This coming Monday, Nov. 7, at 8 p.m., the Vineyard Playhouse will present a staged reading of Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays. And they will not be alone. At the same time there will be simultaneous readings of the play worldwide.
First, let it be said that on the evening this critic attended the Vineyard Playhouse’s outdoor performance of The Comedy of Errors, Friday, July 22, when the weather was so warm it felt as if the entire Island was holding a Bikrum hot yoga class (for those unfamiliar with the workout, the purpose is to reproduce a boiling afternoon in Calcutta), the heat itself became a starring character.
Walking into the theatre at the Yard in Chilmark during a dance rehearsal this week, one couldn’t help noticing a spilled glass of water on the edge of the stage, and, upon further inspection, a puddle in the middle of the floor. A few minutes later a dancer stood in the middle of said puddle, relishing its slippery nature.
Be the star you know you are. The curtain is about to go up for summer theatre arts camp for ages 9 to 14 at the Vineyard Playhouse. Camp begins on Tuesday, July 5 and afterwards runs Mondays through Fridays from 9 a.m. to 1 p.m. through August 26.
Camp directors Liz Hartford and Mac Young are returning this summer, along with Katharine Pilcher. The camps are designed to be small and nurturing with an average of 12 to 15 campers per week.
Next Friday and Saturday evening, Nov. 18 and 19, the Tisbury school gym will transform itself into the magical world of Cinderella for the junior high school play. Twenty-three student actors have been rehearsing since the first week of school to prepare the show that’s a lot of glass slippers to try on. Four other students make up the stage crew, cue turning into a pumpkin. Barra Peak returns this year as a graduate assistant.
The Vineyard Playhouse raised $350,000 at its annual fundraiser on Sunday night, a huge boost for the capital campaign now under way to renovate the historic playhouse building on Church street in Vineyard Haven. The renovation project includes remodeling the stage, which will be named after the late actress Patricia Neal, it was announced at the event early Sunday evening.
On Wednesday, Oct. 12, the Tisbury Senior Center will present at 1:30 p.m. a program entitled Barrymore: The Life and Times of the Bad Boy Actor, John Barrymore. There is no charge for this event
Veteran Hollywood comedy writer Marty Nadler will be performing his one-man show, Very Vineyard 2011, at Grace Episcopal Church in Vineyard Haven, on Saturday, July 9, at 7 p.m.
Mr. Nadler’s writing, producing and performing career spans more than three decades. In television, he served as script consultant for The Odd Couple, story editor and head writer for Happy Days, contributing writer for Sesame Street and guest writer for Saturday Night Live.”
Currently, Venus in Fur, the new play by David Ives, is appearing on Broadway. The show gained stellar reviews last year when it opened off Broadway and the performance of ingenue actress Nina Arianda has mesmerized critics. This week’s New Yorker has a feature on her.
