The cast and design team for South Coast Rep’s LUCKY DUCK is set for the production’s February run in Costa Mesa, CA. Get the whole story at www.playbill.com.

The Henry Krieger/Bill Russell/Jeffrey Hatcher musical has had a TYA makeover and a new release after a re-defining  production earlier this year at Kansas City’s Coterie Theatre, where the authors were in residence. For more information on licensing your production of LUCKY DUCK, visit the show’s homepage at www.theatricalrights.com.

The BroadwayWorld.com 2010 Southern California Theatre Awards brought a Best Costume Design nod to David Carnevale for his awesome work on Orange County’s Theatre Out production of ZANNA DON’T. In addition to that honor, Frankie Marrone was runner-up for the Best Actor in a Musical for his portrayal of Mike, the very cool captain of the…chess team.

Take a look at the BroadwayWorld.com article to get the full story!

broadwayworld.com/article

Minneapolis Musical Theatre Artistic Director Steven Meerdink is directing BARE, Jon Hartmere and Damon Intrabartolo’s searing pop musical, in an area premiere, opening March 18 and playing through April 3rd at the Illusion Theatre. Casting is complete and rehearsals are set to begin. As the process gets underway, Meerdink wrote an eloquent statement on BARE and his thoughts on its very poignant theme. Here are his comments as they appeared in his “From the Director’s Chair” column:

area premiere of bare

bare explores the pains and pleasures of five high school seniors at a co-ed Catholic boarding school as they struggle to grow up in these complicated, conflicted, contemporary times. Each of them question where they are in their lives. Answers are sought in the church confessional and in less formal venues including a stage, a rave, and a well-locked dorm room.

Our production of bare comes at a very important time given the recent dialogue surrounding the tragic suicides of several gay youth and the associated ‘It Gets Better’ project. We’ve all wondered if we would be better off keeping a part of ourselves a secret in an effort to fit in. And what accountability does each of us have for words and actions that might lead others to destructive ends, even if those words and actions seemed well intentioned at the time? bare presents these issues in a very powerful way and through it we hope to facilitate a conversation with this production.

-Steven Meerdink

For information on licensing your production of BARE, visit the BARE show page at www.theatricalrights.com.

And, check out these upcoming productions of BARE:

February 18, 2011 – June 26, 2011-Brave Touch Productions, Erskineville, New South Wales

February 24, 2011 – February 26, 2011-Suffolk University, Boston, MA

March 18, 2011 – April 3, 2011-Minneapolis Musical Theatre, Minneapolis, MN

April 22, 2011 – April 24, 2011-The Love of Theatre, Tallahassee, FL

April 29, 2011 – May 15, 2011-Royal Underground Theatre Company, Tracy, CA

June 2, 2011 – June 25, 2011-New Line Theatre, Saint Louis, MO

August 4, 2011 – August 13, 2011-Next Generation Theatre Co, Raleigh, NC

The Votes are in for the inaugural BroadwayWorld Best of Boston Theatre Awards. Maine’s Ogunquit Playhouse took top spots in 10 categories. Its acclaimed production of Spamalot garnered eight of those honors, including Best Musical! Check out the full story at broadwayworld.com.

Drury Lane is well known as one of Chicago’s premiere theatres, and their sparkling new production of MONTY PYTHON’S SPAMALOT will further that stellar reputation. The Tribune, The Sun Times and ChicagoCritic.com all gave the show high praise as the Tony® Award-winning musical takes Chicagoland by storm! Check out the rave reviews by clicking on the links below:

Chicago Tribune: http://leisureblogs.chicagotribune.com/the_theater_loop/2011/01/with-knockout-monty-pythons-spamalot-drury-lane-proves-its-pythonesque-.html.

Chicago Sun-Times: http://www.suntimes.com/entertainment/stage/3204423-421/broadway-drury-spamalot-arthur-choreography.html.

Chicago Critic: http://chicagocritic.com/monty-pythons-spamalot/.

Matthew Crowle (L) as Patsy and David Kortemeier as King Arthur in Drury Lane Oakbrook's MONTY PYTHON'S SPAMALOT (Photo: Chicago Tribune)

You’ve set in motion the process of assembling titles for your next theatre season and the battle of “Budget vs. Brilliance” has begun. You know you can deliver brilliant musical theatre for your audience…but at what cost? With the StageCenter Collection, TRW helps you win the battle! We are offering this rotating collection of shows from our catalogue at…50% off!

By booking titles from the StageCenter Collection, you’ll reduce your production budget and can fully focus your resources and talent toward making brilliant theatre! The StageCenter Collection currently features eleven titles from our Off-Broadway and Regional Theatre catalogue.

TRW's Director of Licensing Jim Hoare

TRW’s Director of Licensing Jim Hoare, a thirty-plus year veteran director, teacher and theatre artist, is excited about the wave of interest in StageCenter. “Customers who have already selected another TRW title have told me, ‘For 50% off, I’ll add one of the ‘Stage Center’ shows to my season as well.’  One selected LUCKY DUCK and another THE GOOD WAR,” Hoare said.  “50% off of both royalties and materials makes trying a lesser-known title a much more attractive option.”

And…you can peruse them…INSTANTLY! Taking the time to read and listen to shows that you may not be familiar with is a breeze with PersualsNOW™. In an instant, you can select any TRW title and read the script and listen to song samples as you go. Since TRW launched PerusalsNOW™ last year, thousands of customers have embraced digital perusing.

StageCenter and PerusalsNOW™: TRW’s Dynamic Duo is here to give artistic directors the tools they need to bring exciting, new titles to audiences worldwide…without breaking the budget! Check out the possibilities now! Visit the StageCenter Collection and PerusalsNOW™ on our website or call us Toll-Free at (866) 378-9758 and get all the info you need to succeed.

TRW’s brand new StageCenter program is a rotating collection of musicals from our Off Broadway and Regional catalogue offered at a 50% discount! Taking advantage of this exciting new program is easy, once you’ve selected your title or titles. You may have seen some of the titles in the collection.  If not, you can enjoy the process of getting to know these super shows.

The premiere group of eleven shows selected for the StageCenter Collection offers a full menu of musicals that can take a good season and make it a GREAT season! Below is the line-up with easy click links to each StageCenter title. Once you’ve decided a title may be the right fit for you, click right to the PerusalsNOW™ store and you’ll be reading and listening to the show of your choice in seconds!

After six months of marriage the bloom is off the rose for two famous newlyweds. “She gazes out the window and she plays Chopin,” agonizes the husband.  But then—cue the anonymous roses, the amorous letters and enter the Guardsman—her secret fantasy, his greatest fear. ENTER THE GUARDSMAN is an intimate musical about sex, marriage, adultery, role playing, truth-telling and keeping your performance fresh in the long run. As seen through the eyes of a theatre ghost, the action takes place in the timeless world of “back stage”. The score is evocative of turn of the century Vienna; tuneful, romantic and waltz filled, recalling a theater of wit, style, sophistication and romance. But beneath the facade the play is an exploration of marriage and the very modern dilemma of maintaining the erotic within the monogamous. ♦

Herbert Appleman has re-worked H.M.S PINAFORE, Gilbert and Sullivan’s comic operetta masterpiece, about two lovebirds from different backgrounds — a lowly sailor and his upper-class lass — who aren’t aware that after their birth they were mistakenly delivered by their foster mother to the wrong parents. DAUNTLESS DICK DEADEYE brings Gilbert and Sullivan to modern audiences in a brilliant new adaptation! ♦

When the quiet, suburban life of Jerry Gorman becomes too much to bear, he attaches four hundred helium balloons to a backyard lawnchair and takes to the sky. Jerry soars and soars…but will he ever come down? FLIGHT OF THE LAWNCHAIR MAN takes a cue from real-life headlines and delivers the funny and inspiring story of a modern day everyman who aspires to a higher existence! ♦

LUCKY DUCK‘s new TYA version is ready to go! Ugly duckling Serena runs away from her rustic barnyard to pursue her dreams in New Duck City. Her adventures with a bunch of zany characters, including Prince Drake, Galinda (“the most fashionable Goose in the City”) and Wolf, a talent agent and reformed meat-eater (or is he?), take her from high-fashion runways to perilous performing opportunities. Even the happy ending is not exactly by the storybook. ♦

Take a dark and mysterious journey into the life of Edgar Allan Poe. This imaginative musical uses Poe’s poetry and short stories as its base and his shifting obsession with the women in his life as its catalyst. With hauntingly beautiful melodies, NEVERMORE breathes new life into Poe’s work and explores a twisted true-life tale that is as bizarre as his classic stories of the macabre. ♦

IN THIS HOUSE begins as John D’Amato and his wife Annie Friedkin reunite after a long separation. At the same time Henry and Luisa Arden, an older couple, are returning to spend New Year’s Eve in the now-deserted house they built and lived in for many years. John and Annie run off an icy road into the Arden’s brick wall and end up spending the night in the house. In the course of the evening, all four share humor and heartbreak as they compare their views of marriage. Their chance encounter leaves all of them forever changed. ♦

STRIKING 12 is a perfect alternative to standard holiday fare while still being family-friendly. On New Year’s Eve, an over-worked and under-inspired single guy who’s had enough of holiday cheer makes a resolution: to stay home and go to bed early. On another New Year’s Eve, a continent away—and more than a century earlier—Hans Christian Andersen’s Little Match Girl tries unsuccessfully to sell her matches in the snow. ♦

Romeo didn’t die when he drank that poison at the end of ROMEO AND JULIET. Because it wasn’t poison at all; just a sleeping potion that put him out for a few centuries. And when Romeo awakens, he finds himself in 1960 Brooklyn, chasing a girl he believes is his beloved Juliet. But no, it’s not Juliet—it’s Bernadette, the beautiful, sassy daughter of a local mobster. Romeo finds himself aligned with the rival crime family and… poor Romeo! It seems he’s got what the therapists would call, “a pattern.” But unlike Shakespeare’s account of the tale, ROMEO AND BERNADETTE barrels along with dames, dons and dizzy comedy to a happy ending, accompanied by some of the world’s most recognizable Italian melodies, famous from movies, television and many, many pizzerias. ♦

Based on Studs Terkel’s Pulitzer Prize-winning book, THE GOOD WAR, conceived and created by David H. Bell and Craig Carnelia, combines Terkel’s stunning text with vintage songs of the war years, to create a unique and illuminating snapshot of the time. Using the words of the people who were actually there, THE GOOD WAR creates a collage of the personal experiences, attitudes, fears, and joys of a vibrant and vital time in our country’s journey; a time that changed us forever. ♦

Best. Fantasy. Ever. Alex and Laney, two quirky young urbanites in love, are engaged to be married—but they can’t seem to set the date. Is it their hectic schedules? Cold feet? One night, after a pre-marital squabble, Alex finds himself staring at a brand-new picture frame. Inside is a “display photo” of a girl, beautiful and carefree, effortlessly caught mid-twirl by the camera lens… Why isn’t Alex’s life this simple and romantic, he asks? THE GIRL IN THE FRAME is fresh from a defining staged reading by the Midtown Direct Rep and ready to license! ♦

ONCE UPON A TIME IN NEW JERSEY takes us back to Hoboken New Jersey, 1956, in a funny, frantic and frenzied fairy tale about what we do for love. Sweet, shy deli clerk Vinnie switches lives with Rocco, the town stud, to win the heart of the woman he loves. A farce about dames, games, foods, feuds, molls, dolls, thugs, lugs, switches, snitches, glitches and mistaken identities… and how a simple sandwich guy becomes a hero. ♦

Costa Mesa, California’s South Coast Rep (SCR) has announced their much-anticipated run of TYA tuner LUCKY DUCK. Featuring a great score by Henry Krieger and lyrics by Bill Russell, with a book by Russell and Jeffrey Hatcher, LUCKY DUCK is fresh from a re-defining production at Kansas City’s Coterie Theatre and is now set for a Feb. 11-27, 2011 at SCR.  Check out SCR’s newsletter and the LUCKY DUCK article: http://www.scr.org/interactive/dialoguejan11/luckydialouge.aspx