News: Onstage

Staging the Sounds of Blues

Music has always been the great bookmark of my life to tell me where I was and what I was doing, said Tony® Award-winning actor and Lackawanna Blues creator Ruben Santiago-Hudson. When I had been telling people about this incredible upbringing, I knew I couldn’t tell it without music.

Staging the Sounds of Blues

Getting a Derby Rink on the Douglas Stage

A roller derby rink. Choreographed roller skating without wheels. An all-female cast, creative, and design team. These are just a few aspects that set apart For The Love Of (or, the roller derby play)—onstage at the Kirk Douglas Theatre March 7–17, 2019 as part of our third annual Block Party. And these are also some of the many reasons why the...

Getting a Derby Rink on the Douglas Stage

In Memoriam: 'Lackawanna Blues' Composer Bill Sims Jr.

Creator Ruben-Santiago Hudson dedicates his autobiographical play Lackawanna Blues to the memory of Bill Sims Jr.

In Memoriam: 'Lackawanna Blues' Composer Bill Sims Jr.

Forget the Clock, the Night’s Still Young for Cinderella

Whether you’re a fan of Disney animated movies, classic fairy tales, or have been an Ahmanson subscriber since 1999, you are probably very familiar with the story of Cinderella. Now 20 years later, as we welcome Matthew Bourne and his acclaimed Cinderella back to the Ahmanson—onstage February 5 – March 10, 2019—we’ve traded medieval Europ...

Forget the Clock, the Night’s Still Young for Cinderella

The Many Lives of ‘Lackawanna Blues’

When Ruben Santiago-Hudson’s Lackawanna Blues first premiered Off-Broadway in 2001 at The Public Theater, The New York Times lauded it as so humble and warm that the honesty of its spirit is never in question. That honesty was in part due to its directness: Santiago-Hudson was both playwright and solo performer embodying the people he lived along...

The Many Lives of ‘Lackawanna Blues’

Center Theatre Group Comes up Oscar Gold

Some might think the closest Center Theatre Group got to the Oscars was when the Academy Awards were hosted at the Dorothy Chandler Pavilion just across The Music Center Plaza. But in fact, our audiences have come close to Oscar gold for more than 50 years, thanks to the countless Academy Award winners who have appeared in productions across our th...

Center Theatre Group Comes up Oscar Gold