Jeffrey Ellis - Page 51

It would have taken a miracle to save the opening night of Circle Players' Children of Eden - one of the most eagerly anticipated productions of the season in Music City - from the wrath of God: in this case an abysmal sound design that prevented the audience from hearing Lauren Frances Jones' exquisite vocal performance as Eve in the Stephen Schwartz/John Caird musical.

There's nothing quite so entertaining - and nothing goes down more easily after a trip to the groaning board at Nashville's iconic Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre - than a musical revue that is sure to whisk you away to yesterday. Not the day before today, necessarily, but 'yesterday' as in a sentimental journey back to a time when life was somehow more innocent and somehow less complicated than what we experience in the day-to-day of 2016.

Garrett Marks, a 2013 magna cum laude graduate of Belmont University, left Nashville with two degrees in hand: a BFA in Dance and a BS in Entertainment Industry Studies - and hasn't slowed down since, it seems, although he maintains it took him a while to find his groove.

Nashville Repertory Theatre's unveils its production of the Kander and Ebb classic Chicago this weekend, as Music City is transformed into the Windy City - well, the Andrew Johnson Theatre at TPAC will be, at least - for a three week run of the show that asks the musical question "What price fame?"

Cast members Wesley King and Cassie Donegan move into our spotlight today, taking on our Friday 5 questions, offering you some insight into how they got to where they are today, what informs their creative process and, perhaps more importantly, telling why they think you should come see their show!

Shows are opening, shows are closing and the newly reimagined national tour of The Phantom of the Opera continues its run at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center this weekend. Theater in Tennessee continues its fast-paced run through 2016 with a number of new openings this week, thanks to Bongo After Hours Theatre, Nashville Rep, Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre, Circle Players and more - and Cumberland County Playhouse, Arts Center of Cannon County, Street Theatre Company, Lakewood Theatre Company and ACT 1 continue runs of their latest shows - to give you even more opportunities to celebrate the magic of live theater in the Volunteer State! And on Monday night, The Chicago Talking Machine Company premieres its first Nashville show at the Centennial Black Box Theatre.

As the national touring company of Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera continues its run at TPAC, a brand new theater company debuts in White House this weekend, with another much-anticipated production of The Phantom of the Opera, based upon the novel by Gaston Leroux and featuring music by Donizetti, Mozart, Puccini and Gounod. Adapted by Tracy Wells, Ron Lee directs a cast that includes Deron Ryan Martel, Rebecca Nelson and Jonathan Hunter.

Nashville Children's Theatre (NCT)  today announces the appointments of longtime Nashville arts leaders Dan Brewer and Bennett Tarleton as Acting Artistic Director and Interim Managing Director, respectively. Brewer and Tarleton will steer NCT through its management transition as the theatre enters into a nation-wide search to fill the recently vacated executive management positions. 

Music City Theatre Company presents Amy Herzog's 4000 Miles, directed by Bradley Moore, at Nashville's Darkhorse Theater April 1-9. Taylor Novak, Terry Occhiogrosso, Britt Byrd and Megan Blevins star in Herzog's 4000 Miles, which is described as "a dramatic comedy," that ran Off-Broadway in 2011, and again in 2012, and was a finalist for the 2013 Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

Directors and producers throughout Middle Tennessee are seeking actors for upcoming productions of Verge Theater Company's Skinless, Legally Blonde, the Musical (at Columbia's Center for the Arts) and The Little Mermaid (directed by Brittany Blaire Anderson for Circle Players) - and the folks from Disney are planning auditions coming up in April, so you know you want to put on your ears and welcome them to Music City... We've gathered the details together here to make your planning easier. So now you have no excuse: go follow your dream!

A perfect example is Chantal Nchako, a native of Douala, Cameroon, and a graduate of Howard University in Washington, D.C. On her burgeoning resume, you will find such projects as The Vagina Monologues at New World Stages; All American Girls at the Actor's Temple; and Henry V at the Classical Theatre of Harlem. In addition, she starred as Agent Cooper in the feature film Raltat, which was nominated in the Pan African Film Festival.

Next up in its 10th Anniversary season, Mt. Juliet's Encore Theatre Company presents Marsha Norman's 'night, Mother. The show opens Friday, March 25 and runs weekends through April 3. Friday and Saturday shows are at 7:30 p.m., with Sunday matinees at 2:30 p.m. Doors open 30 minutes prior to show time.

Winner of the 2014 Tony Awards for Best Original Score and Best Orchestrations, The Bridges of Madison County makes its Nashville debut with a limited, one-week engagement at the Tennessee Performing Arts Center's Andrew Jackson Hall on May 10-15. Tickets go on sale Friday, March 18, at 10 a.m. at www.TPAC.org, by phone at (615) 782-4040, and at the TPAC Box Office, 505 Deaderick Street, in downtown Nashville. For group tickets, please call (615) 782-4060.

Sometimes it seems there is so much theater happening that it's difficult to keep track of it all. From personal experience, despite all the notebooks, datebooks, smart phones, tablets, desktop computers and laptops...it's hard to keep everything straight in this wacky business of the show.

Melinda Paul and Michael Adcock lead an exhilarating production of the Tony Award-winning Memphis, the Musical - which features an exuberant cast that blends veteran talents like Michael McGee and Susan Walsworth with rising young performers such as Quantavius Rankins and Jordan McCullough, all of whom give their all in bringing the David Bryan-Joe DiPietro work to the stage - running through March 26 at Woodbury's Arts Center of Cannon County.

After 28 years, more than 10,000 performances on Broadway (where it reigns as the longest running show in history), countless tours and with rabid fans greeting the show at every stop, Andrew Lloyd Webber's The Phantom of the Opera continues to amaze and delight, as noted in its press opening at Nashville's Tennessee Performing Arts Center's Andrew Jackson Hall on March 11.

If this is Friday, then there's got to be a new production opening tonight, right? And sure enough, down in Woodbury - home of the Arts Center of Cannon County - 2015 First Night Honoree Darryl Deason unveils his latest directorial assignment with Memphis, The Musical, starring Melinda Paul (most recently seen onstage in Circle Players' Sister Act) and Michael Adcock (who has performed on stages throughout Middle Tennessee) and an ensemble filled with many local stage veterans (including Quantavius Rankins, who closed Dreamgirls at Murfreesboro's Center for the Arts less than a fortnight ago) and newcomers.

Winter's apparently over - it's in the mid-70s, balmy and windy, as we write this - and even before Spring pops up all over, there's an amazing amount of good theater to be found in the Nashville area. In fact, there's so much to choose from that you have absolutely no excuse staying alone in your room. Instead, in the wise and wonderful words of Sally Bowles, life is a cabaret and you're far more likely to find that out in the darkened confines of a theater, where magic and mayhem is bound to happen.

Directors and producers throughout Middle Tennessee are seeking actors for upcoming productions of Legally Blonde, the Musical (at Columbia's Center for the Arts) and The Little Mermaid (directed by Brittany Blaire Anderson for Circle Players) and Metro Parks and the Music City Theatre Collective team up for a series of special classes, including an audition workshop, for this spring, and producer Ken Bernstein presents a workshop to enable you to “Tell Your Story” at Bongo After Hours Theatre. We've gathered the details together here to make your planning easier. So now you have no excuse: go follow your dream!

The regional premiere of Ken Ludwig's comedic take on Sir Arthur Conan Doyle's The Hound of The Baskerville - Baskerville: A Sherlock Holmes Mystery - continues the 16th anniversary season of Dickson's Gaslight Dinner Theatre as the company's 74th show debuts March 31, running through April 9