Please Attend the Holiday Cabaret!

Posted by Bruce Miller
Whether you are one of Greater Richmond's theatre artists, theatre attendees, or a blog reader sympathetic to theatre in general, I hope you will join us this holiday season in our vital efforts to raise money for the Richmond Theatre Artists Fund. The RTAF is an endowment fund managed by the Community Foundation and the Richmond Alliance of Professional Theatres.

Our annual Home for the Holidays benefit cabaret begins this coming Sunday evening, Dec 14 at 7 pm; with subsequent performances at 7 pm on Tuesday Dec 16; 11 pm on Saturday Dec 20; 7 pm on Sunday Dec 21; and 7 pm on Monday Dec 22.

Nineteen of Central Virginia's best musical theatre performers--including Larry Cook, Corey Davis, Georgia Farmer, Jan Guarino, Robin Harris-Jones, Michael Hawke, Kelly Kennedy, Lauren Leinhaas Cook, Katrinah Lewis, Jason Marks, Billy Christopher Maupin, Robyn O'Neill, Derek Phipps, Maggie Roop, Janine Serresseque, Angela Shipley, Debra Wagoner, Chloe Williams, and Tony Williams on piano--are volunteering their time and talent to raise money for the Richmond Theatre Artists Fund.

This important charity provides emergency financial assistance to members of our own community when, through no fault of their own, they face impossible financial challenges and need our help.

I believe in the Richmond Theatre Artists Fund with all my heart. I have known its recipients--the challenges they faced before receiving help and the great joy they experienced when they realized that someone actually cared enough to assist them during their time of crisis.

I hope each and every one of you will make a point to attend one of the cabaret performances this season. I hope you will twist the arms of all your friends, relatives and neighbors. We really need to sell tickets if this once-a-year fundraiser is to be a success.

I've attended every previous performance of the cabarets, and I can assure you that they are lots of fun.

Regular tickets are $25 each. Barksdale and Theatre IV subscriber tickets are $20 each. All of you who are active members of the Richmond theatre community can reserve tickets for whatever size contribution you can afford, no questions asked.

The box office will list these pay-what-you-will tickets as comps, and you can donate whatever works with your budget. 100% of your contribution will go to increase the principal of the Fund. The Fund currently stands at approximately $21,000, and yields approximately $1,000 in emergency relief each year. Over time, we'd like to increase the Fund's principal about tenfold. The important thing is to support your friends and colleagues by attending and making whatever contribution is within your means.

It's also important to make reservations, so that we know how many people to expect.

Please help us spread the word. I honestly can't understand why every performance isn't sold out. All performances are held in the Barksdale Willow Lawn lobby, and all seating is cabaret style at tables. The bar is open throughout the event.

I count on seeing you and all of your friends there.

Thanks. Happy Holidays!

--Bruce Miller

Another Fantastic Cabaret at the Empire Theatre

Posted by Billy Christopher Maupin

I am often accused of not sharing information early enough, so even though there are a lot of exciting things going on next Friday for First Friday at the Empire, I wanted to start getting the word out about the cabaret that will be playing in the lobby FOR FREE (which seemed to be the big question last time: "How much is the cover?"). FREE ENTERTAINMENT; How cool is that?
We featured an incredibly well-received cabaret for First Friday in September; so well-received, in fact, that we are featuring another next week, with several returning faces/voices and several new ones as well.

This time around Corey Davis (most recently of Stuart Little at Theatre IV and Austin's Bridge at the Firehouse Theatre Project, also to be seen in the upcoming Rumpelstiltskin's Daughter at Theatre IV),

Billy Christopher Maupin (seen in Mr. Marmalade and Austin's Bridge at the Firehouse Theatre Project and earlier this year in Smoke on the Mountain at Barksdale Theatre at Hanover Tavern),

Audrey Snyder (Stuart Little with Theatre IV, Frankenstein Lives! at the Carpenter Science Theatre, Where's Charley? at Barksdale Theatre),

and Chloe Williams (Barksdale Theatre's smash hit production of Mame) will return to the stage.

And the vibrant new voices of Taylor Baltimore (currently rehearsing as Petra in Stephen Sondheim and Hugh Wheeler's A Little Night Music with Live Arts in Charlottesville),

Catherine Dudley (who just closed as Snowbell in Stuart Little),

Jacquie O'Connor (recently seen in The Full Monty and Scapino! at Barksdale, as well as I Love You, You're Perfect, Now Change at Swift Creek Mill Playhouse),

and Jonathan Spivey (Barksdale's Cyrano de Bergerac, numerous performances at the University of Richmond, and a stunning Lady #3 in Paul Deiss' adaptation of The Magic Flute with Theatre IV) will join them.

The upcoming cabaret will feature songs from Cabaret, Chicago, Dreamgirls, Side Show, South Pacific, Thoroughly Modern Millie, and more!

So come check out all the exciting things happening, grab a drink at the cash bar and check out a fine cabaret. Life is, after all, a cabaret, ol' chum. So...(yeah...you're singing it...)

Friday, November 2, starting at 7:30PM at the historic Empire Theatre in Downtown Richmond!

(Pictured at right, from September's cabaret are Robin Harris-Jones, Billy Christopher Maupin, Russell Rowland, Janine Sears, Andrea Ross, Audrey Snyder, Corey Davis, Chloe Williams, and Keydron Dunn.)

(NOTE: Headshots appear in order of mention and not necessarily adjacent to name.)

First Friday's at the Empire!

Posted by Catherine Dudley
I just wanted to let you guys all know… if you’re not coming downtown on the first Friday of every month- you’re missing out! At every event the streets are swarming with people, and the energy is amazing. The restaurants are packed, the art galleries are filled to capacity, the music is spilling out into the streets from numerous storefronts and we, here at the Empire Theatre, are proud to show off our beautiful and historic building. Some months our lobby presents live music from awesome bands around the Richmond area, and some months we have a video montage of several of our past productions playing on a large screen in the lobby. Every month there is a gallery display of some kind- photography, artwork, sculpture, costume display, etc…, but there is always a ton to be seen. The bar is ready to serve, and the theatre space itself is ready to be admired. So come on down and join us every First Friday night, and see what you’ve been missing! The theatre beckons…

(This Friday also come check out a cabaret featuring Keydron Dunn, Russell Rowland, Billy Christopher Maupin, Andrea Ross, Audrey Snyder, Robin Harris-Jones, Janine Serresseque, Corey Davis and Chloe Williams.)

-Catherine Dudley