A suicidal husband, a vaudeville act down on its luck, a pair of commedia dell’arte clowns, two morbidly sensitive shepherds, and a train passenger trapped in the loo with an idiot conductor on the far side of the door. What do these characters have in common? Well, brought together in one-act plays under the aegis of Island Theatre Workshop, they represent a fruitcake slice of the human predicament. They are also, as samples of the absurdist tradition, a whole bunch of fun.
The Vineyard Playhouse and the Martha’s Vineyard Library Association continue a five-year tradition of presenting an exciting live theater experience for Island children.
The Playhouse’s troupe, The Fabulists, will perform The Call of the Cuckoo, an entertaining stage adaptation of a folk tale from Afghanistan, written by Elizabeth Wojtusik. There is one performance on Saturday morning, March 22, at 11 a.m. at the Vineyard Playhouse, 24 Church street in downtown Vineyard Haven.
Men: Casting Call
Island Theatre Workshop has an urgent casting call for two men, needed immediately for May/June production of I Sent a Letter to My Love.
First, a man with stage experience who can play as a 30 to 40-year-old, sings baritone or tenor and has comic timing.
Second, a man who can play between 22 to 30 years old, sings tenor or baritone and is larger than life.
Please call 508-627-2456 or 508-627-3166 and leave a message.
Island Theatre Workshop’s second annual one-act festival opens Friday, March 14, at the Katharine Cornell Theatre.
Three directors will offer a program of four plays, all of which look at life with both humor and sadness.
Lee Fierro will be presenting two shows: Aria da Capa, by Edna St.Vincent Millay, and Extensions, by Murray Schisgal.
Since last week’s assassination of Imad Mughniyeh, a leading figure in Islamist fundamentalist organization Hezbollah, Liz Dembrowsky, director of New York theatre company White Trash Intellectuals, does her day job with a police officer in the room, for security.
A speechwriter for United Jewish Communities, a non-governmental organization that raises funds for Israel’s poor, she also spent her 30th birthday last week writing a press release on a suicide bombing that occurred in Dimona, Israel. For Ms. Dembrowsky, it’s all good training.
Edgartown School Theatre
Celebrates Science Fiction
Starting tonight, Friday, Feb. 8 and running through Sunday, the Edgartown School Theatre Department will present Starmites, a musical science fiction adventure.
Directed by Donna Swift and Beth Carr, the show is about a girl who is transported into one of her favorite comic books to help battle evil and restore order to Earth and Innerspace.