PLAYWRIGHT TAMMY RYAN WINS $10,000 FRANCESCA PRIMUS PRIZE FOR 2012; DOMINIQUE MORRISEAU ALSO HONORED Chicago, June 14, 2012 — The American Theatre Critics Association (ATCA) announced at its annual conference today that playwright Tammy Ryan has won the 2012 Francesca Primus Prize for her play Lost Boy Found in Whole Foods. She receives $10,000, a...
Obviously the big (in every way) event of the conference’s first day was “The Iceman Cometh,” a painstakingly rich version of the O’Neill classic. Opinions will naturally differ – hey, everyone’s a critic — but no one can deny the size of the accomplishment, or...
Day 1 featured a reception with the Commissioner of Cultural Affairs (this is not your average city government) and an Iceman Cometh marathon, just the right way to test our mettle. Here’s Day 2: June 14, Thursday * Arrivals contune at conference hotels. * Continental breakfast and General...
Chicago, Tuesday, June 12: What a great city – to arrive in the Loop by train (subway? what do they call it?) on a glorious day like today you discover what a city can be, lively, vigorous, brawny (as the poet says), a real urban city. For me, Chicago always...
That’s what Chicago felt like Tuesday, with or without the big shoulders, with five days of plays and old friends ahead at the 2012 ATCA annual conference. Laura Hayes’ logo for ATCA Chicago: ATCA’s satiric image of a self-satisified critic by Daumier takes over the famous spitting...
Read the final, completed schedule below or click here to view a pdf printable version. ATCA CHICAGO 2012 Annual Conference Schedule June 12, Tuesday -3PM-7PM, Executive Committee meets, home of Jonathan Abarbanel. -Early arrivals, members and guests at Conference hotels; free time. June 13, Wednesday -Executive Committee meets, 10AM-3PM, Club Quarters Hotel. -Arrivals,...
“NATO has left the building and Chicago is still intact.” So says Jonathan Abarbanel, chair of ATCA’s Chicago conference, June 13-17. Recent schedule additions include a Soul Food dinner courtesy of brand-new $19 million Black Ensemble Cultural Center, followed by the Ensemble’s latest musical biography, “The...
Jeffrey Eric Jenkins Jeffrey Eric Jenkins, editor of Best Plays, former ATCA chair, president of Foundation ATCA and chair of our international committee, is the new Head of the Department of Theatre at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Jeffrey writes his friends in ATCA and elsewhere: After fourteen years in...
Jay Handelman, excom chair, has written member John McMullen about the recent request from eight S.F. Bay Area theaters for page view stats for online reviewers (scroll down two items for the original letter). Handelman points out that no theater owes any critic a free ticket, but that...
We’ll have ATCA’s response to the SF Bay Area critics’ concern shortly, but in the meantime, if you need something to distract you from your daily rounds, there are these two discussions going on “Howl Round: A Journal of the Theater Commons”: “What do we actually...