Layne Sasser News

Leading the cast are three stage veterans who have been delighting local audiences for years: Debbie Kraski, Dietz Osborne and Layne Sasser, three names that are sure to attract the attention of theater-goers in the Nashville area. They agreed to take on our Friday Five questions in anticipation of tonight's opening, giving answers we feel certain will encourage you to go see them in their latest onstage adventure.

Halloween's all done in, there are still three weeks ahead before we officially give thanks, and Christmas - and all its accompanying frenzy and frivolity - is about seven weeks away! So what's there to do for all the theatrical types jonesing for a trip to make believe? Plenty! Theater companies all over middle Tennessee are showing off their best and brightest, with a number of eagerly anticipated shows opening this weekend and/or continuing from their earlier opening nights and next Tuesday there's a sparkling new Broadway musical swinging through Music City to entertain you…

Sometimes it seems there is so much theater happening that it's difficult to keep track of it all. From personal experience, despite all the datebooks, smart phones, tablets, desktop computers and laptops...it's hard to keep everything straight in this wacky business of the show.

Tracy Letts' acclaimed play about a dysfunctional family coming to terms with one another - August: Osage County - opens at Nashville's iconic Darkhorse Theater on November 6, directed by Bradley Moore and featuring a veritable who's who of Nashville actors. August: Osage County, running through November 21, is presented by ACT 1 as its second show of the 2015-16 season.

Since yesterday afternoon, when news of the death of Nashville theater stalwart Marianne Clark began making its way through the community, people have taken to social media to send their own farewells, to express heartfelt thoughts and to remember warmly the impact of Clark's stage career and the affects of the untimely demise of one of our own theatrical legends. You see, if Layne Sasser is Nashville's Betty White, as I maintain, and Nan Gurley is Meryl Streep, Denice Hicks is Emma Thompson and Vali Forrister is our answer to Susan Sarandon, then it would go that Marianne Clark was probably our version of Elaine Stritch.

Today, in our third installment of Nashville Theater 101, we introduce you to three more members of the Nashville theater family: Patrick James, April Hardcastle-Miles and Matthew Hayes Hunter. Our questions are fairly basic and to the point: Why do you do theater? And why do you choose Nashville, perhaps best known as the home of country music, as your home base?

Simon's play, an adaptation of his original work, follows the better half of society as newly-separated neat freak Florence Ungar (played by theatre veteran Marianne Clark) moves in with perpetual slob Olive Madison (portrayed by Julie Murphy).

Never send a man to do a woman's job... that seems to be the governing philosophy in Neil Simon's The Odd Couple (Female Version), opening at Towne Centre Theatre tonight, August 15th.

Never send a man to do a woman's job... that seems to be the governing philosophy in Neil Simon's The Odd Couple (Female Version), opening at Towne Centre Theatre on August 15th.

Just in time for Valentine's Day, Street Theatre Company opens its 2013 season with two special performances of Love Letters. Love Letters by A. R. Gurney was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The play is a unique and imaginative theatre piece that is comprised of letters exchanged over a lifetime between two people who grew up together, went their separate ways, but continued to share confidences. Evocative, touching, frequently funny, as the actors read the letters aloud, they chronicle over nearly 50 years of hopes and ambitions, dreams and disappointments, victories and defeats that have passed between them throughout their separated lives.

Just in time for Valentine's Day, Street Theatre Company opens its 2013 season with two special performances of Love Letters. Love Letters by A. R. Gurney was nominated for a Pulitzer Prize for Drama. The play is a unique and imaginative theatre piece that is comprised of letters exchanged over a lifetime between two people who grew up together, went their separate ways, but continued to share confidences. Evocative, touching, frequently funny, as the actors read the letters aloud, they chronicle over nearly 50 years of hopes and ambitions, dreams and disappointments, victories and defeats that have passed between them throughout their separated lives.

Voting is now underway for the Tennessee Awards and continues until December 31, 2012. Winners will be announced in early January.

Nashville actor/singer/musician Geoff Davin has released his latest music video 'White Beat,' written by the multi-talented performer himself. The star of Boiler Room Theatre's The Rocky Horror Show and Circle Players' Company, the versatile Davin surrounds himself with an all-star cast of some of Music City's favorite stage stars. For more information, go to www.GeoffDavin.com.

Lisa Marie Wright's impeccable timing and on-target comic performance-not to mention her cantilevered breastworks-are reason enough to book your favorite table at Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre for Spreading It Around, a formulaic comedy about seniors spending their kids' inheritances that actually packs in a lot of laughs while pulling a minimum of punches in its two hours onstage.

For Tennessee theater audiences, this weekend presents a bounty of theatrical riches, with six shows opening: Blackbird Theatre's Red, Sideshow's Crumble (Lay Me Down, Justin Timberlake), Chaffin's Barn Dinner Theatre's Spreading it Around, Boiler Room Theatre's Parade, Tennessee Women's Theater Project's Shooting Star and Street Theatre Company's latest incarnation of Macabaret.

Set against a backdrop of the razzle-dazzle decadence of the 1920s, the Arts Center of Cannon County presents Chicago-the story of Roxie Hart (with Alexandra McNamara and Jessica Storvik alternating in the role) a housewife and nightclub dancer who maliciously murders her on-the-side lover after he threatens to walk out on her-running September 14-13 in Woodbury.

Theater people from throughout Tennessee gathered at Belmont University's Bill and Carole Troutt Theatre on Sunday night for the 2013 First Night Honors to pay tribute to a group of eight remarkable people who have made indelible marks on the theater scene throughout their storied careers. Hosted by Holly Shepherd and Joel Diggs, the gala evening honored the eight leading lights of Tennessee theater as they were recognized as members of the First Night Class of 2013 Honorees.

Dressed to the nines-despite forecasts of thunderstorms and a tornado watch that hung over the region-theater people from throughout Tennessee gathered at Belmont University's Bill and Carole Troutt Theatre on Sunday night for the 2013 First Night Honors. Hosted by Holly Shepherd and Joel Diggs, the gala evening honored eight leading lights of Tennessee theater as they were recognized as members of the First Night Class of 2013 Honorees.