Category: The Shaker

MCMURRAY, PA, – Little Lake Theatre Company announces that The Best of Everything, based on Rona Jaffe’s novel of the same name, will officially kick-off its run on May 28th as the second installment in Little Lake’s 67th season. The production also officially marks Roxy MtJoy’s directorial debut after taking the helm as Artistic Director at Little Lake Theatre.

“This is a great play to officially launch my Little Lake directing career,” said Roxy MtJoy. “It’s set in Manhattan and centers on the ‘many goings on’ in a 50’s-era secretarial pool at a publishing company. It’s reminiscent of ‘Mad Men’ but funnier – it’s light and frothy but with some serious bite, so it has a little bit of everything for our audiences.”

The Best of Everything follows the women of Fabian Publishing as they navigate career ambitions and romantic adventures. And MtJoy teases, Little Lake patrons should pay particular attention to the men at the Christmas office party. They’re kind of stiff. Sure, they’re tall, dark and handsome; but they’re so much alike that they could have rolled off an assembly line. They may as well be made of cardboard.

MtJoy’s wants Little Lake’s audiences to feel as if they’ve transported back to the early 1950s – from the women’s hairstyles to the music, complete with the politics (both office and sexual) that harken back to a half-century ago. But it’s not all serious – as Little Lake Theatre invites patrons to join them before each performance when doors open at 6:30 for a 50’s-style Cocktail Party, featuring some of the same Gin- and Scotch-based cocktails and desserts that the characters will partake in throughout the play. A mixologist was consulted to help recreate the cocktails from this era. Patrons are advised that there will be no intermission during this play; it runs for approximately 90 minutes.

The cast that brings these women and men to life features six newcomer actors to the Little Lake stage:

• Jane Joseph as Caroline Bender
• Mary Brodland as April Morrison
• Hollie Kawecki as Amanda Farrow
• Rebeka Hukill as Brenda
• Teresa Harrold as Mary Agnes
• Vincent Marshall as Mike Rice/Mr. Shalimar/Ronnie Wood/David Wilder Sagage

In addition to the six newcomers, there are two veteran Little Lake actors cast in The Best of Everything, including Jason Dille in the role of Eddie Harris; and Lindsey Bowes as Gregg Adams.

The Best of Everything runs May 28-30; June 4-7; and June 11-13. Tickets can be purchased online at http://www.littlelake.org/box-office/ or by phone at 724-745-6300.

Little Lake Theatre Company, a 501c3 non-profit organization, was founded in 1949 by Will Disney. Its mission is dedicated to presenting a thoughtful, well-balanced offering of plays appealing to an audience of mixed social, economic, educational, and generational levels; providing comprehensive training and hands-on experience in theater arts to emerging, as well as experienced actors, designers, and technicians; involving the community in outreach programs designed to provide accessibility and to encourage appreciation of live theater.

by Mike “Buzz” Buzzelli, ‘Burgh Vivant.

 

The Saints have marched in, staked their claim in Braddock, and are ready to show you a mystical, magical world that takes place right here, right now, around us, among us, in “The Saints Tour,” an immersive theatrical journey through deserted industrial spaces, burgeoning gardens and decaying cemeteries.

Since we first learned to communicate, humans gathered together around the fire, in the cave, and in sacred oak groves to tell and hear stories. It’s an ancient communal ritual. In Braddock, the Tour Guide (Bria Walker) spins Homeric yarns about the people in the blighted-but-rebuilding neighborhood.

This time, humans gathered outside a desolate dog park, the Tour Guide marches in, bedecked in a black dress, a delicate silk scarf in vivid earth tones swirled around her head and shoulders. After a short introduction, the audience follows her down Braddock Avenue, and the extraordinary expedition begins.

The Tour Guide leads her charges through the New Guild Art & Design Studio; the shop is laden with beautiful glasswork and the stunning, saintly iconography. The group exits through the rear of the building. Fifty or so people are directed to a yellow school bus.

On the bus, the Tour Guide is a tigress, hunching down, ready to pounce, listening to an imperceptible, ephemeral, unseen thing; translating the language of saints.

There are many weird and wonderful stops along the way on the tour. At one point, the bus snakes through the serpentine pathways of the Monongahela Cemetery, a gnarled passageway rising upward to the highest point of the hilltop, past crooked markers of the dead. The view from the top of the cemetery is spectacular. The tourists looked down at the tiny, disfigured community below, an urban diamond in the rough. In the distance, the purple flame from an impossibly tall smoke stack burned bright. On the top of another hill, the bright lights of Kennywood Park sparkled in the distance. An aerial silk performer dances on the limb of a tree; she writhes and contorts on a bolt of orange fabric.

The best part of the tour was when the stoic Tour Guide gently dispenses humor. Most of the audience/tourists couldn’t see past the veneer, but a small, plucky group of us snickered on the back of the bus, especially when the Tour Guide told the crowd to look right and then left, as if she was instructing them to swivel their heads for the first time in their lives.
There are some excellent stops along the way. On one particular bright spot, TeaAjah Cannon asked the tourists to dig in the dirt for trinkets, talismans of the Braddock Saints. Cannon is adorable with her dark skin and bright green hair. She is ebullient, effervescent, a joy to be in her company. It was stunning to discover she was only a sophomore at Propel Andrew Street High School.

The play theatrical experience is a massive undertaking for Bricolage and Real/Time Interventions, involving local artists such as Vanessa German, Lindsey Scherloum, David Pohl, James Simon, and Zena Ruiz. Playwright Molly Rice makes artful use of her surroundings. Rice’s tale is mystical, magical, but peppered with small moments of hilarity.

“The Saints Tour” is a tour de force, and a multitude of hands brought this project to life, but the success of this show lays squarely on Walker. She is electric, engaging, exciting. It’s difficult to even imagine anyone else in the role. She commands the bus with a paradoxical booming voice and quiet dignity. Near the end of the tour, she tells the tragic story of one young man and almost brought the audience/tourists to tears.

Bravo and brava to Artistic Director Jeffrey Carpenter and Producing Artistic Director Tami Dixon for shining a bright, heavenly light on Braddock.
“The Saints Tour” runs Wednesday through Sunday through June 13. For directions, additional information and more, go to http://www.bricolagepgh.org/events/saints-tour-0

 

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by Mike “Buzz” Buzzelli, ‘Burgh Vivant.

 

Take a tall glass, muddle “Our Town,” and “Twin Peaks,” and generously pour in some Budweiser – lots and lots of Budweiser – and you have a dark, potent cocktail titled “American Falls,” served on weekends at Braddock’s newest hotspot, the Barebones Black Box Theater.

Our story opens with eight actors on stage in various locations, each telling a snippet of a story that comes together like a scary-ass jigsaw puzzle. Billy Mound of Clouds (Leandro Cano), a Native American Payless shoe salesman, who watches television like it’s his second job, sets the scene. Billy, like his ancestors, believes in some serious metaphysical mumbo jumbo. Only his psychic intuition works from the bottom up. He gets premonitions that enter feet first, through his smoking new kicks.

Billy can’t wait to tell you about an eclectic collection of neighbors that surround him.

We methodically meet the rest of the cast. In one corner, Eric (John Steffenauer), Matt (Dave Mansueto) and Maddie (Sarah Silk) sit around the local bar and laugh, joke and trade tragic tales from childhood. These barroom buddies put the fun in dysfunctional.

Alone in another corner of the stage, across the dusty plain of American Falls, Samantha (Carrie Anne Spear) spills out her own darkly humorous anecdotes (the tattoo story is simply mesmerizing).

In a bedroom, not far from Billy’s living room, Samuel (Connor McCanlus) has a difficult conversation with eight-year-old Isaac (Gunnar Bjornson).

Above all the action, Lisa (Liz Hammond) narrates the story of her recent suicide. There are ghosts in this story, but, just like in real life, it’s the living ones you have to watch out for.

Somehow (within 70 minutes, mind you), these disparate threads come together, building a dark, disturbing narrative.

With director, and Barebones Productions main man, Patrick Jordan at the helm, you’re always in for a night of compelling theater, but “American Falls,” is utterly enthralling.

Though the entire cast is brilliant, special praise must be lavished on Cano’s Billy, McCanlus’ Samuel, and Spear’s Samantha.

Cano is superb as Billy Mound of Clouds. He’s the kind of guy you want to grab a beer with. He’s a far cry from Al Bundy, America’s best known shoe slinger.

McCanlus, who just wrapped up a stint as Robert, the wacky best friend in “Boeing Boeing” at the Cabaret in Theater Square, pulls a 180 and plays a menacing sociopath with homicidal tendencies. The vile diatribe he spews on to the young boy left in his care is loathsome. His character is so villainous, you’ll want to punch him in the gut after the show (Please don’t. There is a sweet human being beneath that scurrilous scoundrel).

Spear plays an alcoholic with a backlog of regrets, but she is so charismatic and charming; perhaps it’s the twinkle in her eyes as she recounts stories of Samantha’s youth.

Playwright Miki Johnson taps into the zeitgeist of the mundane and blows it up with dynamite.

Lisa, from her POV in Limbo puts it best. She says, “I mean, we do these things.  We spill coffee down our sleeve, we read the labels on soup cans, we honk our horns and floss our teeth and cry and sing and swallow and turn on light switches and turn them off again and get places on time and get places late and watch TV and we get upset when a storm takes out the electricity and we blink and open drawers and sometimes forget to close them again and write ourselves reminders.  All these things.  And it’s nothing.  It’s all nothing. And it’s everything.”

“American Falls” is everything; magical, lyrical, wacky weird, and wonderful.

P.S. Please note that Friday and Saturday shows include a pre-show reception from 6:30-7:45 with small plates from Superior Motors Chef Kevin Sousa in the home of Mayor John Fetterman.

“American Falls” runs until May 31 in the Barebones Black Box Theater, 1211 Braddock Avenue, Braddock, PA 15104

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by Mike “Buzz” Buzzelli, ‘Burgh Vivant.

The aphorism “fences make good neighbors” was never truer than it is in Lisa D’Amour’s “Detroit.” When Ben (Brett Sullivan Santry) and Mary (Alyssa Herron) invite their neighbors Kenny (John Feightner) and Sharon (Sara Fisher) over for a backyard barbecue, all hell breaks loose.

Ben and Mary are desperate for friends. He’s unemployed and she’s unsatisfied. Kenny and Sharon, however, aren’t just the kooky kids who move in next door. Sharon drops a bomb early in the play, she met Kenny in rehab. The couple bonded over substance abuse issues.  Things get weirder from there. Soon, we learn that the new neighbors don’t have any furniture, just a mattress on the floor of the bedroom. It actually takes Mary a bit longer than it should to realize that Kenny and Sharon are squatting, but, by the time they figure it out, they’re deep into the bonds of friendship. Mary even agrees to go camping with Sharon.
When Mary and Sharon return early from their “attempted” camping trip, things go from wacky to wild and, eventually, to catastrophic.

Playwright D’Amour raises some excellent questions about love, compatibility and trust in “Detroit.”

There are four great performances in this play.

Sullivan Santry is excellent as the sad-sack Ben, quietly boiling with rage under his mild-mannered unemployed entrepreneur exterior.  Herron is a perfect match for him. She’s stewing in her own juices as the sole bread-winner at a job she despises. Mary is a frustrated woman who knows more than willing to admit; deep down she knows the truth and it will unravel her.

Feightner and Fisher are so completely natural as the chaotic couple that it’s enthralling. Fisher is a ball of energy soaking up every moment she’s on stage.

Feightner, best known for bringing funny characters to life in improv (he’s on several Pittsburgh teams) and sketch comedy (most notably, Hustlebot), shows a far darker side. Its jarring to watch, like when Robin Williams played his first dramatic role in “World According to Garp” you want to say, “Oh, he can act, too,” as if comedy is easier.

P.S. it’s not.

Vince Ventura does a fine job directing this nearly tragic farce. Ventura is also the founding artistic director of the 12 Peers Theater who mounted this production. He should be commended for picking this absurd work that accentuates the talents of his wife, the aforementioned Fisher.

There are, however, two gripes about “Detroit.”

One, there are two obstructions (supporting beams) that make the play difficult to see from some angles (go early and get a good seat). It’s an unfortunate design of the venue and not the fault of scenic designer James Jamison who created a delightful set; backyard barbecue pastiche with all the trimmings, including an unwieldy, giant Steelers umbrella (that might be why Ben and Mary don’t have friends among all those Lions fans).

Two, there is a final scene that wraps everything up in a bow. It’s badly expositional, stiff and awkward, delivered by an actor, Larry Herrmann who appears in only the final few minutes.

These nagging items shouldn’t obstruct you from going to see “Detroit.” It’s a fun, fascinating dark comedy, brought to life by four talented actors.

“Detroit” runs May 14 through May 30 at the Maker Theater, 5950 Ellsworth Avenue, Pittsburgh, PA 15232.

 

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PITTSBURGH – For its 22nd season, Unseam’d Shakespeare presents a newly inspired adaptation of Thomas Bell’s Out of This Furnace, adapted by Andy Wolk.  Out of This Furnace is the story of immigrant steelworkers and their families who must scrape out a living in the shadow of the mill. The narrator, Dobie, leads the audience on a journey that explores the trials, tribulations and ultimate triumph of three generations of the Kracha/Dobrecjak family.

The production will be directed by Lisa Ann Goldsmith, with an all-new cast featuring Charles Beikert, Lea DiMarchi, Kate Falk, Matthew Mazurowski, Julia Netzer, Max Pavel, Charles David Richards, Jennifer Tober, Tammy Tsai, Mark Warchol.

Post-show discussions with the director and cast will be held following performances on June 10th and 17th.

Out of This Furnace will be presented at the Studio Theatre in the Cathedral of Learning in Oakland. Opening on Thursday, June 4 through June 21, 2015. Wed.-Sat. curtain at 7:30pm; Sunday matinees at 4 pm. Tickets are $18-$30 with group rates for 6+ audience members (for advanced sales only) Limited seating available; reservations recommended. Tickets available through www.unseamd.com or ShowClix: – 1-877-718-4253