Friday, October 4, 2013
If you’ve not yet heard the story, the basic facts are these. Earlier this week, members of the football team at the University of Mississippi (aka "Ole Miss") were required to attend a pe…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 10:34AMFriday, September 27, 2013
If yesterday’s news that theatre attendance is down more precipitously than any of the arts caused you to spit out your coffee over breakfast, well that’s probably because you haven’t …
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 12:31PMThursday, September 26, 2013
If you’ve been reading The New York Times and The Los Angeles Times this week, attempting to find out how the arts as a whole are doing, you would likely get a fairly consistent picture co…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 11:53AMMonday, September 23, 2013
I have a confession to make: I am constitutionally unable to watch the acclaimed TV series Friday Night Lights. Now I realize this may be surprising to those who know and admire that program…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 10:16AMThursday, September 19, 2013
A very good friend of mine began a successful tenure as the p.r. director of the Long Wharf Theatre in 1986, one year after I’d taken up the comparable position at Hartford Stage. H…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 02:38PMMonday, September 16, 2013
For all the years I lived in Connecticut, I used to feel I was missing out, as I saw offers for advance screenings of films dropping into my inbox and plastered on various websites. But, ala…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 09:42AMWednesday, September 11, 2013
This afternoon on Twitter, journalists were decrying the proliferation of the word “premiere” in theatres’ marketing and press materials, especially in cases where the usage is parsing…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 03:38PMMonday, September 9, 2013
There are many reasons to enthuse about The Public Theatre’s inaugural “Public Works” production of The Tempest – the conception and direction of Lear de Bessonet, the original score…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 10:52AMTuesday, September 3, 2013
Let’s face it: railing against Broadway musicals adapted from movies is a useless exercise. As long as people keep buying tickets for them, and as long as enough of them turn out to be fin…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 12:15PMMonday, August 12, 2013
In about 48 hours, I begin a three-day theatergoing binge. But I have no idea what I’ll be seeing. Intrigued? As part of their upcoming “Theatre Week” in September, I’ll be seeing an…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 12:13PMThis is not a cranky older guy post, whining about the way things used to be, but merely an observation about how the digital revolution has affected a behavior that was long taken for grant…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 09:22AMTuesday, August 6, 2013
I happen to follow a group of smart, funny and insightful television journalists on Twitter – among them Alyssa Rosenberg, Todd VanDerWerff, Linda Holmes, Alan Sepinwall, Kate Aurthur, Rog…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 11:59AMMonday, August 5, 2013
In one of his best known stories, “Adrift Just Off the Islets of Langerhans: Latitude 38° 54' N, Longitude 77° 00' 13" W,” the science fiction and fantasy author Harlan Ellison tells o…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 08:54AMTuesday, July 16, 2013
What is the purpose of putting on shows in high school? Is it educational? Recreational? Is it community relations? Is it a family activity? I’ve always thought that high school theatre wa…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 12:12PMMonday, July 15, 2013
Follow this with me, will you? “The plays bothered a lot of us,” says a school superintendent, referring to works presented by a high school drama group. “The plays had references to s…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 10:06AMMonday, July 1, 2013
I’m unable to see a Shakespeare play without thinking of my late mother. “How sweet,” you think, “He and his mother must have shared many great evenings together watching Shakespeare…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 11:01AMWednesday, June 26, 2013
June 26, 2013 President Barack Obama 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Washington DC 20500 Dear President Obama: I realize it’s been a busy week, what with the overturning of the Defense of Marri…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 03:10PMThursday, June 13, 2013
I don’t mean to make anyone paranoid, but if your organization has unpaid interns, you need to start thinking about whether they may start legal proceedings against you for back pay. In th…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 10:56AMWednesday, June 12, 2013
For those complacent about the ongoing reduction and elimination of professional arts journalism, I would like to offer a small but concrete example of where this decline is leading us. On M…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 10:49AMTuesday, June 4, 2013
Yes, I’m serious about the headline. I feel your scorn, but before your jerking knee sends you to the orthopedist, let me get right to the point. There are any number of things one can obj…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 11:35AMMonday, June 3, 2013
Is there no one in town aware of social injustice? Part of the compact we make when we go to the theatre is to shut out the outside world and completely immerse ourselves in the world displa…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 08:28AMWednesday, May 22, 2013
My parents were not theatergoers and my youthful memories are not filled with reveries of family trips to New York to see shows. I can remember being taken to the theatre only twice as a you…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 09:33AMMonday, May 20, 2013
As a teen in the 1970s, I kept testing a small sociological phenomenon. When visiting a Jewish home, I would peek at the record collection of the adults in residence to see if they had the a…
SOURCE: Howard Sherman at 10:25AMTuesday, January 29, 2013
NEW YORK -- "What is the best that Broadway can be?” was the central question of the second TEDx Broadway conference, which continued to explore the query that fueled last year’s…
SOURCE: Los Angeles Times at 09:00AMFriday, December 14, 2012
When TheaterMania launched its Bros on Broadway series in October 2012, theatre pundit and arts administrator Howard Sherman reached out to Creative Director Kimberly Kaye via Twitter to say…
SOURCE: TheaterMania at 09:15PMTuesday, February 7, 2012
At the beginning of December, I breached countless confidences, both personal and professional, in order to bring you “Decoder,” a post which revealed the true meaning of timeworn wo…
SOURCE: 2AMT at 12:28PMTuesday, January 17, 2012
The murmuring from Canada was startling, and grew louder. First Toronto Globe and Mail theatre critic J. Kelly Nestruck tweeted about the cognitive dissonance of the Canadian national anth…
SOURCE: 2AMT at 06:46PMThursday, January 5, 2012
I saw a comment on Twitter this morning which reminded me that Alec Baldwin will be delivering the annual Nancy Hanks Lecture on Arts and Public Policy at the Kennedy Center in April. This i…
SOURCE: 2AMT at 05:54PMWednesday, December 7, 2011
I have opined in the past about the dark arts of theatrical billing, marketing and publicity in such posts as This Blog is Prior to Broadway and Blurb. Now, as the holidays approach, I ha…
SOURCE: 2AMT at 08:02AMWednesday, November 23, 2011
Once upon a time, perhaps 15 or 20 years ago, I read a really fascinating article which posited that the arts would get more coverage in the media if they opened themselves up and provided g…
SOURCE: 2AMT at 09:13AMWednesday, November 9, 2011
Marketing. Advertising. Community Outreach. Audience engagement. Audience Development. Social Networking. Targeted Pitches. And so on. This litany of phrases are among the buzzwords common t…
SOURCE: 2AMT at 03:19PM 
