2016 | Center Theatre Group

In a 1999 interview with The Paris Review, playwright August Wilson stated that his work was most heavily influenced by “my four Bs”: poet Jorge Luis Borges, playwright Amiri Baraka, painter Romare Bearden, and most importantly, the blues. At the center of Wilson’s first hit play and Broadway debut, Ma Rainey’s Black Bottom (at the Mark Tap...

The Story of the ‘Mother of the Blues’

Lucy Alibar has made a name for herself for her distinctive and magical depictions of the American South through the eyes of young, female characters. First there was her Oscar-nominated screenplay for Beasts of the Southern Wild (co-written with Benh Zeitlin and based on Alibar’s play Juicy and Delicious). Now it’s Throw Me On the Burnpile and...

Lucy Alibar & Co.—Badass Women Writers of the South

Andrew Thiels has bought, built, and hunted down everything from dead bodies and antique refrigerators to handmade Amish wheelbarrows and vintage motorcycles for Center Theatre Group’s stages. Thiels, who became Properties Manager in 2013 and began freelancing for us in 2004, sat down with us to share some fun facts about his craft.

Prop Manager Andrew Thiels on 'Wild Goose Chases' and 'Making Fantasies Realities' Onstage

On July 18, 2016, Center Theatre Group Board of Directors Member Manuela Cerri Goren and her husband James Goren opened their incredible home to donors and theatre artists for an enchanting evening. Donors at the Benefactor level and above and their guests entered the event through a stony walkway to find a clear blue pool, vibrant yellow canopies,...

‘Grey Gardens’ Guests Delight Donors

Storytelling. Heat. Passion. Coffee. These were the sounds, smells, and feelings in Rehearsal Room C in The Music Center Annex over a weekend in early June, at the culminating retreat of the L.A. Writers’ Workshop. Each year, Center Theatre Group supports a small group of local playwrights as they research and write a new work while receiving fee...

2015/16 L.A. Writers’ Workshop Culminates in a Circus of Ideas and Stories

The name “Ivo van Hove” doesn’t flow off the tongues of Angelenos yet—but it will soon. (For the record, it’s pronounced “EE-vo van HOE-va.”) The 57-year old Belgian director of A View From the Bridge, which plays the Ahmanson Theatre September 7 – October 16, 2016, has been called avant-garde, minimalistic, provocative, and...

Meet Ivo van Hove