Category Archives: Press Releases

February 6, 2018 · 3:16 pm

DANCING FOR THE STARS 2018 | Sat., April 14 | Music Hall Ballroom

CAA_Dancing for the Stars

CINCINNATI, OH – Who will be voted Cincinnati’s best celebrity dancer?  Which stars have the right moves to rule the dance floor?  Find out on Saturday, April 14, 2018 when the Cincinnati Arts Association (CAA) celebrates season twelve of its annual fundraiser Dancing for the Stars at the newly-renovated Music Hall Ballroom (1243 Elm Street, Cincinnati) to benefit CAA’s Overture Awards – the nation’s largest locally-run high school arts scholarship competition – and Arts Education Programs. 

Inspired by the hit ABC-TV show Dancing with the Stars, Dancing for the Stars will feature seven Cincinnati celebrities paired with some of the area’s finest professional dancers in a competition program, at which the audience will vote for their favorite celebrity dancer. The competitive dance for the evening will be Swing, and each dance pair will have ninety seconds to woo the crowd and the judges.

Saturday, April 14, 2018

  • 6:00 PM – Wine & Cheese / Meet-and-Greet Reception with the Stars and the Pros
  • 6:30 PM – Dancing, Dinner by the Bite, Cash Bar
  • 8:00 PM – Celebrity Dance Competition
  • 10:00 PM – Dance the Night Away

Dancing for the Stars will also feature:

  • Silent auction
  • Dance music by guest DJ “Rockin’ Ron” Schumacher, WGRR-FM
  • Pre-event reception and wine tasting
  • Open dancing before and after the competition
  • Lite bites provided by some of Cincinnati’s finest restaurants and caterers
  • Cash bar

In addition to the winner of the dance competition, Dancing for the Stars will crown a Fundraising Champion – the celebrity dancer who raises the most revenue toward the event’s fundraising goal through table/ticket sales and donations. Fans may add a donation under their favorite celebrity’s name at the time of ticket purchase, or simply make a donation if they cannot attend the event. These direct donations (outside of the event ticket price)  will help one of the fans’ favorite celebrities win the Dancing for the Stars Fundraising Champion award – which will be announced the evening of the event – and are 100% tax deductible.

Tickets are currently on sale at the following levels (a portion of the ticket price is tax-deductible):

  • $150 – Patron (includes pre-event reception and two drink tickets)
  • $1,500 – Corporate Table (ten Patron level tickets and a half-page program ad)
  • $2,000 – Celebrity Circle Table (premium “first-row” viewing of competition area, ten Patron level tickets, full-page program ad, recognition on event signage)

RESERVATIONS AND INFORMATION:

THE STARS:

  • Marcia Bowling, MD (Gynecologic Oncology, The Christ Hospital Network)
  • Ryan Messer (Regional Business Director, Johnson & Johnson; Board Member, Cincinnati Public Schools)
  • Renu Kotwal, MD (Psychiatry & Neurology, The Christ Hospital Network)
  • Pam Kravetz (nationally-recognized artist, arts educator, and Project Manager for ArtWorks)
  • Rhonda Whitaker (Director of Government & Community Relations,  Duke Energy Kentucky; Chairwoman, Northern Kentucky Chamber of Commerce)
  • John Williams (Attorney ; President, Cincinnati Bar Association)
  • Steve Valerius (President Individual Division, Ameritas Life Insurance) 

THE PROS (WITH STAR PAIRING):  

  • Doreen Beatrice (Independent Dance Instructor) – John Williams
  • Leigh Bradshaw (Cincinnati Ballroom Company) – Steve Valerius
  • Maria Wheeler (Phoenix Rising Ballroom)- Ryan Messer
  • Jeremy Mainous (Arthur Murray Dance Studio – Cincinnati) – Rhonda Whitaker
  • Jozsef Parragh (Independent Dance Instructor) – Dr. Marcia Bowling
  • Josh Tilford (Independent Dance Instructor) – Dr. Renu Kotwal
  • Alyenendrov (Lenny) Tsorokean (Phoenix Rising Ballroom) – Pam Kravetz 

THE HOSTS:  Chris O’Brien & Janeen Coyle (“Married With Microphones,” 103.5 WGRR-FM) 

THE JUDGES:   

  • Douglas Beal (Independent Dance Instructor)
  • Bonita Brockert (Independent Dance Instructor)
  • Desiree Mainous (Independent Dance Instructor; Owner, Arthur Murray Dance Studio – Cincinnati)
  • Neal Schulte (2014 Dancing for the Stars Winner & Fundraising Champion; Founder & President, Schulte Financial Group, LLC.)

EVENT COMMITTEE:  Dr. Alison Holzapfel, co-chair (Dancing for the Stars 2017 celebrity participant),  Jamie Humes, co-chair (Dancing for the Stars 2016 celebrity participant), Sue Gilkey, Jim Howland, Ginger Loftin, Rosemary Schlachter, Phil Schworer, and Tracey Skale.

EVENT SPONSORS:  Arthur Murray Dance Studio – Cincinnati; Doreen Beatrice; Bonita Brockert; Cincinnati Ballroom Company; Graphic Village; Pebble Creek Group; Jozsef Parragh; Phoenix Rising Ballroom; Josh Tilford. 

ELEVEN YEARS OF DANCING FOR THE STARS WINNERS:

  • 2007:     Dr. O’dell Owens (former Hamilton County Coroner)
  • 2008:     Jenell Walton (former WCPO-TV9 Anchor and Reporter)
  • 2009:     Phil Schworer (past President, Cincinnati Bar Association; Environmental Lawyer, Frost, Brown and Todd)
  • 2010:     Donna Speigel (Owner, The Snooty Fox)
  • 2011:     Tracey Skale (Chief Medical Officer, Greater Cincinnati Behavioral Health Services)
  • 2012:     Regina Russo (former Director of Marketing and Communications, Cincinnati Art Museum)
  • 2013:     Chris Seelbach (Cincinnati City Councilman)
  • 2014:     Neal Schulte (Founder & President, Schulte Financial Group, LLC)
  • 2015:     Johnny Chu (Owner, AmerAsia Kungfood Restaurant)
  • 2016:     Jay Lame (Financial Analyst, Lenox Wealth Management)
  • 2017:     Rohan Hemani (Procter & Gamble Fabric Care Intrapenuer)

CINCINNATI ARTS ASSOCIATION’S ARTS EDUCATION PROGRAMS

CAA’s Education Department promotes life-long learning through its programs, which are diverse, multidisciplinary, and accessible to all ages and cultural groups. SchoolTime presents a series of programs that feature nationally-recognized artists at CAA’s two venues (the Aronoff Center and Music Hall), and Artists On Tour brings the finest local artists in the region to Tri-state schools for interactive arts experiences aligned with the curriculum.

The Overture Awards Scholarship Competition is the largest locally-run arts scholarship competition in the country.  The program annually provides a $4,000 scholarship to six area high school students for education and training, with 18 finalists each winning a $1,000 scholarship. Each year, nearly 500 students are nominated by their schools to compete in one of six artistic disciplines: Creative Writing, Dance, Instrumental Music, Theater, Visual Art, or Vocal Music. There are three levels of competition: Regional, Semi-Finals, and Final.

The Overture Awards was developed to recognize, encourage, and reward excellence in the arts among Tri-state students in grades 9-12. It also provides students an opportunity to share their talents and interests among their peers in a supportive environment outside of their individual schools.  Now in its 20th year, The Overture Awards was launched in 1996 by the Cinergy Foundation and Leadership Cincinnati (a Greater Cincinnati Chamber of Commerce program).

Founded in 1992, the Cincinnati Arts Association (CAA) is a not-for-profit organization that oversees the programming and management of two of the Tri-state’s finest performing arts venues – the Aronoff Center for the Arts and Music Hall – and is dedicated to supporting performing and visual arts. Each year, CAA presents a diverse schedule of events; serves more than 600,000 people in its venues; features the work of talented local, regional, and national artists in the Weston Art Gallery (located in the Aronoff Center); and supports the work of more than one dozen resident companies, including Cincinnati Ballet, Cincinnati Opera, Cincinnati Symphony/Pops Orchestras, May Festival, and Fifth Third Bank Broadway in Cincinnati, presented by TriHealth. Since the inception of its acclaimed arts education programs in 1995, CAA has reached nearly 1.6 million students.

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February 6, 2018 · 11:47 am

Ed Stern Stages Sam Shepard’s Masterpiece BURIED CHILD for Xavier University Theatre

BURIED CHILD-print

Bruce Cromer & Regina Pugh.

(CINCINNATI, Feb. 6, 2018) — Xavier University Theatre continues its main stage season with Sam Shepard’s acclaimed, Pulitzer-Prize winning play BURIED CHILD. The show — which is directed by former Cincinnati Playhouse in the Park Producing Artistic Director Ed Stern and stars two of the region’s most prolific actors, Bruce Cromer and Regina Pugh — runs Feb. 15 through Feb. 18 in Xavier’s Gallagher Student Center Theatre.

BURIED CHILD shines a surreal spotlight on the disintegration of an American family. Aging patriarch Dodge and his wayward wife Halie are suddenly confronted with the homecoming of their troubled son Tilden, as well as the unexpected visit of their grandson Vince, who has been gone so long no one quite remembers him. As the family tries to make sense of their deteriorating relationships, a murky secret emerges that challenges their beliefs, heritage and memories. With BURIED CHILD, Shepard weaves a compelling Southern Gothic that balances the miracle of renewal with the inevitability of decay.

No one has quite approached the idea of the American family with such imaginative perversion as Sam Shepard. According to Stern, “Shepard is a master storyteller; he has drama, comedy. BURIED CHILD deals with roots, and it deals with finding direction in your life. As an actor himself, Shepard knew how to write for other actors perfectly.”

The relative ambiguity in the script presented Bruce Cromer and Regina Pugh, who portray Dodge and Halie, the opportunity to explore two characters that defy typical logic. Cromer says, “There’s a quote from Shepard that said when he was rewriting BURIED CHILD he didn’t want anything to be unintentionally ambiguous. So there’s intentional ambiguity that makes actors, as well as the audience, scratch their heads and think, ‘What the hell is going on?’ It’s great to work with someone like Ed who excels with details and specifics. He’s not afraid of the weird, irrational aspects of the writing or the world of the story.”

Pugh agrees, stating, “For Halie, in particular, there is a surreal change. There are a lot of unanswered questions with zero explanation. The challenge has been to find the way to make all of that seem right rather than making it seem like anything other than the truth of the play.”

The student actors have found their own challenges within Shepard’s labyrinthine plot. Junior Sam Martini, who plays Tilden, says, “I love the complete reversal of the family dynamic and the way it’s portrayed over time. It’s been a very fun experience, and I’ve learned so much. The play may be difficult, but in this supportive environment it’s easy to go all in.”

The entire cast for BURIED CHILD includes Bruce Cromer (Dodge), Regina Pugh (Halie), Henry Eden (Vince), Holland Taylor (Shelly), Sam Martini (Tilden), Aiden Dalton (Bradley) and Stephen Skiles (Father Dewis). Thomas Wehby understudies the role of Father Dewis. Cromer, Pugh and Skiles all appear courtesy of Actors’ Equity Association.

In addition to Stern, other members of the creative team include Joe Beumer (set design/lighting design); Kevin Semancik (sound design); Maggie Dick (costume design); Andrew Leonard, Cat Sholtis and Micah Price (props design); Hannah Sgambellone (assistant direction); and Bruce Cromer (fight choreography). The stage manager is Emi Suarez. Assistant stage managers are Abby Bricking and Taylor Maas.

Performances take place at 7:30 p.m. on Feb. 15, 16 and 17 and 2 p.m. on Feb. 17 and 18. Tickets for BURIED CHILD are available now through the Xavier University Theatre Box Office. They are $17 each for adults and $12 each for students, as well as Xavier faculty and staff. Limited seating is available. To purchase tickets, visit www.xavier.edu/theatretickets or call 513-745-3939.

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February 5, 2018 · 3:48 pm

THE MAGIC OF ADAM TRENT | Tue., March 13 | Music Hall

CAA_The Magic of Adam Trent logo

CINCINNATI, OH – Broadway/TV star Adam Trent is bringing his signature brand of magic and illusion to Cincinnati Music Hall on Tuesday, March 13 at 7:30 PM in a high-tech stage spectacle that is part of his larger tour of more than sixty cities.

Tickets are on sale now at www.CincinnatiArts.org, (513) 621-ARTS [2787], and the Aronoff Center Ticket Office. Group discount tickets for ten or more are available by calling (513) 977-4157. 

Produced by the creative team behind The Illusionists, the world’s best-selling touring magic show, THE MAGIC OF ADAM TRENT (AdamTrent.com) is an immersive entertainment extravaganza of magic, comedy, and music designed to entertain the entire family. Showcasing his “futuristic” brand of magic, Trent has mesmerized live audiences around the globe, in person, and as a featured guest on America’s Got Talent, The Today Show, Ellen, Rachael Ray Show, and the Disney Channel, among countless other TV appearances. The 32-year-old also stars in his own ten-episode TV series The Road Trick on Red Bull TV.

Trent inaugurated the first two years of The Illusionists’ record-breaking Broadway runs, which served as a launching pad for his own live show and tour. “I am so excited to hit the road and bring an entirely new show to audiences around the world,” says Trent, who has always thought that magic should be entertaining first and tricky second. He doesn’t want people to remember “tricks” as much as the laughs and memories made with the performance. “This will be a show like you’ve never seen.”

THE MAGIC OF ADAM TRENT is produced by MagicSpace Entertainment and The Works Entertainment. “Adam Trent is unlike any magician working today, a funny, witty, and accomplished entertainer — the next David Copperfield meets Justin Timberlake,” says creative producer Simon Painter. “He has a knack for electrifying giant television and theatre audiences with his unique brand of magic.”

For more information and a tentative tour schedule, visit AdamTrent.com. Follow @AdamTrentMagic on all social media platforms for tour info.

ABOUT MAGICSPACE ENTERTAINMENT
MagicSpace Entertainment is headed by Lee D. Marshall, Joe Marsh, John Ballard, Steve Boulay, and Bruce Granath and has been producing and presenting national tours, Broadway shows, concerts, and museum exhibits worldwide for over thirty years. Consistently one of the top promoters in North America, MagicSpace Entertainment typically produces and presents more than 250 events in 75 cities per year.  They have offices in Park City and Salt Lake City, UT. www.magicspace.net 

ABOUT THE WORKS ENTERTAINMENT
The Works Entertainment established and led by Creative Producer Simon Painter and Executive Producer Tim Lawson, is one of the most successful live entertainment companies in the world, creating, presenting, and producing first class entertainment throughout over 300 cities and 30 countries.  Their award-winning shows including The Illusionists, Le Noir, and Circus 1903, have smashed box office records multiple times around the world from Sydney to Mexico to London and Broadway.

CINCINNATI ARTS ASSOCIATION SPONSORS

SEASON SPONSORS:  AMERITAS (Founding Season Sponsor), FIFTH THIRD BANK (Lifetime Endowment Partner), FURNITURE FAIR, LOCAL12 WKRC, The P&G FUND of The Greater Cincinnati Foundation

SEASON PRESENTING SPONSORS:  21C Museum Hotel, Cincinnati Herald, CityBeat, Heidelberg Distributing, Hilton Cincinnati Netherland Plaza, Macy’s, Pepsi, Prosource, Skyline Chili, TriHealth

THE MAGIC OF ADAM TRENT PERFORMANCE SPONSORS:  USI, Ultimate Air Shuttle

Founded in 1992, the Cincinnati Arts Association (CAA) is a not-for-profit organization that oversees the programming and management of the Tri-state’s finest performing arts venues – the Aronoff Center for the Arts and Music Hall – and is dedicated to supporting performing and visual arts. Each year, CAA presents a diverse schedule of events; serves upwards of 600,000 people in its venues; features the work of talented local, regional, and national artists in the Weston Art Gallery (located in the Aronoff Center); and supports the work of more than one dozen resident companies. Since the inception of its acclaimed arts education programs in 1995, CAA has reached more than 1.6 million students. For more information, visit www.CincinnatiArts.org.

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February 5, 2018 · 12:28 pm

Village Players Present RING ROUND THE MOON

VP_Ring Around the Moon logo

Village Players presents Ring Round the Moon by Jean Anouih (adapted by Christopher Fry), Feb. 9 – 17, 2018. Village Players is located in the lower level of the Ft. Thomas Woman’s Club, 8 North Ft. Thomas Ave, Ft. Thomas, KY 41075.

A number of guests arrive for a party at a country chateau. Their intertwining relationships create a mix of emotions, with comic results. A play “of many moods…wistfully romantic, satirical, fantastic…To make his points about love (the author) has invented a fable about twin brothers—Frederic, who is shy and sensitive, and Hugo, who is heartless and aggressive. Frederic is in love with a hussy who is in love with Hugo. To save Frederic from an unhappy marriage, Hugo tries to distract him by bringing to a ball a beautiful dancer who masquerades as a mysterious personage and becomes the triumph of the occasion. She is a susceptible maiden in her own right. She not only breaks up all the cynical romances that have been going on before she arrived, but loses her own heart as well.”

Ring Round the Moon is directed by Allan Karol, produced by Barbara Karol and features the talents of Steve Phelan, Michael Gettinger, Kiya Fix, Nisrene Langenbrunner, Will Lindsey, Barbara Karol, Jennifer Davis, Tim Carney, Fred Murrell, Amanda Szarmack and Dava Lynn.

Performances will be:

  • Friday, February 9th – 8 PM
  • Saturday, February 10th – 8 PM
  • Sunday, February 11th – 3 PM
  • Thursday, February 15th – 8 PM
  • Friday, February 16th – 8 PM
  • Saturday, February 17th – 8 PM

To order tickets for Ring Round the Moon, visit www.villageplayers.biz or leave a message at 859-392-0500.

Village Players began in 1966 when members of the Fort Thomas Woman’s Club formed a community theatre department and renovated the lower level of the building to house a unique and intimate 102-seat three-quarter thrust stage. Village Players is a member of KTA, OCTA, ACT-Cincinnati and AACT. Located at 8 North Fort Thomas Avenue, Fort Thomas, Kentucky, Village Players mounts four productions each year and donates the proceeds of its spring production to charity. For more information, www.villageplayers.biz or 859-392-0500.

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February 1, 2018 · 3:30 pm

Westwood Actor Pens New Jack the Ripper Play

TDW_Jack Williams

Jack Williams.

(Cheviot, Ohio) Westwood resident Jack Williams will achieve a long-held dream later this month, when The Drama Workshop stages his original play, THE GIRLS OF MILLER COURT: HUNTING FOR JACK THE RIPPER. The premiere of his play culminates 7 years of work to put a fresh twist on the well-known tale.

Jack was bitten by the theatre bug at a young age, and was further encouraged by a friend he met over the summer when he was 10. “Cliff was from Detroit, visiting his grandmother for the summer,” he explained, “and we got to be good friends. One of the things his friendship brought to me was his understanding of theatre – quoting chapter and verse from Cyrano de Bergerac and Othello. It all came alive whenever he did it. This went on for years. Every summer, I couldn’t wait until Cliff arrived.”

In high school, Jack participated in the school drama club, and found that he felt comfortable in the theatre world. He went to the University of Cincinnati and got a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Theatre Arts. After graduating, he ended up auditioning at WCPO for a new show featuring a comic from New York. Although that show didn’t work out, he found out that Al Lewis was looking for a character actor for his morning children’s show. Jack ended up playing those characters, including Ringo Rango the cowboy and Lucky the Clown, as well as writing for the program, for nearly the remainder of the show’s run, leaving only a couple of years before the “Uncle Al Show” left the air in 1985.

After that, Jack wrote for the Disney Company, putting storylines behind the products sold in the Disney Store chain. He kept his hand in performing, as a respected actor in Cincinnati community theatre. It was while sitting in the Walton Creek Theatre in Mariemont that he got into a discussion of how a young woman might turn the table on her predator – an idea which grew into THE GIRLS OF MILLER COURT.

“I’ve been a fan of shows like The Twilight Zone and shows like it that skew reality just a little bit to see what happens,” Jack explained. “I got to thinking, what would happen if you had a scene where you have the lady of the evening, who is leaning up against the fencepost and the stalker comes – you see his shadowy form and just before he strikes, she pulls out a knife and kills him, and then she runs away. That stuck in my head.”

“Jack the Ripper is the most infamous of history’s mass murderers, even after all this time,” he continued. “What would have happened if his victims had fought back? And it occurred to me that maybe they did. You can’t go to people who live on the street like that and think that they’ll turn the other cheek. So, I started reading up on it, and discovered that just by changing one or two of their actions, it could have sparked a different outcome. It could have happened. We just don’t know.”

The show evolved over the ensuing years. As Jack finished a draft, he’d share it with his wife, Cheryl, and others in the Cincinnati theatre community. He submitted it for consideration to be produced by a few groups. The Drama Workshop seriously considered producing an early version of THE GIRLS OF MILLER COURT, but in the end decided that it wasn’t quite ready. However, they encouraged Jack to keep working on it, and offered some suggestions to help it work better on the stage. Jack took the feedback to heart.

In 2016, The Drama Workshop did a staged reading of a new draft of the show with some very skilled actors, who were extremely complimentary of the work. After some minor tweaks, it was selected by TDW to be part of its 2017-2018 season. The only stipulation came from TDW’s marketing team, which asked that the original subtitle, “Black Nights in Whitechapel” be replaced with “Hunting Jack the Ripper.”

Despite many revisions, the core of the story remained constant. “There’s a lot of stuff that you have to deal with as far as the facts,” Jack said. “We know they happened, and I tried not to violate any of that. We know that Mary Kelly was singing the night she was killed, because the person who lived above from her heard it. We know the title of the song she was singing. I wanted to show that these women were more than just victims. They were people. They had lives and they had children, and they had lovers, and husbands, and friends. Of all the mass murderers in history, the Ripper was the only one who got away with it.”

Jack smiles, “But he didn’t get away from me.”

As you might expect, Jack Williams is thrilled to be this close to the show’s opening. “I’m excited, and very proud. TDW was the first group who said that they were interested in doing the play. I really like the idea of having it done here because this is where I got my start. It’s probably my favorite theatre in town. The group has been so supportive, I can’t imagine it being done anywhere else.”

THE GIRLS OF MILLER COURT: HUNTING FOR JACK THE RIPPER opens February 23rd, and runs through March 11th. Tickets are $18, and can be obtained by calling The Drama Workshop’s 24/7 ticket line at 513.598.8303, or by ordering online at www.thedramaworkshop.org. Seating is limited, and purchasing your tickets in advance is strongly encouraged.

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THE DRAMA WORKSHOP was founded in 1954. TDW is a 501(c)3 non-profit organization dedicated to advancing education and promotion of the theatrical arts. The Drama Workshop is widely recognized as one of greater Cincinnati’s most accomplished community theater organizations, garnering dozens of awards annually from the Association of Community Theatres of Greater Cincinnati. TDW productions are frequently selected to represent the Southwest Ohio region at the Ohio Community Theatre Association annual conference, including this past season with a production of “Aways…Patsy Cline.” TDW was also honored to represent the state of Ohio at the 2013 and 2017 American Association of Community Theatre regional conferences. The Drama Workshop has been recognized by the Cincinnati Preservation Association for their efforts to rehabilitate the former Glenmore Bowl into The Glenmore Playhouse. Prospective members, and individuals or businesses interested in becoming involved or in helping advance TDW’s mission are encouraged to contact the group through our website at www.thedramaworkshop.org, or by phone at 513-598-8303.

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