Westport Country Playhouse
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Westport Country Playhouse
Westport Country Playhouse, is a not-for-profit regional theater in Westport, Connecticut. It was founded in 1931 by Lawrence Langner, a New York theater producer. Langner remodeled an 1830s tannery with a Broadway-quality stage. History Construction and early use The building that now houses Westport Country Playhouse was originally constructed in 1835 as a tannery by R&H Haight, owned by Henry Haight. Charles H. Kemper acquired the tannery from Henry Haight's widow in 1866 and subsequently renamed the business C.H. Kemper Co. In 1930, the former tannery, which had been unused since the 1920s, was purchased for $14,000 by Lawrence Langner. Cleon Throckmorten, a Broadway designer, was commissioned to renovate the interior of the building. Grand opening On June 29, 1931, the curtain went up on the first production at the Westport Country Playhouse. The Playhouse quickly became an established stop on the New England "straw hat circuit" of summer stock theaters. Tw ...
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Westport, Connecticut
Westport is a town in Fairfield County, Connecticut, United States, along the Long Island Sound within Connecticut's Gold Coast. It is northeast of New York City. The town had a population of 27,141 according to the 2020 U.S. Census. History The earliest known inhabitants of the Westport area as identified through archaeological finds date back 7,500 years. Records from the first white settlers report the Pequot Indians living in the area which they called ''Machamux'' translated by the colonialists as ''beautiful land''. Settlement by colonialists dates back to the five ''Bankside Farmers''; whose families grew and prospered into a community that continued expanding. The settlers arrived in 1693, having followed cattle to the isolated area. The community had its own ecclesiastical society, supported by independent civil and religious elements, enabling it to be independent from the Town of Fairfield. As the settlement expanded its name changed: it was briefly known as "Banksid ...
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Joanne Woodward
Joanne Gignilliat Trimmier Woodward (born February 27, 1930) is an American actress. A star since the Golden Age of Hollywood, Woodward made her career breakthrough in the 1950s and earned esteem and respect playing complex women with a characteristic nuance and depth of character. She is one of the first film stars to have an equal presence in television. Her accolades include an Academy Award, three Primetime Emmy Awards, a British Academy Film Award, three Golden Globe Awards, and a Screen Actors Guild Award. Woodward is perhaps best known for her performance as a woman with personality disorders in ''The Three Faces of Eve'' (1957), which earned her an Academy Award for Best Actress and a Golden Globe Award for Best Actress in a Motion Picture – Drama. In a career spanning more than six decades, Woodward starred or co-starred in many feature films, receiving four Oscar nominations (winning one), ten Golden Globe Award nominations (winning three), four BAFTA Film Award no ...
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Proscenium
A proscenium ( grc-gre, προσκήνιον, ) is the metaphorical vertical plane of space in a theatre, usually surrounded on the top and sides by a physical proscenium arch (whether or not truly "arched") and on the bottom by the stage floor itself, which serves as the frame into which the audience observes from a more or less unified angle the events taking place upon the stage during a theatrical performance. The concept of the fourth wall of the theatre stage space that faces the audience is essentially the same. It can be considered as a social construct which divides the actors and their stage-world from the audience which has come to witness it. But since the curtain usually comes down just behind the proscenium arch, it has a physical reality when the curtain is down, hiding the stage from view. The same plane also includes the drop, in traditional theatres of modern times, from the stage level to the "stalls" level of the audience, which was the original meaning of t ...
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Stage (theatre)
In theatre and performing arts, the stage (sometimes referred to as the deck in stagecraft) is a designated space for the performance of productions. The stage serves as a space for actors or performers and a focal point (the screen in cinema theaters) for the audience. As an architectural feature, the stage may consist of a platform (often raised) or series of platforms. In some cases, these may be temporary or adjustable but in theaters and other buildings devoted to such productions, the stage is often a permanent feature. There are several types of stages that vary as to the usage and the relation of the audience to them. The most common form found in the West is the proscenium stage. In this type, the audience is located on one side of the stage with the remaining sides hidden and used by the performers and technicians. Thrust stages may be similar to proscenium stages but with a platform or performance area that extends into the audience space so that the audience ...
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Wheelchair Accessible
Accessibility is the design of products, devices, services, vehicles, or environments so as to be usable by people with disabilities. The concept of accessible design and practice of accessible development ensures both "direct access" (i.e. unassisted) and "indirect access" meaning compatibility with a person's assistive technology (for example, computer screen readers). Accessibility can be viewed as the "ability to access" and benefit from some system or entity. The concept focuses on enabling access for people with disabilities, or enabling access through the use of assistive technology; however, research and development in accessibility brings benefits to everyone. Accessibility is not to be confused with usability, which is the extent to which a product (such as a device, service, or environment) can be used by specified users to achieve specified goals with effectiveness, efficiency, convenience, or satisfaction in a specified context of use. Accessibility is also s ...
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Mezzanine (architecture)
A mezzanine (; or in Italian, a ''mezzanino'') is an intermediate floor in a building which is partly open to the double-height ceilinged floor below, or which does not extend over the whole floorspace of the building, a loft with non-sloped walls. However, the term is often used loosely for the floor above the ground floor, especially where a very high-ceilinged original ground floor has been split horizontally into two floors. Mezzanines may serve a wide variety of functions. Industrial mezzanines, such as those used in warehouses, may be temporary or semi-permanent structures. In Royal Italian architecture, ''mezzanino'' also means a chamber created by partitioning that does not go up all the way to the arch vaulting or ceiling; these were historically common in Italy and France, for example in the palaces for the nobility at the Quirinal Palace. Definition A mezzanine is an intermediate floor (or floors) in a building which is open to the floor below. It is placed halfwa ...
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Orchestra
An orchestra (; ) is a large instrumental ensemble typical of classical music, which combines instruments from different families. There are typically four main sections of instruments: * bowed string instruments, such as the violin, viola, cello, and double bass * woodwinds, such as the flute, oboe, clarinet, saxophone, and bassoon * Brass instruments, such as the horn, trumpet, trombone, cornet, and tuba * percussion instruments, such as the timpani, snare drum, bass drum, cymbals, triangle, tambourine, and mallet percussion instruments Other instruments such as the piano, harpsichord, and celesta may sometimes appear in a fifth keyboard section or may stand alone as soloist instruments, as may the concert harp and, for performances of some modern compositions, electronic instruments and guitars. A full-size Western orchestra may sometimes be called a or philharmonic orchestra (from Greek ''phil-'', "loving", and "harmony"). The actual number of musicians employ ...
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Seating Capacity
Seating capacity is the number of people who can be seated in a specific space, in terms of both the physical space available, and limitations set by law. Seating capacity can be used in the description of anything ranging from an automobile that seats two to a stadium that seats hundreds of thousands of people. The largest sporting venue in the world, the Indianapolis Motor Speedway, has a permanent seating capacity for more than 235,000 people and infield seating that raises capacity to an approximate 400,000. In transport In venues Safety is a primary concern in determining the seating capacity of a venue: "Seating capacity, seating layouts and densities are largely dictated by legal requirements for the safe evacuation of the occupants in the event of fire". The International Building Code specifies, "In places of assembly, the seats shall be securely fastened to the floor" but provides exceptions if the total number of seats is fewer than 100, if there is a substantial amo ...
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WPC Interior
WPC may refer to: Events * Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference, an annual conference held by the Microsoft Corporation * World Puzzle Championship, an annual international puzzle competition * World Policy Conference, an annual conference on global governance Governmental organizations * Weather Prediction Center, part of the U.S. National Weather Service * Western Power Corporation, owned by the Government of Western Australia, the major electricity supplier from 1995 through 2006 * Wireless Planning & Coordination Wing, an Indian government branch Other organizations * West Penn Conference, intercollegiate athletic conference that operated from 1958 to 1969 in Western Pennsylvania * Westminster Presbyterian Church (other) * Western Pennsylvania Conservancy, a charity based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, United States * Wildlife Preservation Canada, a wildlife conservation organization * Wireless Power & Communication, a privately held company based in Norway * W ...
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Tazewell Thompson
Tazewell Thompson (born May 27, 1948), is an African-American theatre direction, theatre director, the former artistic director of the Westport Country Playhouse (2006–07) in Westport, Connecticut, Westport, Connecticut and the Syracuse Stage (1992–95) in New York (state), New York state. Prior to that he was an assistant director at Arena Stage in Washington, D.C. He is the Director of Opera Studies at Manhattan School of Music. Thompson has directed numerous independent productions, and since 2000, when he directed his first opera, ''Porgy and Bess'' for the New York City Opera, has been called on to direct more operas and musicals. His success led to invitations to direct productions of Francis Poulenc's ''Dialogues of the Carmelites'' for the Glimmerglass Opera and City Opera in 2002 and 2004, respectively, as well as other works. Thompson was nominated for an Emmy in 2006 as Best Director for the televised production of his ''Porgy and Bess'' produced at Arena Stage in Was ...
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Theatre Direction
A theatre director or stage director is a professional in the theatre field who oversees and orchestrates the mounting of a theatre production such as a play, opera, dance, drama, musical theatre performance, etc. by unifying various endeavors and aspects of production. The director's function is to ensure the quality and completeness of theatre production and to lead the members of the creative team into realizing their artistic vision for it. The director thereby collaborates with a team of creative individuals and other staff to coordinate research and work on all the aspects of the production which includes the Technical and the Performance aspects. The technical aspects include: stagecraft, costume design, theatrical properties (props), lighting design, set design, and sound design for the production. The performance aspects include: acting, dance, orchestra, chants, and stage combat. If the production is a new piece of writing or a (new) translation of a play, the director ...
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Opera
Opera is a form of theatre in which music is a fundamental component and dramatic roles are taken by singers. Such a "work" (the literal translation of the Italian word "opera") is typically a collaboration between a composer and a librettist and incorporates a number of the performing arts, such as acting, scenery, costume, and sometimes dance or ballet. The performance is typically given in an opera house, accompanied by an orchestra or smaller musical ensemble, which since the early 19th century has been led by a conductor. Although musical theatre is closely related to opera, the two are considered to be distinct from one another. Opera is a key part of the Western classical music tradition. Originally understood as an entirely sung piece, in contrast to a play with songs, opera has come to include numerous genres, including some that include spoken dialogue such as '' Singspiel'' and '' Opéra comique''. In traditional number opera, singers employ two styles of ...
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