Make a Gift
CTSA to Present THE LAST LIFEBOAT, Begin. 11/14

The Claire Trevor School of the Arts (CTSA) at the University of California, Irvine has announced the world premiere of a new play by award-winning playwright Luke Yankee. The Last Lifeboat is the untold story of J. Bruce Ismay, the owner of the White...
Best Theatrical Ensemble Orange County 2014 - Twelfth Night

The venue—a 9-ton, three-tiered replication of an open-air Elizabethan-era theater—may be what garners the New Swan Shakespeare Festival attention, but Eli Simon's inventive staging of Shakespeare's comedy Twelfth Night truly soared because of his...
BWW Reports: LUKE YANKEE's New Play About the AFTERMATH of the TITANIC

A new play by award-winning playwright Luke Yankee will receive its world premiere at UC-Irvine this November. The Last Lifeboat is the untold story of J. Bruce Ismay, the owner of the White Star Line at the time of the sinking of the Titanic...
UCI Theatre Promises Passionate Performances

Love theater but hate driving up to LA? Me, too! So let's take advantage of having UCIrvine's Department of Drama right in our own backyard. Check out these three upcoming shows. The Last Lifeboat looks at the Titanic tragedy from a different...
Theater Expert Robert Cohen’s 4 Tips for Getting Onstage

Robert Cohen is a university professor, theater director, playwright, and drama critic who has written 20 books on the art of theater and acting. When did your love for theater begin? I started going to the theater when I was 6 or 7. My parents....
Sweet Smell of Success musical coming to the Irvine Claire Trevor School of the Arts

The musical “Sweet Smell of Success” is coming to the University of California, Irvine Claire Trevor School of the Arts from 5/30/2015 to 6/6/2015. Sweet Smell of Success (Music by the late Marvin Hamlisch, Lyrics by Craig...
A Tale of Two Shakespeares

tale of two Shakespeare companies: one benefiting from an intimate relationship with the well-funded, respected UC Irvine theater department and has created one of the most striking performance venues you will ever see; the other a gypsy troupe that...
‘Twelfth Night’ and ‘Hyperbole: bard’ at UCI’s New Swan, ‘Tempest’ brewing

After seeing a production of “Twelfth Night” last year, I decided it wasn’t one of Shakespeare’s better plays. New Swan Shakespeare Festival’s current production (running through Aug. 30 at UC Irvine) has convinced me there’s more to it...
New Swan Shakespeare Festival's Twelfth Night

You’ll understand the “no late seating” warning if you first take in the amazing New Swan Shakespeare Festival’s sustainable, portable outdoor mini-Elizabethan theatre in daylight hours, a reproduction built...
New Swan Shakespeare Festival returns to UC Irvine

Eli Simon knows a thing or two about giving William Shakespeare’s plays a breath of fresh air. Simon serves as the artistic director for the New Swan Shakespeare Festival, a seven-week-long event to be hosted at UC Irvine from Thursday through...
Andrew Palermo's World Premiere of NICKEL MINES to Play Claire Trevor School of the Arts, 5/31-6/7

The Claire Trevor School of the Arts Department of Drama presents Nickel Mines, an original work by Creator/Director/Choreographer and faculty member Andrew Palermo, as its final offering in a season which has focused on the theme of...
No, Laughing Matters.

The Coup de Comedy, now in its second year, is the brainchild of Improv Revolution, a 12-person college improv team co-captained by Andra and fellow drama major Vinny Tangherlini. Joel Veenstra founded iRev as a graduate student in 2010 before...
Coup de Comedy Festival 2014

FREEZE. The music stops. The wild movement on stage comes to a sudden halt. Third-year drama major Vinny Tangherlini quickly enters and taps three performers in bizarre contortions — the weirder the better — on the shoulder and exits with the...
New University - As You Like It

A gypsy in a colorful headdress giggles from a balcony above the stage as she enchants the characters below with several careful taps of her wand. In the multi-layered narrative that follows, the characters venture into a thick forest, learn to forgive an
New Swan Shakespeare Festival Accepting Applications for Summer Apprenticeships

The Claire Trevor School of the Arts Drama Department at UC Irvine is now accepting applications from high school and college students to be an intern during the summer season of the New Swan Shakespeare Festival. The New Swan Apprentice program...
One Story, Two Rooms: The Telematic Project

Responsibility. Heroes. Morals versus rules. Bureaucracy. Confusion. Desperation. Siblings. Chaos. Fuck the man! Distance versus closeness. Passive aggressiveness. Safety. Fire. Decisions. Privilege. This potpourri comprises the smattering of audience...