Category — Shows

Catch Main Street Stage’s popular Redroom series performing at Topia Arts Center in Adams, this Friday, October 16th at 6 pm!  And then see us throughout the day in galleries in North Adams during Open Studios on Saturday and Sunday!

Several great events in store for the evening at Topia:

Presentation: “A Jewel In Downtown Adams”:

Tour the green building design through 3D renderings on Topia’s enormous film screen. Find out what you can expect from Topia Arts Center in the years to come. Learn about exciting programs that will be coming to Adams. Find out how you can help!

Silent Auction: Celebration of Self Expression

Silent auction of donated items: quilts, gift certificates, paintings, drawings, jewelry, services, facials, pedicures, massages, sculptures, home-made crafts, landscaping, home improvement, etc.

Refreshments will be served, cash bar.

The Redroom was rated at 5 out of 5 by the Berkshire Eagle’s “Region After Dark.” It is an artist’s playground where genre lines don’t matter. One audience member called it something you’d see in someone’s basement in Greenwich Village during the 1960’s. Full of readings, original skits and plays, improvisational rap, dance, local musicians and anything else we can get our hands on.

If you are interested in performing or having your work featured in The Redroom, please contact Kelli Newby at theredroomna@gmail.com

Award-winning Minneapolis family entertainers Z Puppets Rosenschnoz present two performances at Main Street Stage, 57 Main Street, North Adams Oct. 3, 2009: “A La Carte: In a Fool’s Kitchen” for families at 7:00 pm and for adults, “The Comical Misadventures of Mr. Punch” at 10 pm.

“Zany, wacky, and for all ages…half Monty Python and half Sesame Street!” DeBlaze and Associates

Z Puppets Rosenschnoz delight children and their adults with feats of imagination through puppetry, physical comedy and live music. Based in Minneapolis, their family-friendly comedies have earned national recognition, including grants from the Jim Henson Foundation and Puppeteers of America.

Z Puppets has charmed audiences at theaters, festivals and special events across the country. They have been featured at the Eric Carle Museum of Picture Book Art, Walker Art Center and Minnesota Children’s Museum.

“Bursts at the seams with wild energy, creative genius and sheer fun!” Minnesota History Center

“A La Carte: In A Fool’s Kitchen”

Saturday, October 3rd at 7:00pm Tickets $10 adults, $6 children Recommended for ages 3 and up.

“A La Carte” is a comic battle between a faux French Chef and a wily lobster set to live accordion music. A family-friendly spectacle, “A La Carte” is a playfully interactive comedy featuring clowning, puppetry, music and a few unruly vegetables.

“A La Carte” begins as the Chef sets the table for the Grand Opening of his 2-seat café. Before the Chef can dazzle his very important guests, dinner’s main ingredient stages a rebellion — again and again and again. Who knew crustaceans could cook up such delicious mischief?

“The brilliance of its slapstick routines is on par with anything
from the glory days of Laurel and Hardy.” MN Daily

“The Comical Misadventures of Mr. Punch”

Saturday, October 3rd at 10:00 p.m. Tickets $10

When the Baby goes missing, Mr. Punch sets out to the rescue, unleashing mischief and mayhem all the way. Tangling with a crocodile, a policeman and the devil himself, Mr. Punch presents a travesty of manners in which the children must keep the puppets from misbehaving and the Baby triumphs in the end. The Comical Misadventures of Mr. Punch is a madcap call and response hand puppet romp.

“Ingenius!” City Pages

For more info about Z Puppets Rosenschnoz visit www.zpuppets.org

On Saturday, September 26th, the Redroom, Main Street Stage’s popular cabaret series will take on American History. Doors open at 8 PM for life drawing and light refreshment. The locally written and produced show will start at 9. Every Redroom is a new show and a great deal. $10.00 covers an entire night’s worth of entertainment. Contact Kelli at 413-664-7745 for more information, or find us on Facebook. All Redrooms contain mature themes and language. Redroom is supported by a grant from the Mass Cultural Council.

The performance will include a dramatic reading of Charles Guiteau’s play written four days before he was hanged for assassinating President Garfiled in addition to company written skits (“The Writer’s Room for National Treasure 3”), songs and readings all giving Redroom’s take on American History, just in time for school to begin.

If you are interested in performing or having your work featured in The Redroom, please contact Kelli Newby attheredroomna@gmail.com.

Main Street Stage announces a change in performance schedule for William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night. The show will now preview July 30th through August 2nd and open on Friday, August 7th. Preview performances are at a reduced ticket rate of $10 for adults and $5 for students.

The show will then run Fridays and Saturdays at 7:30 pm through August 15th, with two matinee performances on Sundays at 2:00 pm. Tickets are $20 for adults, $15 for seniors and $10 for students.

Thursday July 30th is Pay What You Can Night at 7:30 pm. Sunday August 9th is Free Shakespeare by the Pond at Windsor Lake Park at 2 pm.

The full performance schedule is below:

Thu Jul 30 – 7:30pm (Pay What You Can Preview)
Fri Jul 31 – 7:30pm (Preview)
Sat Aug 1 – 7:30pm (Preview)
Sun Aug 2 – 2:00pm (Preview Matinee)
Fri Aug 7 – 7:30pm (Opening Night)
Sat Aug 8 – 7:30pm
Sun Aug 9 – 2:00pm (Shakespeare by the Pond – Windsor Lake Park)
Thu Aug 13 – 7:30pm
Fri Aug 14 – 7:30pm
Sat Aug 15 -7:30pm (Closing Night)

Call 413-663-3240 for reservations or reserve online here.

Main Street Stage is proud to present their second annual Shakespeare production, Twelfth Night. The play will preview Thursday July 30th as a pay what you can night and run Fridays and Saturdays through August 15th at 7:30 p.m. There is a Pay-What-You-Can Community Night on Thursday August 13 at 7:30. There will be a matinee on Sunday August 2nd at 2 p.m. and a free “Shakespeare by the Pond” performance on Sunday August 9th at 2 p.m.

One of Shakespeare’s most popular comedies, Twelfth Night is a story about love, music, mistaken identity, and a world in which perception and reality frequently are at odds with each other.

Viola is shipwrecked upon the shores of Illyria, where Duke Orsino rules. As a woman who has lost all to the sea (including her twin brother, Sebastian), she decides that her safest plan is to disguise herself as a man, Cesario, and find work in service to Orsino. The duke is madly in love with a neighboring countess, Olivia, who rejects his tenders of love stating that she’ll continue to mourn for her brother and father for another seven years. As may be expected in any of Shakespeare’s mistaken identity plays, Olivia falls in love with Cesario, Viola falls in love with Orsino, and the love triangle creates many humorous and tragic encounters. Meanwhile, Toby Belch (Olivia’s drunken uncle) and Maria (Olivia’s handmaid) plan their own acts of deception, trickery and revenge. Together, they plot against Malvolio, Olivia’s puritanical servant, whom she describes as “full of self-love.” They trick him into believing that Olivia is in love with him and set about getting him to dress and act with such madness that he is imprisoned and shut up in a dark room until the truth of the trickery comes to light. In addition, they fool the naive Sir Andrew Aguecheek, an unsuccessful courtier to Olivia, into fighting with Cesario to defend his honor, convincing the knight that this will surely win him the hand of Olivia. Full of mistaken identity, gender bending and fools, Twelfth Night is a play brimming with laughter.

The decision to mount Twelfth Night this summer came from a desire to bring comedy to a community emerging from a dark winter and tough economic time. People simply need a good laugh! After holding a public reading of portions of the script that included talk back with the audience a few months ago, and collaborating with a group of artists and community members, the themes that continued to rise to the surface were: deception, love, music, trickery, and reality vs. perception. From these discussions, the decision was made to set this production of Twelfth Night in the summer of 1969 in Coney Island, NY. The amusement park feel, the “summer of love” environment, and Woodstock all make this a perfect environment for the life of this timeless comedy.

Twelfth Night will be directed by Melissa Quirk and the cast includes local actors Mollie Remillard, Kelli Newby, Eric Auld, David Lane, Barb Cardillo, Alexia Trainor, Sean McHugh, Jack Sleigh, Darren Fitzgerald, Jeremy Kerr, Rachel Barker, Julia Les and David Winn

Tickets are $10 for students and $15 for seniors and $20 for general admission. To reserve tickets for this production please call the box office at 413-663-3240 or reserve online here.

Main Street Stage in conjunction with Nutshell Playhouse announces their summer dates for children’s theater at Main Street Stage:  57 Main Street, North Adams.

Saturday May 30th and Friday August 7, The Musical Hat.

Saturday June 6 and July 18, Pirates!

All shows are at 11 a.m. Tickets are $5 for children and $7 for Adults. No reservations, first come first serve.

The Musical Hat
Written and directed by Don Jordan

Shmurple and her fellow clowns sing songs from their Musical Hat, when suddenly they discover that their music has been stolen. Join them in their hilarious adventures as they try to get it back and in the process discover what music is made of. Meet the Snoof, a detective puppet made of eyes, ears, nose, a hand and a mouth. Learn new words from the Ductionary — the duck who knows every word in the English language. Feel what it’s like to dance with a clown!

The performances feature Berkshire County actors Wendy Walraven, Alexia Trainor and Matthew Coviello, with puppets by Clothespin Puppets.

Pirates!
Written and directed by Don Jordan

A swashbuckling adventure featuring bold buccaneers, a mysterious map with a riddle, cursed treasure, a visit to an island that you can’t see, a pirate ghost, and a magical journey to the bottom of the sea. This sea-faring tale features mime, music, masks, and delightful puppets created by Clothespin Puppets.

The performances feature Berkshire County actors Wendy Walraven, Mike Trainor and Matthew Coviello. Together they bring you a family performance brimming with excitement and theatrical innovation.

For more information visit their website at www.nutshellplayhouse.org

On Saturday, May 16th, The Redroom, Main Street Stage’s popular cabaret series will be presenting “The Most Offensive Show Ever”. Come to 57 Main Street, North Adams, for an evening of mingling, sketching, performance and surprises. Doors open at 8 PM for life drawing and light refreshment. The locally written and produced show will start at 9. Every Redroom is a new show and a great deal; $10.00 covers an entire night’s worth of entertainment. Contact Kelli at 413-664-7745 for more information, or find us on Facebook or the web (www.theredroomna.com). Warning: all Redrooms contain mature themes and language and this one more so than usual.

The Redroom was rated at 5 out of 5 by the Berkshire Eagle’s “Region After Dark.” It is an artist’s playground where genre lines don’t matter. One audience member called it something you’d see in someone’s basement in Greenwich Village during the 1960’s. From 8-9 enjoy a glass of wine, mingle with the cast and other guests while a live model poses in the window. Bring your own art supplies or use the ones we provided. At 9, the variety show begins, full of readings, original skits and plays, improvisational rap, dance, local musicians and anything else we can get our hands on.

If you are interested in performing or having your work featured in The Redroom, please contact Kelli Newby at theredroomna@gmail.com

On Saturday, April 18th, The Redroom, Main Street Stage’s popular cabaret series, will return (with a spring in its step!) at 57 Main Street, North Adams, for an evening of mingling, sketching, performance and surprises.  Doors open at 8 PM for life drawing and light refreshment.  The locally written and produced show will start at 9.  Every Redroom is a new show and a great deal; $10.00 covers an entire night’s worth of entertainment.  Contact Kelli at 413-664-7745 for more information, or find us on Facebook, MySpace, or the web (www.theredroomna.com).

The April 18th show will feature Albany based Alternative folk musician Roki Rock and Eric Auld on accordion in addition to new skits and readings.

The Redroom was rated at 5 out of 5 by the Berkshire Eagle’s “Region After Dark.”  It is an artist’s playground where genre lines don’t matter.  One audience member called it something you’d see in someone’s basement in Greenwich Village during the 1960’s.  From 8-9 enjoy a glass of wine, mingle with the cast and other guests while a live model poses in the window.  Bring your own art supplies or use the ones we provided.  At 9, the variety show begins, full of readings, original skits and plays, improvisational rap, dance, local musicians and anything else we can get our hands on.

If you are interested in performing or having your work featured in The Redroom, please contact Kelli Newby at redroom@mainstreetstage.org.

Main Street Stage is proud to present Arthur Miller’s landmark American drama, All My Sons. Directed by Edward Cating and Alexia Trainor, All My Sons runs March 27, 28, 29 and April 3, 4, at 8pm. With one 3pm matinée on Sunday, April 5th. A special Community Night (Pay What You Can) preview will be held on Thursday, March 26 at 8 pm. For tickets call 413.663.3240 or reserve online by clicking here.

Winner of the New York Drama Critics’ Circle Award for Best New Play in 1947, All My Sons established Arthur Miller as a leading voice in the American theater. All My Sons introduced themes that thread through Miller’s work as a whole: the relationships between fathers and sons and the conflict between business and personal ethics.

The inspiration for the play came from a wartime anecdote Miller heard about a woman who had betrayed her father to the authorities for delivering defective equipment to the U.S. military. From this Miller shaped a drama not about war, but about topics of greater relevance to him: money and greed.

With today’s national headlines of war in Iraq and Afghanistan, executives and financial officers of major corporations behind bars, and fears of financial collapse, All My Sons startles with a contemporary relevance for American audiences. World War II has ended as Joe Keller, an airplane parts manufacturer, is caught in a personal battle between individual responsibility and business success that could threaten his tenuous hold on the American dream.

The cast for All My Sons includes Main Street Stage veterans Linda White and Edward Cating as Kate and Joe Keller, Frank La Frazia as George Deever, and newcomers Samantha Cullen as Ann Deever, and Conor Moroney as Chris Keller.

As a special treat for the run of All My Sons Main Street Stage and Gramercy Bistro are pleased to announce Dinner and a Show!, a $50.00 per person, fixed price, all inclusive package consisting of:

Ticket to All My Sons, A three course meal, consisting of an appetizer, choice of two entrées, and a dessert, gratuity included. Seating is at 6 pm on performance nights, and any time after 5 pm on the evening of the matinée. Reserve the package by calling Gramercy Bistro at (413) 663-5300. The Gramercy Bistro is located at 24 Marshall St., North Adams. See the website at www.gramercybistro.com . Bon Appétit!

Main Street Stage is pleased to announce a free, open reading of William Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night to be held on Sunday, March 1st at 1pm at Main Street Stage, 57 Main Street, North Adams. A skeleton cast of actors will read the script, and audience members are invited to listen and to participate in a post-show discussion and activities.

Main Street Stage has been dedicated to including the local community in the artistic process. Last year, we literally opened our doors to the rehearsal process, inviting the community to come and watch rehearsals for the production of Romeo & Juliet. This year, we wanted to get the audience involved even earlier in the process.

At this stage in artistic discovery, directors, producers, and designers are reading and rereading the script to consider the various themes, images and interpretations to set the tone for this summer’s production, currently scheduled to open in mid-July. To this end, community members are invited to attend this open reading and offer their own insights and observations of the text, story and characters.

After the reading, audience members and actors alike will be invited to the lobby to complete activities at any or all of the “creation stations.” There will be a station for “Building the World” in which a line of text from the play is drawn from a hat and the participant will create a three-dimensional piece of artwork to represent this line. Another station is “Words about Words,” in which participants draw words and phrases from a hat and use them to create an original poem representative of themes or ideas that struck them during the reading. Additionally, there will be a station for creating paintings and/or drawings of scenes, abstract images evoking emotions or themes, or character renderings based on their impressions of the play. These creations will be considered by the directors and design team as they plan this summer’s production and all participants will be recognized in the program for their input.

The event will be run by Alexia Trainor, Executive Director for Main Street Stage, and Melissa Quirk, director of this summer’s Shakespeare production.

There is no charge for admission to this event.