by Jan Davisson
After fourteen months of this pandemic, I’d settle for seeing a school play! Well…I heard that the Barn Theater in Stuart was performing Rumors. Unfortunately, they’re only selling tickets for 50% of seats and were quickly all sold out. Then I heard that Lake Worth Playhouse had a murder-mystery…same story, all sold out.
Thankfully, both the Kravis and Palm Beach Dramaworks continue to have performances on YouTube. Tickets can be purchased at their box office, and then you’ll receive a code to put you online for the show.
Palm Beach Dramaworks
William Hayes and his crew have been the most consistent in providing an online streaming experience. They have performed everything from new scripts and traditional plays to several days of new script readings for their annual New Year/ New Plays Festival when five new scripts were read by professional actors.
Next on the calendar is The Belle of Amherst by William Luce. This is a coproduction by Palm Beach Dramaworks Producing Artistic Director William Hayes and Actor’ Playhouse Artistic Director David Arisco. The show will be filmed on the PBD’s main stage without an audience. It’s being directed by Hayes and will then be streamed from April 2-6.
The one-actor script based on the life of poet Emily Dickinson+ won numerous awards when it was performed on Broadway by Julie Harris and directed by Charles Nelson Reilly. Luce has a series of plays about interesting women including “The Last Flapper” about Zelda Fitzgerald, wife of playwright Scott FitzGerald. His other is Lillian about writer Lillian Hellman, author of The Little Foxes. Her interesting life story makes good copy. She was one of the The Round Table Writers who lunched every day at the Algonquin Hotel in New York where she met Dashiel l Hammitt, a crime writer known for The Maltese Falcon and The Thin Man Series on radio, television and movies. They became life partners.
Actress Margery Lowe will portray Emily Dickinson. Lowe is a well known South Florida talent who has performed locally in numerous shows at Palm Beach Dramaworks, Gables Stage, Actor’s Playhouse and the Maltz Jupiter Theatre in Brighton Beach Memoirs. Lowe is also a New York actress and has traveled across the nation in national tours. She has received many awards both in New York and South Florida.
The Belle of Amherst will be streamed from April 2-6, 2021. Tickets are $30 and can be purchased online at www.palmbeachdramaworks.org or by calling the box office at (561) 514-4042 Ext. 2
Contemporary Voices, the free online series featuring live readings and discussions of plays by a cross-section of some of the finest American playwrights working in theatre today, resumes on April 12 with the spotlight on Pulitzer Prize-winner Nilo Cruz. His works will be featured for three consecutive Monday evenings, followed each Wednesday with a discussion of the work by theatre professionals and community leaders.
Cruz, who was born in Cuba in 1960 and arrived in Miami with his family a decade later on a Freedom Flight, is acclaimed for his broad exploration of the Latino experience. He is often referred to as a “lyrical” writer, and his plays, he has said, are more character-driven than plot-driven. These qualities are evident in the three plays being presented, as is a belief that the arts and language can have a powerful effect upon people’s lives.
Featured will be Two Sisters and a Piano (April 12); Sotto Voce (April 19) and Pulitzer Prize-winning Anna in the Tropics (April 26). The Wednesday evening discussions are on April 14, 21 and 28. All readings and discussions begin at 7:30 pm. Tickets are free, but reservations are required.
Palm Beach Dramaworks, 201 Clematis Street, West Palm Beach FL 33401 Tickets: (561) 514-4042 Ext. 2; www.palmbeachdramaworks.org
Maltz Jupiter Theatre
The renovation project at the Maltz Jupiter Theatre is progressing amazingly. The major renovation was not to happen till April, 2021 but when the theatre had to close because of the pandemic, producing Artistic Director and Chief Executive, Andrew Kato, and the board of directors decided that this would be the perfect time to make the huge expansion of the theatre. The expansion will allow Maltz Jupiter Theatre to mount pre-Broadway production and double the educational capacity. A larger stage, three-story production facilities and a 199-seat second theatre space are just a few of the major renovations. The theater will basically double the square footage in the building.
Currently, the Maltz Jupiter Theatre will reopen in October of 2021 with a production of Agatha Christie’s Murder on the Orient Express. The Box Office is currently closed due to renovations. Tickets may be purchased online using American Express, MasterCard, Visa or Discover. Tickets will be mailed or held at our Will Call window depending upon the customer’s preference and time frame when the tickets are purchased. It is preferable to order tickets on a desktop computer versus a touch screen device.
Maltz Jupiter Theatre, 1001 E. Indiantown Rd, Jupiter. Tickets: (561) 575-2223; www.jupitertheatre.org
The Wick Theatre and Costume Museum
The month’s most exciting news is a production of the Pulitzer Prize-winning show, A Chorus Line, which will be presented April 22-May 30, 2021!
Currently, the Wick Cabaret offers a variety of entertainment and wonderful gourmet meals in the Wick on the Green restaurant. Singer-pianist Billy Stritch kicks off the April line up from April 1-3. Singer Marilyn Maye brings her years of singing favorites from the great American Songbook April 7-10. This is also being sponsored by Legends Radio, the Florida American Songbook radio station. Clint Holmes, vocalist and entertainer will fill the cabaret with his powerful voice from April 15-17.
Catch the glitz and glamour of the twenties with a special luncheon and fashion show. The fun afternoon begins in the museum lobby which has been transformed into a Pullman Car. It will showcase the fashions and remarkable history of the Suffrage Movement. It will also feature costumes from seven incredible Broadway show sets set in locales of the Roaring Twenties. The grand finale is a Great Gatsby celebration with bubbles and baubles, jazz and ragtime galore.
The Roaring Twenties fashion show and luncheon will be held March 13-June 4. They had me at Roaring Twenties!
The Wick Theatre, 7901 North Federal Highway Boca Raton, FL 33487 www.TheWick.org 561.995.2333
The latest photo from the Maltz Jupiter Theatre; an exciting peek at the renovated stage area within the Maltz Jupiter Theatre
Palm Beach Dramaworks and Actors’ Playhouse are presenting Margery Lowe as Emily Dickinson in The Belle of Amherst. It will be filmed and be available to stream April 2-6.
A full calendar of Cabaret at the Wick Theatre in Boca Raton includes the special The Roaring Twenties luncheon and fashion show from the twenties.