Abigail Arnold - Page 21

The Walt Disney company will be releasing a new hand-drawn 'Winnie the Pooh' animated movie on July 15, 2011, jimhillmedia.com has reported. The movie will be called 'Winnie the Pooh' and will feature songs by Robert Lopez, who collaborated on the score for AVENUE Q, and Kristen Anderson-Lopez. The story will be based on five stories from the original Winnie the Pooh books by A.A. Milne.

Deadline.com has been the first to report that actress Carrie Fisher is to appear in a guest role on 'Entourage,' HBO's comedy series. Fisher's character, Anna Fowler, is a reporter who works for Deadline Hollywood. She may reappear on the show.

Actress Julia Stiles is to appear in the fifth season of the television show 'Dexter,' Entertainment Weekly reports. Details on the role Stiles will be playing has not yet been announced.

Sigourney Weaver will star alongside Twilight's Taylor Lautner and RED's Alfred Molina in the upcoming film 'Abduction,' Variety reports today. In the Lionsgate feature, a young man (Lautner) discovers that he was kidnapped as a child and sets out to find his birth parents. Chaos and danger ensue. Weaver will play the psychiatrist of Lautner's character.

Jack Wetherall will join the previously announced Dana Ivey in 'Happy Days' by Samuel Beckett, July 6 - 24, as part of the 80th Anniversary Season at Westport Country Playhouse. Directed by Mark Lamos, Playhouse artistic director, the production is the third in the Playhouse's premier season under Lamos' artistic direction. Lamos will speak about Beckett's inspiring play at a Sunday Symposium on Sunday, July 11, following the 3 p.m. matinee performance.

As previously announced on the 2010 New Years' Honours List, Nicholas Hytner, artistic director of London's National Theatre, was made a knight bachelor yesterday by Queen Elizabeth II.

New York Musical Theater Festival will kick off its 7th season with BEST OF THE FEST, a gala celebration to toast the achievements of the Festival's alumni. The one night only benefit concert will take place on Monday, June 21st at 8 PM at New World Stages (340 West 50th Street, between 8th and 9th Avenues).

WINE LOVERS, the wine-tasting musical, previously scheduled to run through June 13 at Le Petit Théâtre du Vieux Carré's Muriel's Cabaret Theatre in New Orleans, will now run through June 20, according to the theatre's official website. Over the course of the play, audience members will enjoy a tasting of six delightful wines along with the cast.

Cynthia Nixon is in talks to star in AS BEES IN HONEY DROWN in the West End, imdb.com reports today, which is scheduled to open in London in July, 2010. Nixon appeared in the original 1997 New York production of the play.

As previously reported by BroadwayWorld, the Manhattan Theatre Club will present a reading of the new musical STUNT GIRL (book and lyrics by Peter Kellogg, music by David Friedman) as part of their Ernst C. Stiefel '7@7' reading series. The Village Theatre of Issaquah, Washington, where STUNT GIRL was first presented in 2005, has now reported that Brian Yorkey, bookwriter and lyricist of NEXT TO NORMAL and former artistic director of the Village Theatre, will direct the reading.

On June 21, New York's The Acting Company will host ONE ENCHANTED EVENING: RODGERS, RODGERS, AND GUETTEL, a benefit celebrated the music of Richard Rodgers, daughter Mary Rodgers, and grandson Adam Guettel. The benefit will be directed by Christopher Gattelli with musical direction by Mary-Mitchell Campbell and will feature many theatrical luminaries.

The Australian hit musical THE SAPPHIRES is to be made into a film, Variety reported yesterday. The musical, which won the Best Play Helpmann Award in 2005, deals with four Aboriginal women in the 1960s who form a Supremes-esque singing group and perform for soldiers in Vietnam. The musical was written by Tony Briggs and based on the experiences of his mother, Laurel Robinson, and his aunt, Lois Peeler. It was recently produced in Sydney to popular acclaim.

The Berkshire Theatre Festival has announced the cast for its production of Jason Robert Brown's THE LAST FIVE YEARS, which will play from June 22 to July 10. The production, which will be directed by Anders Cato, will star Julie Reiber as Cathy and Paul Anthony Stewart as Jamie.

Arbitrator Marlene Gold has decided that the Broadway League must include a TKTS ticket purchase fee of $1 when calculating royalties for members of the Stage Directors and Choreographers Society (SDC), Variety reported today. Gold ruled that this money should be included when determining a production's total sales figures, out of which royalties are frequently calculated as a percentage. The fee of $1 has been included in the price of every ticket purchased at New York City's TKTS booths since 2008; Gold has decided that this new ruling must be used to recalculate all royalties from then on.

Guillermo del Toro has abandoned his role as director on the upcoming film versions of 'The Hobbit,' based on the novel by J.R.R. Tolkien, www.deadline.com reports. However, he will continue to participate in the writing of the screenplay.

The current Broadway production of FENCES, written by August Wilson and starring Denzel Washington and Viola Davis, just reported its second week of over one million dollars in grosses, according to www.deadline.com. FENCES reported grossing $1,002,750 last week. The week of May 9, FENCES grossed $1,008,103.50, grossing more than any previous production at the Cort Theatre, where it is playing.

Actor Bobby Cannavale has been signed by International Creative Management, www.deadline.com reported today. Those that signed Cannavale include Bonnie Bernstein, one of his agents at WME Entertainment, who formerly represented him.

Pacific Conservatory of the Performing Arts Theaterfest is pleased to present the American Premiere of My Fairytale, a musical about Hans Christian Andersen. The musical is composed by Stephen Schwartz, the award-winning composer of Godspell, Pippin and Wicked, and will be presented in time for the 2011 centennial celebration of Solvang, CA as a Danish-American community. This exclusive engagement will preview in Santa Maria's Marian Theatre August 12 - 19, 2011, then open under the stars in the Solvang Festival Theater August 26, playing through September 25, 2011.

Decca released Clay Aiken's fifth studio album, Tried and True, today. The bulk of the album is made up of songs from the 1950s and 1960s that Aiken listened to as a child in Raleigh, North Carolina.

Tonight, June 1 at 8pm, HBO will air 'I Knew It Was You: Rediscovering John Cazale,' a documentary about actor John Cazale. Cazale appeared in 'The Godfather' (as Fredo Corleone), 'The Godfather: Part II,' 'The Conversation,' 'Dog Day Afternoon,' and 'The Deer Hunter.' The film will explore both Cazale's film credits and his background in the theater.