The new opera by Tazewell Thompson and Jeanine Tesori tells the story of a couple in Harlem who are forced to confront their teenage son's sudden death by police violence.
Earth, Wind & Fire, Sally Field, Linda Ronstadt, Sesame Street and Michael Tilson Thomas will be recognized for their lifetime contributions to the performing arts at a gala in December.
"I always considered song parody kind of cheap," the Emmy-nominated lyricist and performer says. "But ... I've gotten [such a] response from others ... that I'm appreciating it as an art form."
It starts with a perfect black family in a model household, like a '70s sitcom. Then it gets weird. Playwright Jackie Sibblies Drury says she was inspired by an experience with police surveillance.
Menzi Mngoma is hoping that the exposure will help him further his dream of becoming an international singing sensation who doesn't have to drive for Uber.
A new, Yiddish language production of the musical is currently running off-Broadway. Steven Skybell, who plays Tevye, and Joel Grey, who directs the show, explain why the play still resonates.
Drag is experiencing a golden age, thanks to TV's RuPaul's Drag Race. But the tradition of drag performance has its roots as far back as Greece and has gone through a radical evolution in the U.S.
New York City Opera has commissioned Stonewall, a new opera premiering one week before the 50th anniversary of the riots that sparked the modern gay-rights movement.
The Italian director staged sumptuously visualized operas, which often resembled Renaissance paintings brought to life. On film, he brought Shakespearean and biblical tales to the big screen.
Ain't Too Proud, a musical based on Motown legends The Temptations, is up for 12 Tony Awards. NPR's Noel King talks with actor Derrick Baskin and writer Dominique Morisseau.
Singer Alicia Hall Moran and pianist Jason Moran mix original music works with 20th century spoken word to reflect on The Great Migration, when African Americans moved from the South to the North.
The mega-star sold tens of millions of records and had 11 No. 1 hits throughout her career. And in less than year, Houston, or at least a light-projected version of her, could be at it again.
Ten years after leaving his childhood home in West Bengal, photographer Soumya Sankar Bose returned to find that stars of Jatra, a popular local form of folk theater, were fading from public view.
The Latin American Library at Tulane University is digitizing a whopping collection of Cold War-era, must-hear entertainment — Spanish language radionovelas made by Cuban emigrés in Miami.
NPR's Michel Martin speaks with Gabe Barre, director of Amazing Grace: The Musical, which is currently playing at the Museum of the Bible in Washington, D.C.
The comic and actor, known for his boundary-pushing stand-up routines and his sketch comedy TV series Chappelle's Show, will receive the award in a gala at the Kennedy Center.
Jo Sullivan Loesser, who died April 28, married Frank Loesser after starring in his Broadway show, The Most Happy Fella. After Frank died in 1969, she helped preserve his legacy.
In the Broadway musical The Prom, a high school PTA cancels the dance rather than allowing two girls to attend together. The show was just nominated for seven Tony Awards.
Tootsie, Beetlejuice and The Prom round up the Tony category for best musical, while The Ferryman, Gary, Ink, Choir Boy and What the Constitution Means to Me are all up for best play.
A wife and then a mother to Canadian prime ministers, she addresses her time in the public eye and her battles with mental illness in an upcoming one-woman show called Certain Woman Of An Age.
