2011-2012 Drama League Award Winners

The Drama League announced today the winners for the 78^th Annual Drama League Awards at a luncheon ceremony hosted by Stockard Channing (Other Desert Cities) and John Larroquette (Gore Vidal’s The Best Man) at the Marriott Marquis Times Square (1535 Broadway).

The awards went to:

Distinguished Play, Other Desert Cities, presented by Philip Seymour Hoffman;  Distinguished Revival of a Play, Death of a Salesman, presented by Christian Borle;  Distinguished Production of a  Musical, Once, presented by Cynthia Nixon; Distinguished Revival of a Musical, Follies, presented by Kelli O’Hara; and Distinguished Performance, Audra McDonald, presented by John Lithgow. Read more

‘The Best Man’ & ‘The Columnist’ and Get Broadway Extensions; ‘Lonely, I’m Not’ Does too!

After the news that both Leap of Faith and How To Succeed are set to close, here’s a bit of good news: Both The Columnist and Gore Vidal’s The Best Man have announced that their Broadway runs will be extended. And, Second Stage’s production of Lonely, I’m Not has just announced they will as well.

 
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Thoughts on the 2012 Tony Nominations

First of all, congratulations to all the 2012 Tony Award nominees!

The Tony Awards are my absolute favorite of all the award shows so getting up this morning to see who had been nominated was the very first thing I did. What, you didn’t think I’d actually get up at 5:30am LA time, did you?

Since I didn’t make my regular April trek to New York to see the shows, I can only rely on what I saw this past December, my love of the actors in the shows and all the buzz surrounding them. Will I know what the hell I’m talking about?

Absolutely not.

And with that, let’s begin! Read more

Nominations for the 2012 Tony Awards (with video)

Best Play

Clybourne Park
Author: Bruce Norris
Producers: Jujamcyn Theaters, Jane Bergère, Roger Berlind/Quintet Productions, Eric Falkenstein/Dan Frishwasser, Ruth Hendel/Harris Karma Productions, JTG Theatricals, Daryl Roth, Jon B. Platt, Center Theatre Group, Lincoln Center Theater, Playwrights Horizons

Other Desert Cities
Author: Jon Robin Baitz
Producers: Lincoln Center Theater, André Bishop, Bernard Gersten, Bob Boyett

Peter and the Starcatcher
Author: Rick Elice
Producers: Nancy Nagel Gibbs, Greg Schaffert, Eva Price, Tom Smedes, Disney Theatrical Productions, Suzan & Ken Wirth/DeBartolo Miggs, Catherine Schreiber/Daveed Frazier & Mark Thompson, Jack Lane, Jane Dubin, Allan S. Gordon/Adam S. Gordon, Baer & Casserly/Nathan Vernon, Rich Affanato/Peter Stern, Brunish & Trinchero/Laura Little Productions, Larry Hirschhorn/Hummel & Greene, Jamie deRoy & Probo Prods./Radio Mouse Ent., Hugh Hysell/Freedberg & Dale, New York Theatre Workshop

Venus in Fur
Author: David Ives
Producers: Manhattan Theatre Club, Lynne Meadow, Barry Grove, Jon B. Platt, Scott Landis, Classic Stage Company Read more

Trailer: Judd Apatow’s ‘This is 40′ starring Paul Rudd, Leslie Mann, Megan Fox, John Lithgow, Melissa McCarthy, Robert Smigel, Albert Brooks & Jason Segel

This is 40: Writer/director/producer Judd Apatow (The 40-Year-Old Virgin, Funny People) brings audiences This Is 40, an original comedy that expands upon the story of Pete (Paul Rudd) and Debbie (Leslie Mann) from the blockbuster hit Knocked Up as we see firsthand how they are dealing with their current state of life.

Writer/Director: Judd Apatow
Cast: Paul Rudd, Leslie Mann, Megan Fox, John Lithgow, Iris Apatow, Maude Apatow, Melissa McCarthy, Robert Smigel, Charlene Yi, Albert Brooks, Jason Segel

In theaters: December 21st Read more

John Lithgow: “Acting on stage is a batting average game, if you bat 300, you’re doing extremely well”

There isn’t many sentences you can say in New York’s Theatre District that will elicit more smiles than, “John Lithgow is in a new show.” The popular Third Rock from the Sun TV star has been appearing regularly on the New York stage after he returned for Sweet Smell of Success in 2002 after a 14-year absence from Broadway. 

Lithgow stars in The Columnist, based on the life of journalist Joe Alsop, a staunch conservative who nevertheless was a closeted homosexual.  Lithgow spoke to the New York Times about taking on such a conflicting role.

Lithgow admits that despite his experience he still is nervous about appearing in a bad production.  He says, “You work this hard on something and number one, you want so badly for people to love it. Number two, you gradually persuade yourself that it’s absolutely brilliant. Going to see a play, you think, ‘How could anybody think this was any good?’ You see that 50 people worked on it. Or a movie. Nobody sets out to do something bad, they all set out to do something good, by the time it opens they think it is good, which is why bad reviews stung them so deeply. I’ve had that experience many times. Acting on stage is a batting average game, if you bat 300, you’re doing extremely well.” Read more

Biography: John Lithgow

John Lithgow’s roots are in the theater. In 1973, he won a Tony Award three weeks after his Broadway debut, in David Storey’s The Changing Room. Since then, he has appeared on Broadway 19 more times, earning another Tony, three more Tony nominations, four Drama Desk Awards, and induction into the Theatre Hall of Fame. Ensuing stage performances have included major roles in My Fat Friend, Trelawney of the “Wells,” Comedians, Anna Christie, Bedroom Farce, Beyond Therapy, M. Butterfly, The Front Page, Retreat from Moscow, All My Sons, the Off-Broadway premieres of Mrs. Farnsworth and Mr. and Mrs. Fitch, and the musicals Sweet Smell of Success (his second Tony), and Dirty Rotten Scoundrels.

In 2007 he was one of the very few American actors ever invited to join The Royal Shakespeare Company, playing ‘Malvolio’ in Twelfth Night at Stratford-upon-Avon. In 2008 he devised his own one-man show Stories by Heart for The Lincoln Center Theater Company, and has been touring it around the country ever since, including a triumphant six-week run at The Mark Taper Forum in Los Angeles.

In the early 1980’s Lithgow began to make a major mark in films. At that time, he was nominated for Oscars in back-to-back years, for The World According to Garp and Terms of Endearment. In the years before and after, he has appeared in over 30 films. Notable among them have been All That Jazz, Blow Out, Twilight Zone: the Movie, Footloose, 2010, Buckaroo Banzai, Harry and the Hendersons, Memphis Belle, Raising Cain, Ricochet, Cliffhanger, Orange County, Shrek, Kinsey, and a flashy cameo in Dreamgirls. This summer, Lithgow was seen on the big screen in Rise of the Planet of the Apes, Fox’s prequel to Planet of the Apes. Read more

Margaret Colin and Boyd Gaines Join John Lithgow in MTC’s ‘The Columnist’

Margaret Colin (Gossip Girl, MTC’s Defiance, Arcadia) and four time Tony Award winner Boyd Gaines (Gypsy, Contact) will join Tony and Emmy Award winner John Lithgow in the cast of the world premiere of The Columnist.

Written by Tony and Pulitzer Prize winner David Auburn and directed by Tony Award winner Daniel Sullivan, the show follows columnist Joseph Alsop (Lithgow). Joe is beloved, feared and courted in equal measure by the Washington political world at whose center he sits. But as the ’60s dawn and America undergoes dizzying change, the intense political drama Joe is embroiled in becomes deeply personal as well. Read more

John Lithgow on Acting: “It’s a career full of rejection, disappointment and failure. It’s murderously hard on the ego”

John Lithgow, star of stage, television, and movies, has just released his memoir Drama: An Actor’s Education.  One would imagine that the veteran Lithgow, who made his on-stage debut at the age of two, would have pages upon pages of advice for aspiring actors.  In fact, in an interview with NPR Lithgow reveals that he’s given a key piece of advice about acting to his own children.

“I tell young people, including my own kids, don’t do this, it’s too difficult. It’s a career full of rejection, disappointment and failure. It’s murderously hard on the ego. Don’t become an actor,” says Lithgow, perhaps crushing the dreams of many would-be thespians.  However, he adds, “[But] I always add at the end, if you’re going to become an actor, you ignore everything I say anyway, as I did. I mean, the choice to become an actor is very courageous, but like all courageous acts, it’s very foolhardy too, you know.”

But beyond that Lithgow does have more advice for actors who brave on in an attempt to become a successful actor.  Read more

John Lithgow: “You do learn plenty from bad actors”

John Lithgow is an actor who has had success on stage, television, and movie screens, although he’s probably best known for his lengthy run as Dr. Dick Solomon on the sitcom 3rd Rock from the Sun or for his turn as the Trinity killer on Dexter.

Despite his success, in his memoir, Drama: An Actor’s Education, Lithgow focuses mostly on his beginnings as an actor, including how he learned how to perform so well as both a comedic and dramatic actor.  Nonetheless, in an interview with the A.V. Club,  Lithgow doesn’t hesitate to talk about his time on the popular 3rd Rock from the Sun series.

Portraying the same character in a television series for six seasons has plenty of challenges, but Lithgow recounts working on the series as one of the most rewarding experiences of his career because of the collaboration between the actors and the writers. 

He explains, “3rd Rock was remarkable. I’ve tried another sitcom, and I knew it wasn’t going to work. A lot of it had to do with the fact that it was so theatrical. It was very high-energy, it was a bunch of theater actors, and we worked intensely with the writers, which was very, very exciting. It was a very creative experience every week, just inventing a 22-minute, one-act farce. It never got boring. Sometimes it got a little crazy, toward the end, but it never got boring. Imagine laughing for a living—that’s what we did.”  Read more

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