June 21, 2019 -- Volume VI, Issue 22

It all begins tomorrow, and we can hardly wait! Cadence Theatre and Virginia Rep welcome Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright David Lindsay-Abaire (pictured) to RVA to celebrate the inaugural year of the Cadence Pipeline New Works Fellowship and the 2018-19 fellows: Brittany Fisher, Will Inman, Irene Ziegler, and writing partners Steven Burneson and Sanam Laila Hashemi. The Cadence Pipeline New Works Fellowship offers selected Virginia playwrights the chance to develop new work under the guidance and mentorship of a professional playwright. This year’s mentor has been Lindsay-Abaire. Readings from the fellows’ new works will take place June 22 and June 23, in Theatre Gym, Virginia Rep Center, 114 W. Broad St., in downtown Richmond. Each reading will be followed by a reception hosted by Lindsay-Abaire. Tickets to the readings are FREE! Visit this Eventbrite link to reserve a free general admission ticket, pending availability. Sat June 22, 2 p.m. will be Chimborazo Hill by Irene Ziegler, directed by Rusty Wilson. That evening at 8 p.m. will be For My Next Trick by Will Inman, directed by Laine Satterfield. On Sun June 23 at 2 we’ll hear Cross Stitch Bandits by Sanam Laila Hashemi and Steven Burneson, directed by Bostin Christopher. And on Sun at 8, we’ll get a first look at How to Bruise Gracefully by Brittany Fisher, directed by Melissa Mowry.

Last week we looked back on the several decade history that has led to the greatly anticipated construction of the Perkinson Center for the Arts. Knowing that bulldozers are moving dirt even as we type, we’ll start the look forward. The Perkinson Center will be a 23,350-sq-ft facility featuring the 352-seat Jimmy Dean Theatre, the Baxter and Elaine Perkinson Art Gallery, and an arts classroom (your name could be here; let’s talk). A beautiful performance patio named in memory of the mother of our chair, Hugh Cline (pictured), will also be included, plus comfortable support spaces. It will be the first purpose-built, public performing arts facility to be raised from the ground up in RVA since the construction of the historic Empire Theatre (now the Sara Belle and Neil November Theatre) in 1911, more than a century ago. It will serve as a more southerly home for many of RVA’s leading arts organizations (we hope the Richmond Symphony, Richmond Ballet, Richmond Jazz Society, Virginia Repertory Theatre, et al), several Chesterfield performance troupes, and some national acts. Within the Perkinson Center, the Chesterfield Cultural Arts Foundation will create programs that will tour to every school, library, recreation center, senior facility, and historic site countywide. Groundbreaking will take place this coming Mon, June 24, 10 a.m., 11800 Centre St., in Chester Village Green. Please join us!      

NYC’s Drama Book Shop was and will be one of my favorite places in the world. I’ve visited there probably a hundred times in the last half-century, and every time I go, I’m like a kid in a candy store. I own many more scripts, theatre books, DVD’s etc. than I should. Still, I’ve never been able to walk into the Drama Book Shop without buying four or five more. The DBS began in the lobby of a 42^nd St theatre in 1917, where DBS founder and Drama League member Marjorie Seligman sold plays on a card table to theatre types who didn’t know where else to find them. As popularity grew, she moved her “shop” to a bookshelf in the Drama League offices. In 1923, as that shelf expanded into shelves, the DBS moved to its own building on 47^th St. Later it “hopped from brownstone to brownstone” on 52^nd. That’s where it was when Jack Welsh first introduced me in 1970. In 1983, it moved to a second floor labyrinth of offices on Seventh Ave, near 48^th. I thought I’d lost it forever until Jack led me to that new second-floor location. It felt like a clandestine hideaway, for “insider’s only,” and Jack had taught me the secret password to get in. It moved to its more traditional digs on 40^th St in 2001. As I mentioned in last week’s report, the beloved, 2011 Tony Award-winning Drama Book Shop closed due to rent increases in Jan, with Lin-Manuel Miranda, Thomas Kail, and others from the Hamilton family stepping in at the last minute to rescue it from extinction. They bought the book shop from Rozanne Seelen, the 84-year-old legend who had co-owned the shop with her late husband Arthur. He had bought it from Seligman in 1956. It will reopen in a soon-to-be-identified location “in the Fall.” Why did I love the DBS so much that I had to visit the old 40^th St. location last Apr just to say goodbye? Because it felt like home, and everyone who worked there, from Rozanne to her nephew/co-owner Allen Hubby to every clerk at the register LOVED theatre and knew EVERYTHING. You could misquote one or two lines from an obscure play and they could tell you the title and playwright in a manner of seconds. And why did Lin-Manuel Miranda and pals love the DBS so much they decided to buy it rather than let it close? “I wrote most of In the Heights there, at the basement piano,” says Miranda. “And when I was in college and too poor to buy plays, they let me sit there and read everything without spending a penny.”    

The Wiz opens TONIGHT at our historic Sara Belle and Neil November Theatre, on the Marjorie Arenstein Stage, and we eagerly shout “Break a Leg” in the general direction of Oz. Staging and choreography is by our Associate Artistic Director, Kikau Alvaro; music direction is by Anthony Smith. Mariah Lyttle, Dylan T. Jackson, Devonte Jerome Wells, and Brandon LaReau will star as Dorothy, Scarecrow, Tin Man, and Lion, respectively. Many of you will remember Devonte for his bring-down-the-house performance as Jimmy Early in our 2016 production of Dreamgirls. Also from Dreamgirls and so many other shows, the incomparable Desiree Roots will be back as Evillene, the Wicked Witch of the West. With Virginia Rep All Stars like Jerold Solomon, Jessi Johnson, and too many others to mention here rounding out the cast of 21, The Wiz is sure to be THE supercharged hit of the summer. If you’d like to catch a free preview, please join Wiz cast member Mariah Lyttle as she sings “Home” for the Ground Breaking of the Perkinson Center (Chesterfield’s new “home for the arts”) on Mon June 24, 10 a.m., 11800 Centre St., in Chester Village Green. Yours truly will be the emcee. The Perkinson Center has been in the works since the mid-80s, so everyone’s pretty jazzed to see dirt actually begin to move. It’s free, and you’re all invited for this exciting moment in Virginia theatre history.

“All right,” he emailed, asking not to be identified, “it feels like half your articles these days are now being labeled ‘Part 1’ or ‘Number 7.’ It’s driving me nuts. Why can’t you just write what you need to write and stop trying to serialize everything?” Fair question. Here’s the method behind our madness. When we started GNF in 2014 it was designed to be read in five minutes. We wrote three weekly articles, each of which was designed to be read in 1 minute 40 seconds. During a strategic planning focus group, someone said he wished Good News Friday covered more topics in each issue, while remaining succinct. Others concurred. Since then we’ve had five articles, including Two-Way Talkback, and each is written to be read in 1 minute 15 seconds, for a total read of 6 minutes 15 seconds. We base our reading times on 5 seconds per line of type in the working draft. We serialize in an effort to keep things short, and we’re pretty strict with ourselves. In response to your comment, we’ll try a longer article this time. The estimated reading time for “Report from New York, Number 8” runs 2 minutes 10 seconds. Let us know what you think. Barbara Comstock wrote: “Being a visual artist, I’m starting to hunger for a ‘Report from New York’ from Terrie Powers’ perspective. Can she put pen to paper to tell us more about her gallery adventures?” Our response: “Sounds good to us! We’ll ask.”