CENTER OF IT ALL: One of Off-Broadway’s finest companies, Signature Theatre, is moving to a fabulous new home. On January 30, the ribbon will be cut and the champagne passed around for the Signature Center Opening Gala Celebration at Signature Center, the brand new Frank Gehry-designed space at 480 West 42nd Street between Dyer and 10th Avenues. The new facility features three intimate theaters connected by a lobby with a café, bar and bookstore, a studio theater, a rehearsal studio and the Company’s administrative offices. Also that evening, the company will honor stage and film actor Edward Norton with their Playwrights’ Award, created to recognize those individuals and organizations who, through their vision and leadership, have placed their own signatures upon American theater. (Mr. Norton made his professional debut at Signature Theatre in Edward Albee’s Fragments.) The first performances at Signature Center takes place the following day (January 31) with Athol Fugard’s Blood Knot inaugurating The Alice Griffin Jewel Box Theatre. Hearty congratulations to everyone at Signature—long may you stand on West 42nd Street. www.signaturetheatre.org
YOU’RE THE POETRY MAN: John Grier has a charmed career—this professor of literature at a renowned university is about to be named Poet Laureate. But when his daughter and new boyfriend return home from the weekend, hidden secrets are revealed that threaten to destroy the professor’s career. A biting drama that explores the fallout from the cutthroat “publish or perish” world of academia, Jack Canfora’s Poetic License features a cast that includes Ari Butler, Geraint Wyn Davies, Natalie Kuhn, and Liza Vann, under Evan Bergman’s direction. Performances begin February 9 at 59E59 Theaters. www.59e59.org
MARVELLOUS MARVELL: An eye-catching season at Marvell Rep kicks off for 2012 with a production of Arthur Schnitzler’s controversial play Professor Bernhardi, which was banned in Europe and is still rarely performed in the US. Schnitzler, who wrote another hot button but more oft-seen drama, La Ronde, was the first German author to confront head-on the anti-Semitism of the time. The story of Professor Bernhardi takes place in Vienna, 1900, where a young woman is dying of septic poisoning from a backstreet abortion. Yet, she’s in a complete state of euphoria due to the camphor injection she received at the hands of her doctor. Trouble arises when the doctor, a Jew, and a priest clash over her condition. The cast features veteran actor Sam L. Tsoutsouvas as Dr. Bernhardi, and performances begin January 31 at TBG Theatre on West 36th Street. www.marvellrep.com
GIVES GOOD HEADSHOT: The upcoming NBC series Smash (which you’ve surely heard about, given the network’s surprisingly vigorous campaign for a show about the theatah) is not the only TV product that aims to look at life on the boards. Submissions Only is a grassroots web sitcom that shows viewers what really goes on off stage. Created by New York actors Kate Wetherhead and Andrew Keenan-Bolger, SO begins its second season on January 27. The show follows the friendship between two theater professionals, an actress (Ms. Wetherhead) and a casting director (Colin Hanlon) as they try to build careers in the notoriously tricky world of New York theatrics. To tune in, log onto www.submissionsonly.com
SMART ALEC: He’s practically a stage and television staple in Hollywood, but New York only gets an occasional chance to see the divinely funny actor/comedian Alec Mapa, (who triumphed here in M. Butterfly once upon a time) live and in the flesh. Taking a brief time-out from toiling on such shows as Desperate Housewives. Ugly Betty, and RuPaul’s Drag Race, Mapa returns to New York in his acclaimed new one-man extravaganza Alec Mapa: Baby Daddy, which plays for three performances only, February 9-11 at The Laurie Beechman Theater. AM: BD is an outrageous evening of stories and stand-up comedy, as our self-proclaimed “America’s Gaysian Sweetheart” holds forth on what it means to be a father (with husband Jamison Hebert) of an adopted five-year-old boy. From RuPaul’s Runway to the Tarrytown P.T.A. (to steal a line from How To Succeed, thank you) Mapa will take audiences on a fast-paced ride with sudden dips and turns. And maybe he’ll spill a few red carpet secrets, too. Oh, Baby! Oh, Daddy! 212-352-3101.
FRINGE WATCH: It’s only cold January, but it’s not too early to talk about hot August’s hottest theater event, The New York International Fringe Festival (FringeNYC), especially since February 14 is the date that applications for inclusion in this year’s festival are due. General FringeNYC applications are being accepted for participants in all genres (theatre, dance, puppetry, performance art, multi-media, etc.) and you have until Valentine’s Day to get them in. Submit, submit! Get all the info online at www.fringenyc.org
