Innovation brings change to Cleveland theaters in 2004
Sunday, December 26, 2004
Tony Brown, The Plain Dealer

For many in Cleveland's financially beleaguered theater community, 2004 will be remembered as the fourth year of lingering budgetary hell.

It's a condition brought on by a sour economy, post-Sept. 11 angst, reduced state of Ohio arts spending, a continued lack of local public funding for culture and perhaps also by many companies' refusal to innovate.

But it was also a year of hopeful change at the Cleveland Play House, where Peter Hackett left the artistic directorship to teach at alma mater Dartmouth, and promising-sounding Michael Bloom, a director with off-Broadway and heavy regional credits, brought a new openness.

Charles Fee, producing artistic director at Great Lakes Theater Festival, approached Cleveland Public Theatre with a collaboration, and founder James Levin accepted. "Nickel and Dimed" became the event of the season and a model for all.

Fee "reinvented" Great Lakes in '04 as a summer repertory company, producing excellent classics but not increasing subscriptions. Fee plans more wrinkles, including possibly merging shops with Cleveland Public Theatre and shipping productions back and forth across the country with his Idaho Shakespeare Festival.

A small band of artists known as Bad Epitaph Theater Company, who set out to stage a "Hamlet" in 1999 but stuck around for much more, moved on to other pursuits.

But two other tiny troupes, Convergence-Continuum and Kalliope Stage, surged forward.

And, perhaps most heartening, Karamu Performing Arts Theatre, the country's oldest black theater company, came charging back to prominence this year.

For that, we toast 2004.

1. "Nickel and Dimed: On (Not Getting By in America"):
Great Lakes Theater Festival and Cleveland Public Theatre finesse a historic collaboration. Director Melissa Kievman, designer Todd Krispinsky and actress Jill Levin turn a balky, didactic script into a work of art.

2. The revival of Karamu with the arrival of the first artistic director in nearly eight years, the funky, spunky Terrence Spivey: Highlights: "For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/When the Rainbow is Enuf" and "Bee-Luther-Hatchee," both directed by Spivey.

3. Great Lakes' entertaining, energetic and just plain fun classics:
The best: Risa Brainin's modern-dress "Julius Caesar," Drew Barr's slapstick "The Taming of the Shrew" and Victoria Bussert's sexy "Private Lives," the last two with the irresistible Andrew May.

4. The rise of Convergence-Continuum, a tiny Tremont-based company with lots of moxie and the talent to carry it off, as Cleveland's most daring theater:
Top work: Paula Vogel's "Hot 'n' Throbbing" and Nicky Silver's "Free Will and Wanton Lust," both directed by Clyde Simon.

5. The similar rise of Kalliope Stage, the likewise tiny Cleveland Heights-based company as the area's out-of-nowhere top producer of musical theater:
Outstanding productions include "The Christmas Carol Rag," "Summer of '42" and "Pete 'n' Keely," all directed by Paul Gurgol.

6. The first-class resuscitation of theater programming, after a yearlong hiatus, by the Jewish Community Center of Cleveland:
The maiden production, director Fred Sternfeld's lollapalooza "Ragtime," heralds the return of the JCC to the musical theater scene with style and fanfare.

7. Superb work at stalwart small professional theaters:
Dobama Theatre's "Highway Ulysses," Ohio Shakespeare Festival's "Side by Side by Sondheim," Actors' Summit's "Merry Wives of Windsor" and "Copenhagen," and Beck Center's "Agnes of God" and "Reefer Madness."

8. Four entertaining shows at the Cleveland Play House at the end of Peter Hackett's artistic directorship:
Regina Taylor's "Crowns," Ken Ludwig's "Leading Ladies," Steve Martin's "The Underpants" and Nicholas Wright's "Vincent in Brixton."

9. Edgy, indispensable and challenging work from Cleveland Public, where James Levin stepped aside and Randy Rollison took charge:
Floraine Kay and Randolph Curtis Rand's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" and Raymond Bobgan's "The Confessions of Punch and Judy" lead the way.

10. Three artistically satisfying though hardly blockbuster offerings on Playhouse Square Center's touring Broadway Series: Deaf West Theatre's "Big River," Barry Humphries' "A Night With Dame Edna," and Mark Hollmann and Greg Kotis' "Urinetown."