Jeffrey Ellis - Page 101

With the Tony Award-winning musical Spring Awakening making its Tennessee premiere tonight in Tullahoma in a sparkling new production directed by Robert Allen, we present dueling "Friday Fives," featuring the show's two leads. The focus of this interview? None other than Michael Adcock, winner in January of a BroadwayWorld.com Tennessee Theatre Award for his performance in Anything Goes at Murfreesboro's Center for the Arts.

Today's spotlight falls upon Blair Allison, who in January was recognized as one of First Night's Top 11 of 2011 Actors We'd Invest In For the Biggest Payoff (If We Had The Money). Tonight she opens in the Tennessee premiere of Spring Awakening, playing Wendla Bergman at Alpine Chateau, February 24 and 25, directed by Robert Allen (and playing opposite Michael Adcock, who stars in today's second installment of The Friday Five). After rolling in the hay as Wendla, Allison will focus on her next onstage assignment: The Ugly Duckling, running March 16-18 in the Belmont Little Theatre.

Will Butler is pretty jazzed up about playing Eugene Morris Jerome in Circle Players' upcoming production of Neil Simon's Brighton Beach Memoirs which might be due, in part, to the fact that he's pretty certain he's got all the lines down pat. But the real reason he's excited is that Brighton Beach marks his return-it's kind of a comeback for the young actor-to the Nashville stage since his "senior capstone project" at Belmont University in 2010.

On the day before Tommy in Concert bows at STC's venue (conveniently located at 1933 Elm Hill Pike), get to know Ben Van Diepen, who plays Captain Walker, better. Just coming off his gig as music director of Blackbird Theater's Pacific Overtures, he turns his attention now to Tommy in Concert.

Comedian, author and Emmy Award-winning actor Leslie Jordan will have a homecoming of sorts on May 15 when he returns to Chattanooga to headline Tuesday Night Live!, Chattanooga Theatre Centre's annual fundraising gala, with proceeds going to the Annual Fund.

Tyrannical and imperious, Bernarda Alba rules her five daughters with an iron-fisted vehemence in Actors Bridge Ensemble and Belmont University Theatre's presentation of Federico Garcia Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba, which marks the return to the stage of Vali Forrister, Actors Bridge producing artistic director, after a far too long six-year absence.

In the days before Tommy in Concert bows at STC's venue (conveniently located at 1933 Elm Hill Pike), we'll introduce you to the principals who weigh in with their takes on the production. First up: Holly Shepherd, a Nashville stage favorite making her STC debut which follows her recent one-woman show that wowed sold-out crowds and her First Night's Top 11 of 2011-honored performance as Miss Hannigan in Annie at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre…

Try as they might, director Martha Wilkinson and her talented ensemble of actors just can't breathe enough life into a thin, tepid script to make it work onstage for audiences eager to be entertained. Virginia Cate and Duke Ernsberger's Elvis Has Left The Building is pleasant enough, with a promising premise, yet it falls flat despite the best efforts of the cast and crew putting forth the new production at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre.

First up is Gina D'Arco, one of Belmont University's most gifted actors, who tonight opens in Actors Bridge Ensemble's staging of Federico Garcia Lorca's The House of Bernard Alba (the professional company's annual collaborative production with Belmont University's Department of Theatre and Dance), directed by Jessika Malone, who helmed last year's critically acclaimed and award-winning production of Eurydice by Sarah Ruhl.

Vali Forrister retuns to the stage for the first time since her 2006 triumph in How I Learned to Drive to lead the cast of Actors Bridge Ensemble and the Belmont University Department of Theatre and Dance's production of Frederico Garcia Lorca's The House of Bernarda Alba. Jessika Malone, artistic associate at ABE, directs the cast of Emily Mann's adaptation of Lorca's work which has been described as 'a cross between Downton Abbey and The Bachelor with an added splash of Mommie Dearest.'

The play provided the impetus for the venerable Columbo television series, starring the late Peter Falk. The cast includes Eric Link (2011 Lakie Award Winner for Best Lead Actor), Buffi Holland, Pamm Howard (named BroadwayWorld.com's 'Best Featured Actress in a Play' for her performance in A Few Good Men), Rod Streng, April Hardcastle-Miles and Patrick Goedicke as 'Lt Columbo.'

Jessika Malone, artistic associate at ABE, directs the cast of Emily Mann's adaptation of Lorca's work which has been described as 'a cross between Downton Abbey and The Bachelor with an added splash of Mommie Dearest.' Opening, Friday, February 17, and running through February 26, The House of Bernarda Alba plays Belmont University's Troutt Theatre at 2100 Belmont Boulevard. General admission tickets are $18, with tickets for seniors at $12.

From the same writing team that created Frankly, My Dear-Duke Ernsburger and Virginia Cate-comes the latest comedy opening at Nashville's Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre: Elvis Has Left the Building. Running February 16-March 18, the comedy is directed by Martha Wilkinson, artistic director of the company that is celebrating its 45th season of bringing theater to Nashville audiences.

In a town where everyone from your next-door neighbor to your favorite barista - from your dental hygienist to your manicurist, your seatmate on the bus, your friendly neighborhood bartender and maybe even the guy who does your taxes - is a songwriter, you'll find that there's never a shortage of opinions on the topic of favorite songs. Ask a cross-section of Nashville theater-types what their favorite love song is from the annals of musical theater and you're going to get a barrage of answers.

Pulitzer Prize-nominated playwright Tina Howe (her Painting Churches was a 1984 finalist for the prize and Pride's Crossing was a Pulitzer finalist in 1997), and Mark Richard, the author of the best-selling House of Prayer No. 2, will be among the special guests at this year's Southern Literary Festival, held March 29-31 on the Lipscomb University campus in Nashville.

What began as a commissioned opera in Boston, and which was shelved during a management shake-up, and what eventually turned into a 17-year odyssey for composer Robert Aldridge and librettist Herschel Garfein, came full-circle Sunday, February 12, when their original work, Elmer Gantry, won two Grammy Awards.

Dickson's Gaslight Dinner Theatre kicks off 2012 by bringing Hollywood and Broadway legends Judy Garland and Mickey Rooney to life via the musical revue Babes in Hollywood: The Music of Garland and Rooney, February 14-March 10.

Nashville Symphony's recording of Joseph Schwantner's Concerto for Percussion & Orchestra was honored with a GRAMMY Award for Best Classical Instrumental Solo on Sunday at the 54th Annual GRAMMY® Awards. This latest recognition is the seventh GRAMMY® Award to be presented to a recording by the Nashville Symphony.

It might not be great art, but Xanadu-the new musical onstage through March 3 at Franklin's Boiler Room Theatre-sure is great fun! Pure, unadulterated escapism, Xanadu is laugh-out-loud funny, thanks primarily to the book by Douglas Carter Beane, but you have to give props to director Corbin Green and his talented cast who bring the completely ridiculous musical (featuring the music of Electric Light Orchestra's Jeff Lynne and John Farrar) to life onstage.

Debuting February 28 at Nashville Children's Theatre-where it will continue through March 18-is producing artistic director Scot Copeland's original adaptation of The Beauty and the Beast (La Belle et la Bete), described as "an exquisitely theatrical adaptation of the French fairy tale by Jeanne-Marie Le Prince de Beaumont.