Epps and the Pasadena Playhouse seem particularly well-positioned to address.

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Sheldon Epps' plans for the playhouse

-- Mike Boehm

Photo: Sheldon Epps confers with cast member Tessa Thompson during a rehearsal of "Blues for an Alabama Sky." Credit: Gary Friedman/Los Angeles Times