N  E  W  S

RUTH an early hit for The Magnetic Theatre

John Crutchfield's verse play Ruth was presented Thursday, July 1 - Saturday, July 10, 2010 by The Magentic Theatre as part of the Catalyst Series at NCStage in downtown Asheville. The show ran for six performances, and played to enthusiastic houses. In a very positive review, Alli Marshall of Mountain Xpress wrote of the play's "peculiar magic," working up to the "final sumptuous moment." 

For the full review, click here: Mountain XPress review

The show combines original poetry, choreography by Julie Becton Gillum, and Crutchfield's own live music on non-traditional instruments to re-imagine the eponymous biblical story of Ruth in a contemporary Southern Appalachian setting.

The show was directed by Steve Samuels (Artistic Director of The Magnetic Theatre), produced by Chall Gray (Co-Founder of The Magnetic Field), and starred Kathryn Temple, C.J. Breland, Peter Brezny, Erik Moellering, and Kelley Hinman. Jason Williams designed the lighting and set, and Jessica Kammerud stage-managed and ran the light board.

After Crutchfield's The Songs of Robert and Lucia del Vecchio's The Wedding Show, Ruth represents the third production by The Magentic Theatre in the lead up to the company's official launch this September at The Magnetic Field, a new performance venue in Asheville's River Arts District.

THE BARS OF ATLANTIS: Selected Essays of Durs Grünbein

Now available from Farrar, Straus and Giroux

Translated from the German by John Crutchfield, Michael Hofmann, and Andrew Shields

Edited by Michael Eskin, who praises Crutchfield's translations for having "beautifully caught the original's stylistic visage...with great fidelity and elegance, while...retaining its mild-to-medium-strong undercurrent of wryness and irony," and for having "managed to follow the original on its many stylistic and intellectual explorations without sacrifiing sense and logical consistency."

For more information, click here:   The Bars of Atlantis

LOCAL BOY GOES TO BIG CITY, MAKES GOOD

THE SONGS OF ROBERT wins "Outstanding Solo Show" at FringeNYC 2009

This past August, John Crutchfield took his quirkily poetic one-man show, The Songs of Robert, to the 2009 New York International Fringe Festival. The show ran for five performances at the Milagro Theatre on Suffolk Street in Manhattan's Lower East Side, garnered two very positive reviews, and won the Festival's Overall Excellence Award for "Outstanding Solo Show." For the New York production, Crutchfield worked closely with director Steve Samuels (Artistic Director of The Magnetic Theatre in Asheville) and producer Chall Gray.

To read what the critics had to say, click on the links below:

Time Out New York       NYTheatre

The official playscript is now avalable in the anthology, Plays and Playwrights 2010, edited by Martin Denton. For more information, click here:   Plays and Playwrights 2010

To read Martin Denton's "cyber interview" with John Crutchfield, click here:   Crutchfield interview