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Goodspeed To Present Workshop Testing ‘Honeymooners’ As Musical

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“The Honeymooners” as a musical? The folks at Goodspeed are hoping it’s a “Bang, zoom, straight to the moon” idea.

The East Haddam-based theater, in association with Jeffrey Finn productions, will present a private workshop of a new musical based on the iconic ’50s TV series, which starred Jackie Gleason, on Nov. 7 in New York. The show is expected to play the Goodspeed Opera House in the fall/winter of 2015.

The cast for the two-week workshop includes Tony Award-winner Michael McGrath as Ralph Kramden, four-time Emmy Award-winner and Tony nominee Hank Azaria as Ed Norton, Drama Desk nominee Leslie Kritzer as Alice Kramden and Drama Desk nominee Megan Hilty as Trixie Norton.

Tony Award-winner John Rando will direct the musical, with choreography by Emmy Award-winner Joshua Bergasse, book by Dusty Kay and Bill Nuss, music by Stephen Weiner and lyrics by Peter Mills.

“The Honeymooners” is presented under a license from CBS Broadcasting, Inc. The original TV series also featured Art Carney, Audrey Meadows and Joyce Randolph, the last surviving member of the quartet.

The storyline of the musical? “After shocking their wives by winning a high-profile jingle contest, Ralph and Ed are catapulted out of Brooklyn and into the cut-throat world of Madison Avenue, where they find themselves torn between success and friendship.”

The show was previously announced for a fall 2013 production at the Old Globe Theatre in San Diego but was withdrawn due to a “conflict with artist schedules.” Jerry Mitchell (“Kinky Boots”) was originally slated to direct that production.

Sad News

Chicago-based actress Molly Glynn, who was born and raised in Hartford, died earlier this month after being struck by a tree while out cycling with her husband. She was 46.

She died after a tree fell on her while she was caught out bicycling during a storm.

The actress, who graduated from Hartford’s Watkinson School, performed at Steppenwolf Theatre Company, Chicago Shakespeare Theater, Northlight Theater, Chicago Dramatists and other venues around the Chicago area. Her husband is actor Joe Foust.

A graduate of Tufts University, her TV credits included the “Boss,” “Chicago Fire” and “Early Edition”.

She was the mother of two sons: Declan, 13 and Chance, 17.

Friends have set up a fund, The Molly Glynn Memorial Trust on GiveForward.com.

She is also survived by her mother, Jacquelyn Glynn, brothers Bill Glynn and Garry Tilton, and sisters Mary Beth Kelso and Sarah Peters. Glynn’s father was the late William Glynn, who served as mayor of Hartford from 1961 to 1965.

Hartt Art

There’s going to be a lot of angels around the Hartford area in early October.

Not only is West Hartford’s Playhouse on Park opening its season Oct. 1 to Oct. 19 with Tony Kushner’s Pulitzer Prize and Tony Award-winning “Angels in America: Millennium Approaches” but the Hartt School at the University of Hartford is producing the play, too, from Oct. 9 to Oct. 12 at its black box theater at the Handel Performing Arts Center at 35 Westbourne Parkway in Hartford. Annmarie Davis directs.

In other upcoming shows at the college: Hartford Stage associate artistic director and Hartt alumni Maxwell Williams will direct “Tragic Ways of Killing a Woman” Oct. 17 to Oct. 19 at the Hartt School’s Roberts Theater. The show is developed for the stage by Christina Pellegrini and Williams.

A rare collaboration of Hartt’s theater, dance and instrumental studies divisions will present the Rodgers & Hart musical “On Your Toes” at the university’s Lincoln Theater Oct. 22 to 26. Hartt theater division director Alan Rust will stage the show; Hartt dance division director Stephen Pier and Ralph Perkins, director of dance for the theater division, will choreograph; Edward Cumming, who holds the Hartt’s chair in orchestral conducting, will lead the Hartt School Symphony Orchestra.

Casting About

Debra Jo Rupp (“Becoming Dr. Ruth,” TV’s “That ’70s Show”) and Vasili Bogazianos star in “Annapurna” by Sharr White (“The Other Place”) at Hartford’s TheaterWorks. The show, staged by producing artistic director Rob Ruggiero, begins previews Oct. 3, opens Oct. 20 and runs through Nov. 9. Info: www.theaterworkshartford.org.

Dan DeLuca stars in the national tour of “Disney’s Newsies” that plays there Palace Theater in Waterbury Oct. 23 to Oct. 25. Also cast are Steve Blanchard, Stephanie Styles, Angela Grovey, Jacob Kemp and Zachary Sayle. Info: 203-346-2000 and http://www.palacetheaterct.org.

Martin Sola (Broadway’s “The King & I,” “La Boheme” and “Coram Boy”), Nicholas Urda (Valentine in “Two Gentlemen of Verona” at Shakespeare on the Sound), Anita Petry, Anthony J. Goes and Dale AJ Rose head the cast of Connecticut Repertory Theatre’s “Olives and Blood” by UConn professor Michael Bradford. The show, directed by Gary English, plays Oct. 2 to Oct. 12 at the Nafe Katter Theater on UConn’s campus in Storrs. The play is described as exploring “the mystery surrounding the unsolved murder of Spanish poet-playwright Federico Garcia Lora, a promising and polarizing young artist, who disappeared during the Spanish Revolution.” The play premiered in 2012 at HERE in New York City. In the fall of 2013 it was presented at Brixton East in London. The production in at the college marks the first regional theater production of the play. Also cast are Saul Alvarez, Whitney Andrews, Gabriel Aprea, Kent Coleman and Derrick Holmes. Info: www.crt.uconn.edu, 860-486-2113.

Short Takes

>>Seth Rudetsky — musician, actor, theater historian, writer and host of “Seth’s Big Fat Broadway” on Sirius/XM Satellite Radio’s On Broadway — will present his show “Deconstructing Broadway” Oct. 25, 7 p.m. at Hartford’s Charter Oak Cultural Center. The event is part of the center’s 10th annual Celebration of Jewish Arts and Culture. Tickets are $20 general admission, $15 for members of Charter Oak and Let’s Go Arts, seniors and students.

>>“Ned and Sunny — A Love Story,” commissioned by The Edward C. and Ann T. Roberts Foundation for its 50th anniversary, will be performed Oct. 5 at 3 p.m. at the Kingswood-Oxford School’s Roberts theatre in West Hartford. Emmy Award-winner Jill Eikenberry, Emmy nominee Michael Tuckler and WNPR’s Colin McEnroe star in the play, written by Jacques Lamarre (“I Loved, I Lost, I Made Spaghetti”) and directed by Rob Ruggiero. The event is free.

>>Jennifer DiNola, who was born and raised in Meriden, will make her West End debut as Elphaba in the London production of “Wicked” for a 14-week run, from Oct. 27 to Jan. 31 at the Apollo Victoria Theatre. DiNola starred in the role in the Chicago and Broadway productions as well as the North American tour. She also played the role in Seoul, South Korea and Sydney, Australia.

>>The Bushnell Center for the Performing Arts in Hartford has a new website (www.bushnell.org), logo and visual identity, created by CoreBrand, a New York-based branding agency. The new website is designed by Situation Interactive, a full service digital agency.

>>Executive Director Elaine Calder, formerly of Hartford Stage, will retire from Canada’s Shaw Festival in September 2015.

>>Robert J. Orchard, 67, will step down as executive director of Boston’s premiere presenting venue, ArtsEmerson starting Jan. 1. He made a great impact in New Haven, too, in the ’70s when in his 20s and just out of the Yale School of Drama he became managing director of Yale Rep, under founding artistic director Robert Brustein. When Brustein was fired from the Yale School of Drama and the Rep, he and Orchard left Yale for Harvard and created the American Repertory Theatre. In 2009 he left ART where he was executive director to create ArtsEmerson. Orchard will be succeeded by David Dower, who is now the director of artistic programs at ArtsEmerson.

>>Lucie Arnaz (Broadway’s “They’re Playing Our Song,” “Dirty Rotten Scoundrels”,” TV’s “The Lucy Show,” “Here’s Lucy”) will be Granny Berte when the tour of the Broadway revival of “Pippin” plays the Bushnell Jan. 6 to 11. John Rubinstein, who was the original title character when the show bowed on Broadway in 1972, will be playing Pippin’s father, the King Charles.

>>Cheshire’s Jonny Orsini will be in Broadway’s “Fish in the Dark,” written and starring Larry David. Orsini made his Broadway bow two years ago opposite Nathan Lane in “The Nance.” Previews for the new comedy begin Feb. 2 and opens on March 5. Jayne Houdyshell, Rosie Perez, Jerry Adler (Connecticut Rep’s “I’m Connecticut”) and Jake Cannavale also are featured.

>>“Chasing Rainbows — The Road to Oz,” a new musical developed at Goodspeed Musicals’ Johnny Mercer Colony in East Haddam, received a staged reading in New York earlier this month. The musical has a book by Mark Acito, direction by Matt Lenz, choreography by Parker Esse and features songs identified with Judy Garland. The show is conceived by producer Tina Marie Casamento.

>>Hartford Stage named nine new board members and two “life directors.” The new two-year term members are Devon C. Francis, Carrie Hammond, Barbara Hennessey, Sibongile Magubane, Otis Maynard, Barri Marks, Dr. Paul Mitchell and Lynda B. Moecker. Life members are Janet Larsen and Christina B. Ripple. Elected as one year term officer as Jill Adams, president; Robert V. Lally, vice president; David R. Jimenez, secretary, and Sue Ann Collins, treasurer.

>>The first third-year directing project of the season at the Yale School of Drama is “The Master and Margarita,” from the novel by Mikhail Bulgakov, adapted by Edward Kemp, and directed by Sara Holdren. the show will play Oct. 21 to 25 at the Iseman Theater in New Haven.

>>Emerson Theatre Collaborative will present David Horace Greer’s “Hour Farther” Oct. 3 to 5 at the First United Methodist Church in Mystic. Kirk Taylor stars in the show, directed by Camilla Ross. Also cast are Elijah Manning, Nichelle Rollins, Menelik Nesmith and Derrick Williams. In addition, ETC will present a free reading of the play in New York on Oct. 6 at 7 p.m. at Manhattan Plaza, second floor, 400 W. 43rd St. Reservations required. Info: www.emersontheatercollaborative.org.

>>Cheever Tyler’s new book, “The Shubert Murals — Broadway in the Basement”, is being published this fall. It centers on the artwork and graffiti in the cellar of New Haven’s Shubert Theater, which is celebrating its 100th anniversary in December.

This story was changed from the originally posted version to correct the names of Joe Foust and Garry Tilton, and to include the name of Molly Glynn’s father, the later William Glynn.