By Alan Sherrod How does a work of theatre confront the issue of domestic abuse but at the same time walk the fine line between painful tragedy and unseemly comedy? For playwright Lauren Gunderson, the solution was to construct…
Review: CBT’s ‘People Where They Are’ – A Lesson in Escaping the Gravity of Our Past
By Alan Sherrod In the spring of 1955, much of the Southern U.S. was a simmering kettle of racial segregation, civil rights repression, and worker/workplace abuses—one that was on the verge of boiling over into a full scale struggle…
Review: CBT’s ‘Million Dollar Quartet’ – A Whole Lotta Shakin’ Goin’ On
By Alan Sherrod It is said that there is a moment in a person’s life—usually in the adolescent or teenage years—when music begins to speak to them in a personal way, with that specific music magically acting as a…
UT Theatre MFA Program Moves Up To 11th In National Ranking
By Alan Sherrod It should come as no surprise that theatre graduate schools in and around New York City benefit tremendously from their proximity to the epicenter of professional theatre in the United States. As it turns out, though,…
Review: CBT’s Whimsical and Poetic ‘The Madwoman of Chaillot’ Reveals the Truth About Evil
By Alan Sherrod Ending the season with a large and colorful bang has generally been the modus operandi for the Clarence Brown Theatre, closing out with a season finale production that pulls out all the stops with a visual…
Tuesday Arts Miscellany: A New Footprint for Knoxville Opera’s Rossini Festival Adds To A Busy Weekend
For the last 17 years, Knoxville Opera’s Rossini Festival International Street Fair has grown and evolved from an event aimed mostly at opera-goers, into a multi-genre, multi-stage festival of performances, artisans, and food that attracts a diverse cross-section of Knoxvillians.…
Review: The Cast of CBT’s ‘Detroit ’67’ Finds Treasure in the Basement
By Alan Sherrod Detroit in the incendiary “long, hot summer of 1967” is the setting for Dominique Morisseau’s Detroit ’67 which opened on Friday evening at Clarence Brown Theatre’s Carousel Theatre. While that summer was defined by racial tensions…
Review: CBT’s ‘King Charles III’ – A Possible Future Chases the Past
By Alan Sherrod It should come as no surprise that a somewhat heated controversy arose in the U.K. over Mike Bartlett’s 2014 play, King Charles III, a dramatic projection of the accession to the throne of Prince Charles following…
Top Ten Most Read Arts Knoxville Stories of 2018
By Alan Sherrod Over the last week, we’ve taken a look back at 2018 and its memorable music performances, as well as the enlightening Top Ten lists from film critics Andrew Swafford and Reid Ramsey. But what stories and…
Review: Clarence Brown Theatre’s ‘A Christmas Carol’ – The Tradition Continues
By Alan Sherrod In Charles Dickens’ A Christmas Carol, it is Christmas Eve and time is of the essence for Ebenezer Scrooge. The familiar tale of Scrooge, from the 1843 Dickens novella that inspired a plethora of film and…