Seattle Spotlight: December 2009
and Ryan McCabe in Plaid Tidings
(© Matthew Durham)
Holiday shows and more holiday shows vie for your attention this month. Annually produced classics abound. The cast of last year’s smash holiday hit, Plaid Tidings, returns to ArtsWest (December 2-27) in Stuart Ross’ follow up to Forever Plaid, and featuring singing, swingin’ jingle bell ringing favorites.
The 34th annual production of A Christmas Carol at ACT Theatre (December 4-27) stars artistic director Kurt Beattie and R. Hamilton Wright alternating as Scrooge. Meanwhile, Black Nativity is reborn at Intiman Theatre (December 1-27), musically directed by Pastor Patrinell Wright, and featuring members of her Total Experience Gospel Choir.
Stone Soup Theatre’s A Child’s Christmas in Wales by Dylan Thomas (December 3-24) realizes the experience of Christmas doesn’t change with time, but holds a place in our hearts nothing else can fill. Harlequin Productions brings back Stardust Homecoming (December 1-January 2), as a mysterious man from the Fulton Street Fish Market makes a delivery to the Stardust on Christmas Eve, 1942.
Newer holiday offerings include Burien Little Theatre’s Christmas with the Crawfords (December 1-20), a musical comedy set in the 1940’s, and featuring Hollywood’s most famous dysfunctional family. Balagan Theatre reprises Death, Sex 2: The Holiday Show, their second annual one-act festival (December 3-19) of six short plays with broad themes of death and sex in a cheery holiday setting.
Holiday Bizarre: A Jewish Christmas! chronicles the trials of Goldberg, Frankenstein and Murray, three representatives of the Wiseman Law Firm who have been hired by Joseph to sue the mysteriously illegitimate father of his wife’s son Jesus. The production stars David Bestock, Quinn Redman, Eli Rosenblatt and Eli Keltz, and is now in its fourth year at two of Seattle’s best venues, the Re-Bar and the Tractor Tavern (December 15-23).
Seattle Shakespeare Company mounts the Bard’s Twelfth Night (December 3-27), starring Susannah Millonzi as Viola, John Bogar as Malvolio, and well-known director, Carol Roscoe, as Maria. Outsider’s Inn Collective debuts Big Ball by Leslie Bramm (December 4-13), as the Brumfayleur’s celebrate their son Billy’s 18th birthday with dysfunctional Uncle Wade.
Family audiences are likely to enjoy The Best Christmas Pageant Ever (December 10-24) at Seattle Public Theatre, in which the infamous Herdman clan take over the church’s annual holiday pageant.
