Desperate to keep their architecture company afloat, Max and Paul hire the mob to build a police retirement home in Kate Danley’s screwball comedy now playing at Harlequin Productions. For people who love those great old comedies from Hollywood’s Golden Era of the 1930s, “Building Madness” is a ticket to hilarity.
Five Washington state Theatre companies converge on Tacoma to present five one-hour plays in competition for American Association of Community Theatre’s top regional honors over one weekend in February.
Take a stroll with the Olympia Symphony! In partnership with the City of Olympia, Olympia Symphony musicians have selected OSO recordings, narrated by vocalist, actor, and former OSO guest artist Cheryse McLeod Lewis, to accompany twelve magnificent park walks.
Expect miracles, at least those of the theatrical kind, at The Midwinter Revels in Tacoma’s Rialto Theater this holiday season.
In many ways the Martins, the quintet of characters who populate Deanna Jent’s hour-long, 2011 play Falling, resemble a typical American family. Mother Tami, in some ways a stand-in for Jent herself, is overwhelmed and fond of red wine. Teenage son Josh demands a day off from school. There’s one all-important factor missing from that synopsis, however: Josh is a person with autism, given to veering from giddy hilarity to violent frenzy with little provocation or warning.
It’s surprising and delightful when an amateur company chooses an entire slate of obscure material. Such is the case with Olympia Little Theatre (OLT), which will offer a roster of seven shows entirely new to most audience members. Feeling adventurous?
After two unprecedented pandemic years, most theater organizations in the South Sound decided to schedule full seasons of live entertainment in late 2022 and early 2023. The state of Washington no longer requires proof of vaccination or a negative COVID test to enter theater spaces, but masks are still required for most patrons. With that in mind and figurative fingers crossed, OLY ARTS is pleased to announce upcoming offerings from Tacoma Little Theatre and Tacoma Musical Playhouse.
“I’ve been doing salons for about 20 years through the Northwest Playwrights Alliance,” playwright Bryan Willis explains. “I really love the format.” Happily for Willis, executive director Jill Barnes was eager to host a salon in The Washington Center’s black box theater, a utilitarian space adjacent to its main auditorium. It returns this May after a three-year hiatus.
Valerie Veils, the self-billed “Heroine of the Hoochi Coo,” has dazzled audiences up and down the Pacific Coast. Now she’s extended her talents to produce the first-ever Pacific Northwest Burlesque Festival, a two-day, ecdysiastic extravaganza that’ll twirl its tassels at the Capitol Theater the first full weekend in May.
With COVID cases on the decline, it’s time for something new. That’s where Christen Greene saw an opportunity. She’s the programmer of a new summer music festival in Olympia, the South Sound Block Party on Port Plaza this August.
