Sunday, November 07, 1999
DTC soldiers on despite losses, cuts
'Wonderful Life' to return this month
BY JACKIE DEMALINE
The Cincinnati Enquirer
Downtown Theatre Classics is shopping for its third artistic director in four years — the positive spin being that the company is planning to be here in 2000 and beyond.
The financial 11th hour has passed, says DTC founder Chuck Wente, at least to the point of moving forward with the two remaining shows of the season.
The reworked holiday musical It's a Wonderful Life, a world premiere for DTC last year, returns Nov. 26 through Dec. 12 to the Aronoff's Jarson-Kaplan. Among the belt-tightening measures are Mr. Wente stepping in as director, the live orchestra dropped in favor of taped music (a savings of $20,000-plus) and no salaried artistic director at present.
Mr. Wente envisions a small profit on Wonderful Life and on season closer Wait Until Dark, for which a director is needed. That would take DTC, an official Equity stock company as of Oct. 15, into 2000-2001 with a little cash.
Mr. Wente anticipates cutting back to four shows from the current five, cutting performances back from three weeks to two, finding a season sponsor with at least a three-year commitment and returning to the first season's plan: one large musical, one small musical, two nonmusicals.
“We're not a musical theater,” he says emphatically, but DTC had its largest surge of subscribers when it went all musical in its second season. The company lost them again with this season's mixed bag of musicals and plays.
If all proceeds as dreamed, a new season will be announced in time to market it during the March run of Wait Until Dark. An artistic director will be named shortly after.
Anyone interested in applying for the job can call Mr. Wente at 621-3822.
PLAYWRIGHT'S LOCAL DEBUT: Much admired African-American playwright Pearl Cleage gets her local debut in reading form Monday when the new Theatre of the Mind continues its Women's Writers series at Mercantile Library (414 Walnut St.) Curtain time is 7 p.m., admission $5.
Flyin' West centers on a little-known bit of American history: the post-Civil War migration of ex-slaves to the wide-open American prairie and the black frontier towns they established.
“It's a play that deserves a hearing in Cincinnati,” says director Luther Gibson, a founder of Amethyst in the Eighties and the longtime director of the annual Dreambuilders Celebration. “There's a rich texture to her writing, and the social issues (including domestic violence) remain eye-opening today.”
The cast includes Everett Cork, Marcia Isabel and Edna Lindsey.
Theatre of the Mind has lined up directors for the remainder of its season of regional premieres of plays written by contemporary women (presented in reading form).
Cincinnati Shakespeare Festival's Rebecca Bowman will direct Naomi Wallace's In the Heart of America, Jan. 10; Regina Pugh, who teaches at School for Creative and Performing Arts and Playhouse in the Park will direct Tongue of a Bird, March 13. (Her production of Earhart at Ensemble Theatre continues through today.)
The series concludes May 8 with ETC artistic director D. Lynn Meyers directing View of the Dome by Cincinnati native Theresa Rebeck.
An audition for In the Heart of America is scheduled for 6-9 p.m. Nov. 18 at Xavier University's Student Center (Terrace Room). There are roles for two Caucasian men (20s to 40s), an Arab-American man and woman (20s to early 30s) and an Asian-American woman (20s to 30s). Honorariums will be paid.
To schedule an audition time, call Rebecca Bowman at Cincinnati Shakespeare, 381-2288.
For reservations and information about Theatre of the Mind and Women's Writers, call Barbara Stanley at 961-2994.
"THUNDER' ON THE MARCH: Will Thunder be knockin' on Broadway's door? That was the question posed in Playbill on Line recently.
Playhouse in the Park's acclaimed 1998 production of Thunder Knockin' on the Door, with musical score by Grammy-winning Keb Mo and directed by author Keith Glover, spent most of summer and fall touring regional theaters with hopes of a direct Broadway move. Thunder wrapped its regional tour at Great Lakes Theatre Festival in Cleveland last week.
The New York move didn't happen, but producer Mitchell Maxwell, interviewed by Playbill on Line, said the latest plan is to get to the Great White Way via Glitter Gulch.
The show is expected to re-
assemble in early February for a Las Vegas pre-Broadway warm-up, at a venue to be announced. Mr. Maxwell and partners are hoping to get Thunder, capitalized at $3 million, in New York in March, in time for Tony Award eligibility.
BLACK THEATRE FESTIVAL: There will be a second Black Theatre Festival. Plans base the two-week festival at Arts Consortium March 1-12.
Organizer Don Sherman, who debuted the first festival in 1998, says, “I've wanted to do another festival since we ended the first one, but I want it to be viable, something that will last.”
For the 2000 edition of the festival, “We'd like to highlight new artists.”
His dreams include possibly inviting a regional company to perform as an anchor event and reaching out to work with other venues. He welcomes all project proposals.
There will be auditions from 9 a.m. to 2 p.m. Nov. 20 and Dec. 4 at Arts Consortium (1515 Linn St.).
Anyone with a new script or project proposal should drop them off in advance at the consortium, to Mr. Sherman's attention.
These big ideas demand lots of volunteer support. Call Mr. Sherman at Arts Consortium, 381-0645, to help make the festival happen.
ARTS CONSORTIUM'S PLANS: Arts Consortium is under way with its own three-play 1999-2000 theater schedule. Athol Fugard's Sizwe Bansi Is Dead, presented by studio theatre, continues through Nov. 14 with 8 p.m. performances Thursday through Saturday and 3 p.m. Sunday matinees (including today).
C. Dean Tabler directs A.D. Davis, Reginald Willis and Derek Snow. For tickets ($15), call the box office at 381-0645.
Later this season, Don Sherman will direct For Colored Guys Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow Is Enuf, “a response to” Ntozake Shange's classic assemblage of poetry, movement and music For Colored Girls.... The third entry in the season will be a new script by a Chicago playwright (details to be announced) directed by Luther Gibson.
BENEFIT CABARET: What better title for an hourlong cabaret by the company of the touring Titanic than The Going Down Show? Cast members will sing show tunes and such at 11 p.m. Wednesday and Thursday Upstairs at Carol's (825 Main St.) to benefit Broadway Cares/Equity Fights AIDS and AIDS Volunteers of Cincinnati.
Tickets are $30. Call AVOC at 421-2437 to reserve.
Jackie Demaline is The Enquirer's theater critic and roving arts reporter. Write her at The Cincinnati Enquirer, 312 Elm St., Cincinnati, OH 45202; fax, 768-8330.
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