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MIDDLETOWN: CATCHING UP WITH 2014

jerseyboysmovieimageFrankie Valli meets Dirty Harry — when director Clint Eastwood’s cinema treatment of the Four Seasons musical bio JERSEY BOYS screens as part of a month of free 2014 releases at Middletown Library.

Remember 2014? Even if you’re the resolute type who actually meets your personal goals, and who wraps up The Year That Was with a neat little bow, there no doubt remain a number of tiny but torturously nagging regrets — chief among them “that movie you were meaning to go see.” Fortunately, for the latest monthly slate in their ongoing series of free movie screenings, Middletown Township Public Library presents a month of Mondays (and one Friday) designed to offer a chance to catch some last-year releases that may have slipped between the sprockets.

It begins this coming Monday, January 5, with a 2:30 pm showing of a biopic that boasts a special resonance for regionals: Jersey Boys, an adaptation of the Broadway jukebox-musical smash detailing the early career of Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons. Director Clint Eastwood (who, it must be recalled, acquitted himself well with the Charlie Parker jazzman bio Bird) works with a cast featuring Tony winner John Lloyd Young (originator of the Frankie role on Broadway) and Christopher Walken — as well as a slew of vintage Bob Gaudio/ Bob Crewe songs that include of course “Sherry,” “Big Girls Don’t Cry” and “Rag Doll.” The January screening schedule continues from there, with some cinematic studies in art, commerce, cooking, passion, and romance with a decidedly mature shading.

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January 2, 2015 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: HUMBUGS RULE!

Scrooge John WatersScrooge scowls again, as Nebraska Theater Caravan rolls into Red Bank for its annual staging of A CHRISTMAS CAROL — but not before filmmaker and Bad Tastemaker John Waters X-plains why he LOVES Christmas. (Waters photo by Greg Gorman)

Let’s make one thing perfectly clear here, to all who fear that the Count Basie Theatre has momentarily joined the perceived War on all that jingles and jollifies: John Waters absolutely LOVES Christmas — the “compulsive desire to give and receive perverted gifts;” his “religious fanaticism for Santa Claus, and an unhealthy love of true crime holiday horror stories.”

With a track record of forty-plus years as an author, lecturer, sometime actor, Bad Tastemaker authority and director of game-changing underground/ indie films (from Pink Flamingos and Female Trouble to the happy crossover of the original Hairspray) — and fresh off a modern-day odyssey that spawned the book Carsick: John Waters Hitchhikes Across America — the man in the pencil mustache makes his Basie debut on the night of Tuesday, December 16.

Succinctly entitled A John Waters Christmas, the 8 pm show finds the Baltimore-born raconteur riding into Red Bank “on his sleigh full of smut” with a one-man show that “puts the X in Xmas” — and for which tickets ($29 – $129) can be reserved right here. It so happens that Waters’ Bad-Santa sleigh will be sliding in fast on the ice-tracks of Junie B in Jingle Bells, Batman Smells — a playfully titled but family-friendly touring stage show (adapted by Allison Gregory from the children’s book series by Barbara Park) in which “sassy first-grader Junie B. Jones and her classmates embark on a hilarious adventure that packs a message about the joy of giving.” Take it here for tickets ($20 – $25) to that 4 pm performance — and around the corner for more holiday humbug.

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December 15, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

MIDDLETOWN: VERY MERRY MATINEES

Reginald-Owen-right-with-Leo-G-Carroll-as-Marley’s-Ghost-in-A-Christmas-Carol-1938Marley’s ghost rattles old Scrooge in the 1938 MGM treatment of A CHRISTMAS CAROL, one of several holiday-themed films screening for free this month of Mondays at Middletown Library.

The ongoing series of free movie screenings continues apace at Middletown Township Public Library here in December — with the holiday season setting the theme for the next several Monday afternoon offerings, as well as the debut of a New Film Fridays series in the week to come.

Showing at 2:30 pm this Monday, December 8 is the 1938 version of A Christmas Carol, one of the screen’s first full-length treatments of the Charles Dickens chestnut. Produced by top Hollywood studio MGM — albeit with a second-string cast that featured character actor Reginald Owen in a rare starring turn as Ebenezer Scrooge — the film’s not without its charms, even if it creaks and groans in comparison with Alastair Sim’s nuanced 1951 turn in Scrooge. Then on Friday, December 12, the new series kicks off with the final(?) film of the late Robin Williams — A Merry Friggin Christmas, in which a father and grown-up son (Joel McHale of Community and The Soup) are forced to go on a desperate road-trip in an effort to salvage the holiday for their family of misfits. Released just last month, the black comedy screens at 2 pm — with more movie merriment around the corner.

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December 7, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

MIDDLETOWN: POETIC VOICES PLEASE

CoraGreenhillAcclaimed British poet Cora Greenhill visits the Middletown Library on Monday, December 1, in an event hosted by the Red Bank Writers Group.

As her official bio states, “She lives in the Peak District in middle England, and in the Greek Island of Crete. Her poetry is strongly influenced by these places as well as other parts of the world, such as Africa, where she has traveled.”

So what brings Cora Greenhill to the greater Green this week — specifically Middletown Township Public Library, where the British wordsmith makes an exceedingly rare Stateside appearance on Monday, December 1? As it turns out, she’s visiting family right here in Red Bank — and when The Red Bank Writers Group got wind of those plans, it became necessary to engineer this opportunity for the poet (whose most-visited themes include feminism, spirituality, the natural world and global cultures) to meet some of her American fans, make new friends, and sign some copies of her books.

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November 30, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: LITTLE PINK (HAUNTED) HOUSES

Ghost BrosT Bone Burnett, John Mellencamp and Stephen King are the creative crew — and Gina Gershon co-stars — as GHOST BROTHERS OF DARKLAND COUNTY takes its cross-country tour to the stage of the Count Basie Theatre on Tuesday, November 18.

It’s the most curious collaboration since the Wilburys rode the range — a three-for-all that pools the talents of a working class rocker turned Americana exponent (John “Cougar” Mellencamp), an Oscar winning music director/ record producer (T Bone Burnett), and the Springsteen of supernatural fiction (Stephen King). While they’ve had their misfires at the multiplex (Falling from Grace, Maximum Overdrive), there remained but one arena for these Kings of Most Media to conquer: the legitimate “theatah.”

Tomorrow night, November 18, the Count Basie Theatre is the (allegedly haunted) host venue, as the national touring production of Ghost Brothers of Darkland County commandeers the stage for an 8 pm one-nighter. Featuring a book by King, songs by Mellencamp, and “eerie blues ‘n’ roots” music direction by Burnett, the “Southern Gothic supernatural musical” is but the most visible manifestation of a cross-platform phenomenon that also includes a hardcover book, e-book, album download and “deluxe” edition of the aforementioned. And, even if none of the Ghost partners are promised to be in attendance at the Basie (Mellencamp will be there for an April 2015 concert that sold out in a flash), the production boasts some star wattage of its own.

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November 17, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

MIDDLETOWN: A MOVIE MONDAY MULTI-CULTI

The Artist and the Model.Aida Foch and Jean Rochefort star in THE ARTIST AND THE MODEL, one of a series of recent foreign films screening for free, Mondays in November at Middletown Library.

The Movie Mondays series of free afternoon film screenings continues at Middletown Township Public Library, where the word for November isn’t spoken out loud, so much as it is subtitled — for it’s a set of recent foreign films that take the spotlight, beginning this Monday, November 3.

Set in Nazi-era occupied France — and sumptuously photographed in black and white — The Artist and the Model details the bond between a renowned (but aging and disillusioned) sculptor and the young muse who enters into his life: a Spanish war refugee, sought-after escapee and possible fighter for the Resistance. Jean Rochefort stars with Aida Foch (and Claudia Cardinale!) in the 2012 drama from director Fernando Trueba. Ages 18 and up only for this one, screening at 2:30 pm.

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November 2, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: GHOSTS AT THE COUNT’S CASTLE

the-shiningCome play with us: the Count Basie Theatre Cinema Society presents a Creature Double Feature on Wednesday, with showings of GHOSTBUSTERS and THE SHINING.

Wanna hear something really scary? For the latest in the new series of Cinema Society screening events, the Count Basie Theatre gives a nod to the impending Eve of All Hallows, with a Creature Double Feature drawn from that most mortifying of decades — the 1980s.

It all begins in a lighter vein at 6 pm this Wednesday, October 29, with Ghostbusters, the 1984 horrorcom hit with Bill Murray, Dan Aykroyd and the late Harold Ramis as ectoplasmic exterminators up against some big-league demonic forces. A multi-generational favorite and a true relic of the MTV era, the flagship of the franchise (soon to reportedly spawn a threequel) still holds its own with a bevy of eye-popping practical FX that include Slimer and Mr. Stay-Puft.

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October 27, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: A SPECIAL FX FOR BASIE, SONY

The promo video for the film competition.

Press release from Count Basie Theatre

On Monday, Project FX, the Count Basie Theatre’s statewide student film competition, went live at www.projectFXbasie.com.

Under the program, sponsored by Bank of America, students enrolled at any New Jersey high school or college can visit the site to learn about entering the competition, with an internship with Sony Pictures Classics at stake as the contest’s grand prize.

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October 10, 2014 - 7:00 am |

MIDDLETOWN: JERSEY-FRESH FILM STOCK

the_station_agentPeter Dinklage co-stars with Patricia Clarkson and Bobby Cannavale in THE STATION AGENT, one of a series of “filmed in New Jersey” movies screening for free, Mondays in October at Middletown Library.

The Movie Mondays series of free afternoon film screenings continues apace at Middletown Township Public Library, where the keyword for October is “locally-sourced” — as in filmed (in whole or in part) around the highways, hamlets, ivy-covered institutions or barnacle-encrusted pilings of the Garden State.

It’s a slate of four features that kicks off at 2:30 pm this Monday, October 6, with a quiet, quirky, 2003 comedy-drama from writer-director Tom McCarthy: The Station Agent. A pre-Game of Thrones Peter Dinklage stars as Fin, an introverted train buff who’s inherited an isolated old railroad station in the nowheresville netherland of Newfoundland, NJ. Making great use of its Jersey countryside scenery, the intimate indie   explores the growing bond between reclusive Fin and his fellow misfits Patricia Clarkson (Six Feet Under) and Bobby Cannavale (Boardwalk Empire, Nurse Jackie).

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October 4, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: ‘DRIVING JERSEY’ REELS ‘EM IN

driving jersey 2‘Driving Jersey,’ a television series that mines the Garden State for its culture, kicks off a new season Wednesday night with footage shot in Red Bank, where producer (and borough resident) Steve Rogers cornered locals for thoughts on their favorite movies.

The season premiere episode, which takes “a sweet look at New Jersey’s place in the history of the silver screen,” airs on NJTV at 8:30 p.m.

September 23, 2014 - 1:24 pm |

RUMSON: SHORED UP, BATTENED DOWN

The collision between coastal development and severe weather in New Jersey and elsewhere is the subject of the documentary “Shored Up,” screening for free this Saturday at Holy Cross School.

As filmmaker Ben Kalina tells it, “I made Shored Up to explore what it means to live beside the beauty of the ocean — where, as we saw with Hurricane Sandy, we are always just one storm away from catastrophe.”

Filmed in late 2012 and 2013 on locations along the Jersey Shore and the North Carolina coast, the documentary feature hits close to home — and with a Category 5 wallop — for local residents who experienced firsthand the unprecedented and still-lingering effects of the superstorm that marks its second anniversary next month.

This Saturday evening, September 20, Holy Cross School in Rumson hosts a free screening of the film, a public-welcome event that includes a discussion with the director and panel of local coastal and environmental scientists.

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September 18, 2014 - 6:52 am |

SHORING UP SUPPORT FOR COAST’S FUTURE

Shored UpThe documentary film SHORED UP, which examines the collision between coastal development and severe weather in New Jersey and North Carolina, will be shown September 20 at a special screening in Rumson.

Press release from New Jersey Future

On the evening of Saturday, September 20, New Jersey Future — a nonprofit organization which is working with Sea Bright and Highlands on long-term recovery planning in the wake of Hurricane Sandy — will sponsor a free public screening of the documentary feature Shored Up in Rumson.

Doors open at 6:30 pm for the screening, scheduled for 7 pm at Holy Cross School, 40 Rumson Road. At the conclusion of the film there will be a panel discussion and question-and-answer session, featuring the film’s director Ben Kalina, as well as several local coastal and environmental scientists.

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September 8, 2014 - 6:00 am |

MIDDLETOWN: WORD IS BOND AT MTPL

007 BondChristopher Lee and Roger Moore pace it off in THE MAN WITH THE GOLDEN GUN, as Middletown Township Public Library hosts a month-of-Mondays worth of classic James Bond thrillers.

Even if some of them haven’t quite weathered the years too well, the classic films in the long-running James Bond franchise are never in any danger of going out of style — and with Middletown Township Public Library having decreed that All Things 007 is the theme for September’s series of free film screening events, fans will have their pick of four distinct Bonds.

The series gets underway on Monday, September 8 with a 2:30 pm showing of The Man with the Golden Gun — the second of Roger Moore’s seven turns in the tuxedo, and an entry that casts horror master Christopher Lee as the suave assassin Scaramanga (with a pre-Fantasy Island Herve Villechaize as his sidekick). An improvement on Moore’s Bond debut — even with a tad too much comic relief — the 1974 romp found TV’s former Saint getting comfortable in the role that he’d play over the course of the next decade.

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September 7, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: HOLY DOUBLETAKE! IT’S BATMAN!

rb batman 081414 6rb batman 081414 2Spoiler alert for fans of the cable show ‘Comic Book Men,’ shot in and around Kevin Smith’s Jay and Silent Bob’s Secret Stash on Broad Street in Red Bank: a future episode will feature a race between the Batmobile and the Green Hornet’s Black Beauty, shot Thursday afternoon on Bridge Avenue in Gotham Red Bank.

And who was riding shotgun for a faux Batman? None other than onetime Batman portrayer Adam West himself, now 85 years old. Andres Verde of Red Bank, above, got a selfie with West, following one take of the low-speed race. (Photo by John T. Ward. Click to enlarge)

August 14, 2014 - 5:00 pm |

RED BANK: FOR THE GOOD OF THE GHOSTS

Ghosts-1The animal-rights advocacy feature GHOSTS IN OUR MACHINE shows in a benefit screening, Thursday evening at Bow Tie Cinemas on White Street.

Although The Ghosts In Our Machine makes a passionate case for ending the suffering of animals worldwide — and the idea that animals are sentient beings, worthy of rights — the documentary has a human protagonist: the photographer Jo-Anne McArthur, whose tireless work for the nonprofit We Animals organization (and the book of the same name) has made her one of the animal kingdom’s most eloquent spokescreatures. The feature-length doc screens at Red Bank’s Bow Tie Cinemas on Thursday night, in a special event that also features a panel talk immediately following the film.

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August 6, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: BACK TO THE FEATURES

jaws-1975-001-bathers-running-sea-00m-eodIt’s “everybody out of the water” and up onto the lawn, as ‘Jaws’ returns to Riverside Gardens for a Tuesday night showing. The original ‘Back to the Future’ materializes on Wednesday at the Count Basie.

back-to-the-future-Calling all discount Don Juans: the season for cheap-date movie nights continues this week in Red Bank, with the re-appearances of two favorites from the Steven Spielberg filmography.

First up, tonight, is the thriller that started the whole modern summer-blockbuster industry as we know it, in addition to kicking off something of a local tradition in recent years. We’re talking about Jaws, the 1975 smash that put director Spielberg on the map, spawned a fishy franchise (Middletown’s own Billy Van Zandt would have a featured role in the 1977 sequel), and drew inspiration from a real-life 1916 shark attack near Matawan.

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August 5, 2014 - 11:30 am |

CLIPPINGS: MOVIE IN THE ROUND

CLIPPINGS_220Liz Stahl, Mary Ellen Dowd, Chris Lombino and Tom Smith – friends who met in a theater group –  were all set for the July 8, 2014 movie screening in Red Bank’s Riverside Gardens Park. But the event was rained out. They’ll get another chance with the Tuesday night screening of ‘Jaws,’ and a favorable weather forecast. (Video by Gerda Liebmann. Click to pause.)

Check out all the Clippings from the Green here.

Gerda Liebmann bio

August 5, 2014 - 9:06 am |

MIDDLETOWN: MONUMENTAL MOVIE MONDAYS

MonumentsJohn Goodman, Matt Damon, George Clooney, Bob Balaban and Bill Murray ARE The Expen…check that, THE MONUMENTS MEN, as Middletown Township Public Library hosts a month-of-Mondays worth of recent Hollywood releases.

They don’t have the five-dollar bottled waters or nine-dollar popcorns of the mega-mall multiplex. You won’t have the option of paying almost twenty bucks for the privilege of wearing someone else’s greasy, used 3D glasses. Chances are you won’t even be seated near someone doing the play-by-play on their phone. But for everything you’ll miss about the blockbuster movie house experience, you’ll congratulate yourself for waiting to catch those movies you always meant to see — when they come to the climate-controlled screening space at the Middletown Township Public Library.

The weekly series of free matinee Monday Movies continues in August, with a selection of very recent films that’s keynoted by The Monuments Men, the fact-inspired World War Two tale from producer-director-screenwriter-costar George Clooney. Matt Damon, Bill Murray, Cate Blanchett and John Goodman are featured in the ensemble piece about an elite Army unit charged with recovering and preserving stolen or endangered art treasures during the Nazi occupation, with the film unspooling at 2:30 pm on August 4.

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August 3, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: THINK GLOBAL, ACT RE-LOCAL

The trailer for ‘In Transition 2.0,’ a documentary screening at Red Bank Public Library Thursday evening.

If you’re the sort of person who’s been looking for a hyper-local way to address some of the truly game-changing issues of the day, the volunteers at Transition Monmouth (aka the Greater Red Bank Transition Mullers) have an illuminating and informative way to spend your Thursday evening.

An independently organized part of a global initiative known as the Transition Network, the Red Bank-based nonprofit is dedicated to the creation of “local, self sufficient, and sustainable communities” — a collection of “re-localized” neighborhoods that respond to the global challenges of climate change, economic hardships and dwindling supplies with attention to renewable energy, locally sourced food supplies, and availability of resources.

Headed by Little Silver resident Sarah Klepner — a community activist who helps program the monthly Social Action Film Series at Lincroft’s Unitarian Meeting House — Transition Monmouth is actively seeking interested neighbors who’d like to learn more about this grass-roots effort, and how it all fits in with the planetary big picture. On July 31, Klepner and company invite all residents of the greater Green to the Red Bank Public Library, for a free screening of the documentary featurette In Transition 2.0.

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July 30, 2014 - 6:00 am |

RED BANK: SOME BLACK ‘N WHITE NIGHTS

hardThe Fab Four run free-range in A HARD DAY’S NIGHT, with a free screening Wednesday night at the Count Basie as a special 50th anniversary event.

After blowing out the last of winter’s drab watercolors, you’d think the last thing we’d be willing to do is sacrifice summer’s brilliant Roy-G-Biv for another trip to grayscale gardens. But some of the most vividly colorful films in existence are in black and white, and this Tuesday and Wednesday, local audiences will be treated to a couple of favorites that are as free of charge as they are free of hue, tint and saturation.

On July 15, Shore Flicks returns to Riverside Gardens for the latest in a slate of Summer 2014 movies under the setting sun and stars, with Gene Wilder inheriting a retro castle and mad laboratory in Mel Brooks’ laughingly loving horror homage Young Frankenstein. Photographed with the misty glow and sparking electricity of a 1930’s Hollywood soundstage talkie — and packed with shticky gags that were already antiques in the Herbert Hoover administration — the 1974 comedy screens just after sundown, with attendees encouraged to bring nonperishable food items (for Lunch Break and other local charities) along with the folding chairs and beach towels.

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July 13, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

SEA BRIGHT: CATCHING THE BIG ONE AT YUMI

070614 yumi sb rollThe fresh and aptly named Sea Bright roll at Yumi (Photo by Susan Ericson. Click to enlarge)

By SUSAN ERICSON

morsels smallA horde of moviegoers filled the public beach in Sea Bright with assorted lawn chairs and blankets Sunday night. The occasion: the annual Shore Flicks showing of “Jaws,” which was rained out last year.

Keeping in the theme of the evening, dinner before the movie had to be seafood at Yumi on Ocean Avenue.

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July 9, 2014 - 6:55 am |

MIDDLETOWN: LOST IN AUSTENLAND

Persuasion 1995 screencaptureCiaran Hinds and Amanda Root star in the BBC’s 1995 adaptation of PERSUASION, one of four Jane Austen-themed films screening Mondays in July at Middletown Library.

Nothing says “summertime” like the stifling manor homes and constricting social mores of Regency era, country-life England. But the classic romantic novels of Jane Austen — dating as they do from an interlude when ladies temporary lost those whalebone corsets — have perennially been a breath of fresh air on summer reading lists, so it’s only proper that Middletown Township Public Library dedicates the Movie Monday month of July to a slate of films adapted from (or otherwise inspired by) the increasingly popular author whose 240th birthday will be marked next year.

It’s a schedule that begins on the afternoon of July 7, when MTPL hosts a screening of Persuasion, the 1995 BBC production of Austen’s posthumously published final completed work. Amanda Root and Ciaran Hinds star in the made-for-BBC production, a feature that was noticed for its somewhat grittier, more realistic take on the “prettier” Austen adaptations in circulation around that same time. The film unspools at 2:30 pm inside the climate controlled Community Room, where the rest of the Monday series follows in short order.

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July 6, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: LET FREE-FILM RING

indepDown in front: Shore Flicks rolls into Riverside Gardens for the first in the free summer film series, as INDEPENDENCE DAY brings the sci-fi fireworks to the banks of the Navesink.

It’s got Will Smith one-punching an alien Squidward! Bill Pullman as a Mission-Accomplished president! Randy Quaid as an airborne Cousin Eddie, plus Harvey Fierstein, Jeff Goldblum, Judd Hirsch, Robert Loggia, and the glory that is Brent Spiner as Dr. Okun. The space invaders realistically never stood a chance against that cast of scenery-devouring terrestrials — but the 1996 sci-fi epic Independence Day also ate up tons of discretionary dollars at the box office, and tonight you’ll be able to relive every exploding landmark (and every fallen punchline) for free, as Shore Flicks returns to Riverside Gardens for the first in a slate of Summer 2014 movies under the setting sun and stars.

The longest-running of the many outdoor screening series presented by T.J. Brustowicz all over Monmouth and Ocean counties, the Red Bank showings take place just after sundown over the Navesink — and attendees are encouraged to bring nonperishable food items (for Lunch Break and other local charities) along with the folding chairs and beach towels.

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July 1, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: CHAZZ AT THE BASIE

ChazzJoanMarcusChazz Palminteri brings his solo stage play A BRONX TALE back to the Count Basie Theatre, for a two-night stand. (photo by Joan Marcus)

In the 1993 film A Bronx Tale, Robert De Niro directed a hitherto little-known actor, screenwriter and former Hollywood bouncer named Chazz Palminteri, in the Bronx native’s own semi-autobiographical script about a teenager named Calogero and the two father figures in his life — his morally upright bus driver dad, and a neighborhood mob boss named Sonny, who takes the young man under his wing in the racially charged powderkeg of 1960s NYC.

The actor born Calogero Palminteri would go on to a busy career in the moving pictures, highlighted by cult favorite The Usual Suspects and an Academy Award nomination for Bullets Over Broadway — but not all of his newfound fans realized that Bronx began life as a one-man stage play; custom crafted by the struggling thespian, who performed it numerous times in his adopted city of L.A. before industry word-of-mouth carried it all the way to Broadway. In between screen projects (and side projects like Chazz: A Bronx Original, the Baltimore restaurant he opened in 2011), Palminteri has continued to bring the original solo stage version of A Bronx Tale to live audiences — and this Thursday and Friday, June 26 and 27, he returns to the Count Basie Theatre for two-nighter followup to his well received Red Bank engagement of last year.

The Drama Desk at redbankgreen spoke to the actor, writer, producer and restaurateur about projects old, new and perhaps never to be — with a Q&A around the corner.

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June 24, 2014 - 12:00 pm |

RED BANK: GO, GO ANNETTE

ThirdFilm and television actress Annette O’Toole stars in Wendy Wasserstein’s THIRD, continuing through June 22 at Two River Theater. (photo by Michal Daniel)

Wednesday marks the final homestretch of performances for Third, the Wendy Wasserstein play that closes out the 20th anniversary season at Two River Theater. For anyone who hasn’t caught the production under the direction of Broadway star and Middletown resident Michael Cumpsty, there are six more chances to catch the acclaimed and dynamic turn by Annette O’Toole now through Sunday, June 22. The Emmy nominated actress (for The Kennedys of Massachusetts, which also featured Cumpsty in a supporting role) and Oscar nominated composer (with her husband Michael McKean, currently on Broadway with Bryan Cranston in All the Way) stars as a middle-aged maverick professor at a Liberal Arts college, whose own bold ideas about Shakespeare’s King Lear are challenged by a young male student (Christopher Sears) who comes to represent everything the academic despises. Emily Walton, JR Horne and Amy Hohn co-star as the friends and family members in the professor’s eventful orbit.

The Drama Desk at redbankgreen spoke to Annette O’Toole about her role (and her time in Red Bank), with a Q&A around the corner.

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June 18, 2014 - 12:00 pm |
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