March 23, 2011, City Stage
Theatre through March
“Two Jews Walk into a War…” at the Unicorn Theatre; “Look to the Rainbow: The Lyrics of Yip Harburg” at Quality Hill Playhouse; “In Trousers” by Egads! Theatre Company at Off Center Theatre; “Cabaret” at Kansas City Rep
For complete Theatre listings through 2011, click here to visit the KC Events calendar.
Unicorn Theatre
Two Jews Walk into a War…
Runs March 5 through March 27
For tickets call 816-531-7529 x10 or online at www.unicorntheatre.org
Call or visit the website for performance days and times
Funny, poignant, and first introduced in our In-Progress New Play Readings, Ishaq and Zeblyan are the last two surviving Jews in a dilapidated old synagogue in Kabul during the Taliban regime’s final days. The only thing that binds them together is that they hate each other’s guts. Could the salvation of Afghanistan’s Jewish community actually be left in the hands of these two meshuganas?
Quality Hill Playhouse
Look to the Rainbow: The Lyrics of Yip Harburg
Runs March 11 through April 10
For tickets call 816-421-1700 or online at www.qualityhillplayhouse.com
Call or visit the website for performance days and times
Working with a variety of composers, E.Y. "Yip" Harburg wrote a number of quintessential American songs: “Over the Rainbow,” “It's Only a Paper Moon” and the Great Depression anthem “Brother, Can You Spare a Dime?” Through his songs, learn about the successes (The Wizard of Oz, Finian's Rainbow) and struggles (becoming placed on the infamous “Hollywood blacklist”) of this fascinating man.
Egads! Theatre Company
In Trousers: A Musical by William Finn
Runs March 11 through March 26, at the Off Center Theatre
For tickets call 816-842-9999 or online at www.egadstheatre.com
Call or visit the website for performance days and times
EGADS! THEATRE COMPANY presents the Kansas City premiere of In Trousers by contemporary musical master William Finn (composer of The 25th Annual Putnam County Spelling Bee). In Trousers is Finn's earliest work and the first (and often over-looked) one-act musical of the Falsettos trilogy (AKA the “Marvin Musicals”).
Marvin has a kid and a wife AND a lover - oy vey! When this balancing act gets too hot for Marvin, he reverts to himself at age 14 dodging the affection of his high school sweetheart and chasing after his aloof English teacher. Finn's clever, catchy and breathless songs pitch us in and out of Marvin's confused adolescence and his current struggle between fantasies of kissing men and a desire to maintain a normal family life.
Kansas City Repertory Theatre
Cabaret
Spencer Theatre
Runs March 18 through April 10
For tickets call 816-235-2700 or online at www.kcrep.org
Call or visit the website for performance days and times
1931 Berlin, and the fragile Weimar Republic is being torn apart by radical politics on the right and left. But inside the cabaret, the world is alive with seedy glamour and a kind of freedom never known before -- for now. A young, broke American finds himself entangled by the dreams of the unforgettable Sally Bowles, who initiates him to the pleasures and dangers of the cabaret. One of the great musicals of the last century is brought to passionate, vibrant, imaginative life by Artistic Director Eric Rosen (Venice, A Christmas Story, Winesburg, Ohio). Kansas City native and legend John Kander, along with Fred Ebb, created one of the most powerful theatrical scores ever.
For complete Theatre listings through 2011, click here to visit the KC Events calendar.
Senior Editor, Theatre; Theatre and Features Contributor
Victor Wishna is a writer, editor, and author, among other things. A graduate of Stanford University and the New School's creative writing MFA program, he has written for the Wall Street Journal, the Baltimore Sun, the Miami Herald, the Kansas City Star, Humanities, and other major magazines and newspapers. He contributes a weekly real estate feature to the New York Post and his column “Letter from New York” is syndicated nationally.
With photographer Ken Collins, he published In Their Company: Portraits of American Playwrights (Umbrage Editions, 2006), for which he conducted and edited interviews with 61 prominent stage writers including Edward Albee, August Wilson, Tony Kushner, Wendy Wasserstein, and many others. The book won a 2007 Independent Publisher Book Awards Silver Medal (www.intheircompany.com).
He has always maintained a love for theatre, as a writer, an audience member, and even an actor, appearing in several community and semi-professional productions. As an undergraduate, he studied acting and playwriting with Anna Deavere Smith, in addition to journalism and psychology (and not engineering or medicine).
After nearly 12 years in New York City, Victor recently returned to his hometown with his wife, Annie, also a K.C. native. When not writing for publication or pleasure, Victor is honing his stand-up routine, which he has performed at numerous clubs and special events around New York, the Midwest, and elsewhere. In June 2010, he was named New York’s second-funniest amateur Jewish comedian by The Jewish Week. Seriously.