Seattle Spotlight: November 2009

It’s snowing again at The 5th Avenue Theatre as White Christmas (November 28-December 30) brings back Michael Gruber as Bob Wallace, and Greg McCormick Allen as Phil Davies. Billie Wildrick, Outstanding Actress nominee for the 2009 TPS Awards, is also included. Meanwhile, ACT brings back Sister from the long-running Late Nite Catechism performing Sister’s Christmas Catechism: The Mystery of the Magi’s Gold (November 27-January 3).

Seasonal fare also includes Taproot Theatre bringing back its holiday hit, It’s a Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play (Stage One Theatre at North Seattle Community College, November 20-December 26). SecondStory Repertory offers A Christmas Cabaret (November 27-December 27) a musical revue with traditional (and a few not so traditional) holiday songs. Lisa Koch and Peggy Platt continue tradition with Ham for the Holidays: Lard Potion #9 at Theatre Off Jackson (November 25-December 27). Open Circle reprises The Judy Garland Christmas Special (November 27-December 19) from the 1963 TV show.

See the World’s Fair at The Village Theatre in Meet Me in St. Louis (November 11-January 3) with a home-grown cast, including talent Ryah Nixon, John Patrick Lowrie, Frances Leah King, Jason Kappus, and Keaton Whittaker. Balagan’s next production is The Full Monty by Terrence McNally and David Yazbeck (November 5-28), where a group of unemployed men resort to stripping to earn money. Also of musical note, Seattle Musical Theatre presents Honk (November 13-29), based on Hans Christian Andersen’s “The Ugly Duckling,” while Tacoma Musical Playhouse rolls the dice with Guys & Dolls (November 27-December 20).

Direct from Ashland and the Oregon Shakespeare Festival, Seattle Repertory debuts Equivocation by Bill Cain (November 18-December 13). In it, William Shakespeare is commissioned to write a play about a thwarted attempt to kill the king. Theater Schmeater presents At Home at the Zoo by Edward Albee (November 6-December 5), pairing the 1958 classic The Zoo Story with a more recently written prequel, Home Life. The theater also debuts The Oak Tree (November 9-December 2) by Tim Crouch about a stage hypnotist who has lost his mojo. A new actor performs every night, one who has never seen the play or read the script.

Satori Group produces the West Coast premiere of Artifacts of Consequence by Ashlin Halfnight (November 5-22), where a group of people take refuge in an underwater bunker to perpetuate the species. Ghost Light Theatricals world premieres The Oedipal Duplex (November 6-22), two new adaptations of the Oedipus myth: Mother Phucker and Blinding Pains. New City Theatre reveals Clit Notes by Holly Hughes (November 1-21), a lesbian adventure story from Saginaw, MI to San Diego. New collaboration NewsWrights United will present the world premiere of It’s Not in the P-I: A Living Newspaper About a Dying Newspaper. Six playwrights join forces to investigate, write and stage a “living newspaper,” theatrically reporting on the demise of the print version of the Seattle Post-Intelligencer (November 6-22). Phoenix Theatre brings us Crimes of the Heart (November 6-29) by Beth Henley, where we learn to truly love ourselves and those who stick by us.

Seattle Children’s Theatre believes in magic as Peter Pan flies in (November 13-January 10) with the familiar musical. Centerstage presents its third annual English Christmas pantomime, Jack and The Beanstalk (November 28-December 20). Tacoma Musical Playhouse shows Junie B. Jones and a Little Monkey Business (November 7-15), and Storybook East presents Snow White (November 1-December 3).