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Michael McKeever to play a major role in Parade Productions’ 2012-2013 Season

16 Monday Jul 2012

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Award Winning Playwright Michael McKeever
figures prominently in Parade Productions’ 2nd Season

Parade Productions is pleased and proud to announce their 2012-2013 schedule.  Boca Raton’s newest theatre company has two productions planned for its second season: Michael McKeever will star in Joe Mantello’s adaptation of David Sedaris’ The Santaland Diaries, and McKeever’s collection of short plays, The Whole Caboodle, will run for four weeks in February.  Both plays will be produced at the Studio Theatre at Mizner Park. Parade Productions debuted solidly last winter with an entirely sold out run of Donald Margulies’ Brooklyn Boy.

“Last season we took a leap of faith, and the community followed right behind us,” says Candace Caplin, the company’s executive producer and the driving force behind Parade Productions.  “We’ve had tremendous support, and we’re grateful. People have asked us to continue bringing more, quality theatre to Boca Raton, and that’s just what we’re going to do.  We’re excited about how we’ve begun, and where our partnership with the community is going. This year our focus is on humor,” Caplin adds, “and with Michael McKeever, we’ve got the best.”

From December 13th through December 23rd, McKeever will star in The Santaland Diaries, the one-person performance piece written by humorist David Sedaris and adapted for the stage by Joe Mantello. This hilarious piece of theatre relates Sedaris’ own experiences as he reluctantly worked as an elf in Macy’s Christmastime Santaland display, offering an uproarious behind-the-scenes look at how department stores manufacture Christmas spirit.

And from February 2nd through February 24th, audiences will discover whatStephen Sondheim, Abe Lincoln, munchkins and ambivalent lesbians have in common, as they all get the McKeever touch in The Whole Caboodle, the award-winning playwright’s wickedly funny collection of some of his most celebrated short plays. With a razor sharp sense of humor and extra-keen insight, The Whole Caboodle takes apart and reassembles an entire series of loveably flawed characters and pop culture icons with hilarious results.   Along with McKeever himself, Parade Productions has assembled a top-notch cast for The Whole Caboodle: Elena Maria Garcia, Jacqueline Laggy, Clay Cartland, Casey Dressler, and Candace Caplin. Both productions will be directed by Kim St. Leon.

Michael McKeever, who recently won a Carbonell Award for Best New Work for his play, Stuff, explores every aspect of the human condition in his work, which incorporates a wide variety of styles and subject matter.  His plays have entertained audiences throughout America and Europe. From the deep-rooted prejudices of small town America to the delicate dysfunction of society’s wealthiest homes, the playwright creates stories that entertain and enlighten. He has been honored with an NEA Residency Grant (New Theatre, Miami) and has been a 3-time finalist for Humana Fest’s nationally renowned Heideman Award. He is the proud recipient of three Carbonell Awards; four Curtain Up Awards; and two Florida Individual Artist Fellowships. Six of his plays have been produced at City Theatre’s prestigious Summer Shorts Festival in Miami. He has been a finalist several times at both the Key West Theatre Festival and the Sarasota Festival of New Plays. He is also an award-winning actor and designer. He resides in South Florida and is a member of the Dramatists Guild and Actors’ Equity.

Parade Productions is a not-for profit theatre company whose mission is “To produce high quality theatre experiences that entertain, enlighten, inform, uplift, and inspire audiences, sending them home with new thoughts, insights, questions, and ideas.”

The Santaland Diaries opens December 13th, 2012, and runs through December 23rd, with performances Thursday through Saturday evenings at 7:30 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays at 2 p.m. Tickets are $35 ($30 for groups of 15 or more).

The Whole Caboodle previews on January 31st, 2013, opens on February 2nd, and runs through February 24th, with performances Thursday through Saturday evenings at 7:30 p.m., and Saturdays and Sundays at 3 p.m. Tickets are $35 ($30 for groups of 15 or more).

A special two show package price of $30 per ticket is also available.
All seating is reserved.

All tickets are available at: www.paradeproductions.org, or by calling 866-811-4111.  For Group Sales please call:  561-291-9678.

Kim St. Leon
Candace Caplin
Elena Maria Garcia

Jacqueline Laggy

Casey Dressler

The Women’s Theatre Project Finds a New Home in Boca Raton

24 Thursday May 2012

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The Women’s Theatre Project has found a new home in Boca Raton. The acclaimed 10 year old company will move from their performance space in Fort Lauderdale to the Willow Theatre in Sugar Sand Park.

Incorporated in 2002, the Women’s Theatre Project is a company of professional female theatre artists dedicated to producing theatrical works exploring the female voice, and the move from their previous intimate 50-seat venue to the Willow’s state of the art 155-seat theatre is an exciting step forward in the company’s continuing evolution.

“A unique opportunity presented itself at The Willow Theatre,” says founding member and Artistic Director Genie Croft. “I’ve directed The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife and several other plays for The Boca Raton Theatre Guild at the Willow, and have imported The Women’s Theatre Project’s productions of The Year of Magical Thinking and Bridge and Tunnel into the theatre – it’s a natural progression to make our home here – a perfect union of theatre, creative growth, and venue to expand our productions and mission.”

Actress, founding member, and company treasurer Jacqueline Laggy agrees: “This move provides us with the opportunity to continue our work and expand our audience base. We’re very excited!”

Carol Sussman, TWTP secretary, and another founding member of The Women’s Theatre Project, is  thrilled the company’s mission will continue. “The Willow Theatre is the perfect venue for TWTP to further our vision of telling women’s stories,” she says. “We have worked long and hard to be able to share our passion with the community and we look forward to many years in our wonderful new home.”

The Women’s Theatre Project was incorporated as a 501c3 not-for-profit organization in May of 2002. The company was founded from a need for women’s voices to be heard, a desire to break down the stereotypes of women propelled by the media, and to create more professional theatrical opportunities for women of all shapes, sizes, races, and ages. The young company quickly drew praise from critics and audiences alike, received numerous Carbonell nominations, and built a strong and loyal following throughout South Florida.

The Women’s Theatre Project has presented staged readings, one act, and full length plays. Works by local, national, and international female playwrights have been featured throughout TWTP’s 10 year history, including the world and regional premieres of several works such as Speaking Elephant by local playwright Terry Lawrence, Jar the Floor by Cheryl L. West, Three Fittings by Stephanie Alison Walker, and True Blue by Marj O’Neill-Butler. Other recent productions include Playhouse Creatures, Eclipsed, Sunday on the Rocks, Chitterling Heights, and Women Drivers.  Over the past few years, TWTP has run a lesbian play festival in conjunction with the Pride Center.

Two productions are planned for the company’s 2012-2013 season at the Willow Theatre, Delval Divas, a comedy by Barbara Pease Weber will run November 2-18, and Faye Sholiton’s powerful memory play, The Interview will run January 4-20, 2013.  A third production is “not an impossibility,” says Croft.

The Willow Theatre at Sugar Sand Park is located at 300 South Military Trail in Boca Raton, just south of Palmetto Park Road. Tickets for Delval Divas will be on sale August 1st and can be purchased at the Willow Theatre Box office: 561-347-3948. Tickets for all performances are $25.

http://www.womenstheatreproject.com/#

The Boca Raton Theatre Guild Announces their 2012-2013 Season

24 Thursday May 2012

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A.R. Gurney’s Sylvia and Kander & Ebb’s Chicago
at the Willow Theatre in Sugar Sand Park

The Boca Raton Theatre Guild’s 2012-2013 season will begin with a comedy, and end with a classic.  A.R. Gurney’s Sylvia, and Kander & Ebb’s Chicago will run in September and March at the Willow Theatre in Sugar Sand Park.

Director Genie Croft will helm Sylvia, which will run September 28th through October 14th.  Croft, who recently directed the BRTG’s sold out production of Lady Day at Emerson’s Bar and Grill, has also been responsible for guiding the Guild’s successful productions of Neil Simon’s Broadway Bound and Charles Busch’s The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife.   Sylvia is the comic tale of a middle-aged couple who move back to New York City. However, their new life is humorously upended when the husband adopts a most unusual canine. A.R. Gurney (Love Letters) has tapped into the fragility of human relationships, and the joys and frustrations of pet ownership and has created what most people feel is his best work – a delicate balance of humor and poignancy.  Patti Gardner (The Tale of the Allergist’s Wife) Jacqueline Laggy (Other People’s Money, Chapter Two), Keith Garsson (Other People’s Money, Broadway Bound), and Mario Betto (The Sisters Rosensweig, playwright – Combing Through Life’s Tangles) will star. (Tickets: $25)

In Chicago, John Kander, Fred Ebb, and Bob Fosse created a work that flawlessly evokes its vaudeville setting.  Flamboyant flappers, crooked lawyers, and merry murderesses are all part of a sparkling script and a classic score that includes “All That Jazz,” “Cell Block Tango” and “Razzle Dazzle.” Chicago’s songbook immediately became an integral part of the Broadway lexicon during its original Broadway run in 1975.

Two of South Florida top talents will join director Keith Garsson to lead Chicago’s creative team: Choreographer Ron Hutchins and Music Director Eric Alsford.

Says Garsson, who also serves as the BRTG’s Artistic Director: “Hopefully our audiences will be pleased with our continued evolution away from community theatre. Each year our productions have grown significantly in both ambition and execution. With Chicago we intend to leverage even more of South Florida’s top talent.” (Tickets: $27 if purchased before January 1st, 2013, $30 if purchased after January 1st).

The Boca Raton Theatre Guild is also pleased to welcome the Women’s Theatre Project to the Willow Theatre. “We have had great success importing TWTP’s The Year of Magical Thinking and Bridge & Tunnel into our past two seasons,” says Keith Garson. “Their provocative plays will add a new and critical dimension to the theatre at Sugar Sand Park. Their artistic Director Genie Croft has directed all of our plays for the past several seasons, so their move to the Willow is both logical and inspiring.”

The Boca Raton Theatre Guild is a not-for-profit organization dedicated to producing professional productions and advancing the art of theatre in the South Florida community.

All productions will take place in the Willow Theatre in Sugar Sand Park.  The theatre is located at 300 South Military Trail in Boca Raton, just south of Palmetto Park Road. Tickets for Sylvia will go on sale on August 1st, and can be purchased at the Willow Theatre Box office: 561-347-3948.

The Boca Raton Theatre Guild

Parade Productions presents “Better Than Damn Good” – April 23rd

15 Thursday Mar 2012

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To present a premier reading of
Stuart Meltzer’s
Better Than Damn Good
at
The Studio at Mizner Park
April 23

Talk Back with Playwright, Director, and Cast

Boca Raton, Florida:
Parade Productions, Boca Raton’s newest theatre company, will follow up their wildly successful debut production of Donald Margulies Brooklyn Boy with a premier reading of South Florida playwright Stuart Meltzer’s comedy, Better Than Damn Good. The reading will take place on April 23rd, at 7:30 p.m., at the Studio at Mizner Park in Boca Raton.

Written in a sophisticated voice reminiscent of a young Woody Allen, Meltzer’s tour de force comedy follows a group of Manhattanites through their complicated, too-funny, too-real dilemmas.

Director Kim St. Leon has assembled a top-notch cast, including Michael McKeever, Michael Gioia, Jacqueline Laggy, Kim Ostrenko, Nan Walter, Linda Ellis, Candace Caplin, Natasha Waisfeld, and Meltzer himself.  All will participate in a talk back following the performance.

Although he is primarily recognized as one of South Florida’s finest and busiest directors, Meltzer enjoys writing immensely: “It is an enormously fun and creative time for me when I get to put on the playwright’s hat. I don’t often get that opportunity but it is one that feels the most comfortable, oddly enough,” he says.

“And I am thrilled to have my play read with the wonderful creative and producing team at Parade Productions,” Meltzer continues.  “Being a new theatre company in South Florida, it is wonderful to have another place where local playwrights can workshop material and hear it read. Kim St. Leon is an incredible director who understands my style and rhythms very well. She totally understands the characters and I feel very happy that she likes the play as much as she does.”

STUART MELTZER is the Artistic Director and a founding member of Zoetic Stage. He directed The SantaLand Diaries, Michael McKeever’s world premiere play Moscow, and the world premiere of Christopher Demos-Brown’s Captiva for which he is currently nominated for a Carbonell Award for Best Director of a Play.  In 2010, he directed Zoetic Stage’s critically acclaimed inaugural production of South Beach Babylon. Previously, Stuart served as the Artistic Director of City Theatre in Miami, where he oversaw and expanded the Summer Shorts Festival.  His New York credits include Romulus Linney’s Gint, Harold Pinter’s One for the Road, Aristophanes’ Lysistrata, Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls… as well as Morzek’s Striptease. South Florida directing credits include Kiss of the Spider Woman, Painted Alice, Barefoot Boy With Shoes On, Everything Will be Different, and Melt. He received his M.F.A. in Directing from the Actors Studio in 2002 and B.F.A. from New World School of the Arts in Miami, where he currently serves as part of their adjunct faculty.

Parade Productions is a not-for profit theatre company whose mission is “To produce high quality theatre experiences that entertain, enlighten, inform, uplift, and inspire audiences, sending them home with new thoughts, insights, questions, and ideas.”

Tickets for Better Than Damn Good are $12.00 and are on sale now. Tickets can be purchased on-line at www.paradeproductions.org, or by calling 866-811-4111.  For group sales, call: 561-291-9678.

Better Than Damn Good
April 23
7:30 p.m.
The Studio at Mizner Park
Tickets $12
For Tickets:  www.paradeproductions.org
866-811-4111
Group Tickets: 561-291-9678

 

MY MOTHER’S ITALIAN, MY FATHER’S JEWISH & I’M IN THERAPY!

26 Sunday Feb 2012

Posted by in Clients, My Mother's Jewish, My Father's Italian & I'm in Therapy

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PLAYWRIGHT STEVE SOLOMON
STARS IN HIS OWN
HILARIOUS COMEDY

MY MOTHER’S ITALIAN, MY FATHER’S JEWISH & I’M IN THERAPY!
Coral Springs Center for the Arts
2855 Coral Springs Drive, Coral Springs, FL 33065
March 14 – 25, 2012
Tickets ON SALE NOW!

Brooklyn born, Boynton Beach resident Steve Solomon will perform in his three time award winning comedy MY MOTHER’S ITALIAN, MY FATHER’S JEWISH & I’M IN THERAPY!  at the Coral Springs Center for the Arts for a limited 2-week engagement, March 14th through  March 25th.

Solomon is very excited about coming back in Florida after hundreds of performances around the United States in 2011.  As he puts it, “There’s nothing like a South Florida crowd…. After the show, you ask the audience how they’re doing and they all tell you!”

MY MOTHER’S ITALIAN, MY FATHER’S JEWISH & I’M IN THERAPY! will reach another production milestone in 2012—Two Thousand performances spanning dozens of states, Canada, South Africa and (in October) Australia.

Solomon has added a lot of new material to spice up the Coral Springs production, and is looking forward to appearing in his own play in his home state:  “Sure I’m delighted with how my other actors play the part around the country,” Solomon says. “But South Florida is MY home, and these are MY friends and neighbors.  This way if I don’t please them, they can knock on my door and complain personally.”

Described as “One part lasagna, one part kreplach, and two parts Prozac,” you don’t have to be Jewish or Italian to love this show. All you need is to know what it feels like to leave a family dinner with heartburn and a headache.

“Steve Solomon is Alan King, Billy Crystal, a smidgen of Don Rickles
and George Carlin all thrown in.”  Variety

“Perfect comic timing.” New York Post

Tickets are $45.50 (Golden Circle) and $42.50 (Orchestra) for Wednesday and Thursday performances and $49.50 (Golden Circle) and $44.50 (Orchestra) for Friday, Saturday and Sunday performances. Group discounts are available. Tickets are on sale now and can be purchased at www.ItalianJewish.com or www.coralspringscenterforthearts.com  or by calling the Box Office at 954-344-5990. Discounts of $10 per ticket for groups of 20 or more are available – for more information about group sales, call 888-264-1788.

The show is produced by Philip Roger Roy, Dana Matthow, and Bud Martin.  For more information, visit www.ItalianJewish.com.

MY MOTHER’S ITALIAN, MY FATHER’S JEWISH & I’M IN THERAPY!
March 14-March 25, 2012
Coral Springs Center for the Arts
2855 Coral Springs Drive, Coral Springs 33605
Tickets $49.50-$42.50
For Tickets:  www.coralspringscenterforthearts.com
                           954-344-5990
Group Tickets:   888-264-1788

Performance Schedule:

March 14, 2012 – Wednesday – 2:00 pm
March 14, 2012  – Wednesday – 7:30 pm
March 15, 2012  – Thursday – 7:30 pm
March 16, 2012 – Friday – 8:00 pm
March 17, 2012 – Saturday – 2:00 pm
March 17, 2012 – Saturday – 8:00 pm
March 18, 2012 –  Sunday – 1:00 pm
March 21, 2012  – Wednesday – 2:00 pm
March 21, 2012 –  Wednesday – 7:30 pm
March 22, 2012 – Thursday – 7:30 pm
March 23, 2012 – Friday – 8:00 pm 
March 24, 2012  Saturday 2:00 pm
March 24, 2012  Saturday 8:00 pm
March 25, 2012  Sunday 1:00

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