Page 13 - Sheldon Epps News Today : Breaking News, Live Updates & Top Stories | Vimarsana

While mourning one of South Florida theater’s most influential leaders, the GableStage board filled a programming void with Engage@GableStage, featuring fresh and free short, digital content from diverse artists. But the board’s most significant task — carried out with a search committee that included Guthrie Theater artistic director Joseph Haj and actor-writer-director Teo Castellanos — was to select Adler’s successor. A national search yielded 85 applicants, with the pool then narrowed to 25, then 10, then five... then one. The new leader at the helm of GableStage is Bari Newpor...

Photograph by Jim Cox Sheldon Epps needed a play. It was 2013, and the man who killed Florida teenager Trayvon Martin had just been acquitted, sparking widespread outrage and intense conversations about racism in America. As artistic director of the Pasadena Playhouse in Los Angeles, Epps knew he had to find a way to respond to the issues stirred up by this shooting. But how? Then Epps, a longtime theater and television director, had a flash of inspiration. Maybe his way in was through the trial—the jury that had decided to let Martin’s killer go. So he decided to stage Reginald Rose’s...