Ovation

2014 Fall Performing Arts Guide

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Tulsa has become home to some of the most exciting, adventurous theater in the region. This season will prove no different, but if you’re new to the scene, you might wonder where to start on finding the goods.

If you ask someone about going to see live performances, you’ll invariably get an array of answers. “Oh, I really should get out to see more plays,” or perhaps, “You know, I used to do plays in school, but I haven’t been to see one in forever.” Maybe they do get out to see a few seasonal things, such as holiday shows, but aren’t aware of much else. Why even bother? Shouldn’t you just stay home with Netflix or play games on your console? Isn’t it just one of those things that fancy people do to be snobby?

Want to know a secret? No one is there to see you. If you want to show up in jeans or come straight from work in your casual-Friday duds, we’ll be happy to have you there. If you don’t want to talk to anyone because you’re an introvert, that’s completely fine. Live theater isn’t about impressing people with how culturally superior you are.

It’s a way to connect with human beings in a shared experience that makes you laugh, grimace, think, and, sometimes, just plain get out of the house. Yes, thespians appreciate the effort you made to put on some deodorant, but having the most expensive jewelry in the building doesn’t score you any extra points. Heck, we don’t even care how you spell the word, whether you put the r before the e or vice versa, so dive on in and enjoy the show.

Start with the individual theater companies in the area. There are dozens—yes, dozens. Like musicals and larger productions? Check out Theater Tulsa and Tulsa Project Theater for show-stopping sights. Is contemporary theater with a message more your style? Hit the black box for something from Heller Theater Company or Theater Pops to feed your neurons. More into the unusual and avant-garde? Check out the remarkable happenings at Nightingale Theater. Want to find something for the kids? Try Clark Youth Theater or Children’s Musical Theater of Bartlesville for some family-friendly entertainment.

If you live outside city limits, you’re not left out of the fun. Owasso Community Theater Company, Muskogee Little Theater, and Sapulpa Community Theater each has a full season of its own. This is just a sampling of what we have in our own backyards.

If you’re not into a full-length play, your choices are still plenty. The Comedy Parlor plays host to acts ranging from touring stand-up performers to popular improvisational comedy troupes. Spotlight Theater puts on perennial favorite The Drunkard, complete with booing and hissing from the audience every single week. Tulsa’s latest additions to summer entertainment, Blue Whale Comedy Festival and Tulsa Fringe Fest, offer extraordinary performances that have gotten us invited to the World Fringe Congress this year. Harwelden Murder Mystery, another summer standby, gives you the chance to support the arts in Tulsa while taking a stab at a whodunit.

With so much on offer from our own city, you’re sure to be inspired. Plus, when your friends ask, “Hey, what did you do this weekend?” you’ll always have something interesting to say. Next thing you know, instead of having nothing to do on your night off, you’ll be wondering where to fit it all in. Creativity works like that. You’re not expecting anything to happen when suddenly, it sneaks up on you in the best possible ways.

One last tip: when you go to a live show, please unplug. Once those lights go down, put your phone in a time out and relax. Those of us who get on the stage understand that you have a life, but we’re here to give you an escape from that for a couple of hours. You’re always being told to get a life, right? In the theater, you’ll get more lives than a herd of wild cats.

Local Laughs

Comedy is on the rise in Tulsa. Finding a good laugh has never been easier. There’s a constant stream of big names in comedy coming through Tulsa to Brady Theater, the BOK Center, the Joint, and Cox Business Center (including Brian Regan in November) but to really get a sense of this comedy movement, you’ve got to see shows in Tulsa’s smaller comedy venues. At the Comedy Parlor, you can see more different varieties of comedy than anywhere in town, including local and touring stand up comedians, short form and long form improv from troupes like Spontaniacs! and Low Status Characters, and even variety, game, and talk shows, such as the fascinating and unpredictable Show and Tell with Peter Bedgood. The Loony Bin hosts performances by nationally touring comedians, local greats and first-timers alike—sometimes all in one night—as well as a bi-weekly variety show.  Then there’s the Chris West-hosted shows on Thursdays at Bamboo Lounge and every other Tuesday at Centennial Lounge, Two Lips Burlesk’s shows at the Little Theater, which are always hosted by local comedian Hilton Price, and a growing number of regular comedy nights at bars like Lot No. 6, The Shrine, Woody’s, and Undercurrent. Laugh it up, Tulsa. You’ve earned it.

From Screen to Stage

By some kind of bizarre coincidence, October 10th is the day that movies come alive in Tulsa. Four stage versions of hit movies are all opening on the same day.  Ok ok, so three of them were plays before they were movies, but the film versions of “Oklahoma!” and “You Can’t Take It with You” were both Oscar winners, and Audrey Hepburn immortalized the role of Susy, the blind heroine of “Wait Until Dark,” earning an Oscar nod of her own (though she lost that year to another Hepburn.) But most exciting of all is director Sara Cruncleton’s adaptation of Quentin Tarantino’s debut, “Reservoir Dogs” presented by Midwestern Theater Troupe at Nightingale Theater. Cruncleton promises to subvert our expectations with this staging of the cult hit, but one thing is for sure: the stagehands at this show will be cleaning up a lot of blood each night.