Phindie will provide more Philly Fringe Festival coverage than any publication in the world! Coverage begins with 15 picks from star Phindie writer Deb Miller.

Philadelphia’s oldest theater is also by far it’s most popular and financially secure. In a time when other large theaters are struggling to stay afloat, the Walnut Street Theatre maintains the largest subscriber base in the country. In the first section three-part series, Kathryn Behrman sits down with Walnut artistic director Bernard Havard and other local theater folk to consider the playhouse’s commitment to popular entertainment.

Sebastian Cummings has always been a little edgy. A military brat, a black man in the white suburbs, a Jamaican American in African American black society, a gay actor in a straight-role world—throughout…

Lately I’ve been thinking about that “worthwhile strategy” in regards to making a living as a theatre artist. Too many of my colleagues can’t afford to get sick, and certainly can’t afford to start a family. An interview with Charlotte Ford (revealing she’s stepping away from theater to go back to school for speech pathology) seems to have sparked a vigorous public debate about how difficult it is to make a living as an artist, and what can be done about it.

“There aren’t enough cocktails to help me understand why I continue to be an actor! This shit is for the birds!”

Thus begins the Facebook entry by Joey, a dancer-actor-singer who played many roles along the U.S. east coast, but recently did not get hired for a new musical.

Josh McIlvain’s interview with Charlotte Ford “The untenable career of a successful Philadelphia theater artist” sparked some soul-searching among Philadelphia performers. They met on June 23rd to discuss.

“It’s really hard to do acting and make a living unless you’re really good—and a Caucasian man.”

Downtown theater company Quince Productions – the punchy, LGBTQ-leaning bunch that puts on GayFest! every August – opens their sixth annual Full House cabaret series this Thursday in its ancestral home, the Red Room at the Society Hill Playhouse, and it’s looking as wicked, delightful and boozy as ever. (Boozy because your ticket includes the price of a drink.)

Director Manon Manavit had not heard of Heinrich von Kleist when she found a copy of his Michael Kohlhaas on a street in Montreal. It’s easy to understand why she was attracted to the text.

Phindie talks to Manon Manavit, a future star of Philadelphia performing arts, before her debut show in the city. She just relocated from Montreal, where she worked with Cirque Du Soleil.

Kate Brennan lit up the Philadelphia stages for years as an actor and producer for BCKSEET Productions. Now NYC-based, she’s back in town this summer for an offbeat theater camp. Phindie asks her about this and her memories of Philly.

Phindie talked to Tamanya Garza, a longtime leader of the Philadelphia Latino theater community and director of EL NOGALAR, part of the three-play 30/30 series exploring Latino theater.

The support for performing arts organizations and artists, of all sizes, pales in comparison to the type of funding that art museums obtain. It is time to start placing more value on the “art” part of performing arts.

Philadelphia’s theater scene is better than ever—haven’t you heard? But so few of its practitioners can eke out a living wage from it. This interview Charlotte Ford takes a serious look at how poor the health of the theater industry is in this city.

In ALWAYS COMING SOON: THE FUTURE, BRAT Productions takes another look at what the future holds, and the auguries are not pretty: Derelict clowns, aggressive barkers, and obscene control culture. But THE FUTURE is funny and fun: It’s another of the entertaining rock cabarets which the company has launched in recent years,

Makoto Hirano asks Lantern artistic director Charles McMahon some tough questions about the “Super Racist” Julius Caesar. And a clearly contrite McMahon does his best to explain the process that lead to the company’s misguided choices.

Together with collaborator Nick Gillette, Ben Grinberg founded Almanac Dance Circus Theatre to offer production of his unique brand of acrobatic theater. Almanac’s inaugural show, Communitas, launches this May 22-24 at Christ Church Neighborhood House. Phindie asked Ben a few questions about the show and his new company.

Adrienne Mackey, 32, is the artistic director of Swim Pony Performing Arts, a performing arts company that prides itself on presenting work that is “loud, strange, and never seen before on earth.”

At rehearsal last week putting the finishing touches on his new dance piece ‘Promises I Never Meant to Keep,’ choreographer Roni Koresh was bleary eyed, wondering if the coffee he was drinking was from three days ago, but otherwise thoroughly engaged

Phindie looks at tax returns for local theaters to see how much they brought in from what sources. We also look at who the best paid employee was for each “non-profit”.