Odds & Ends: PBS Is Streaming Great Performances Plays for Free & More

Here's a quick roundup of stories you might have missed recently.

PBS' Thirteen Offering Access to Great Performances
Here's another item to add to your quarantine watch list. The PBS channel WNET, locally known as Thirteen, is offering viewers free access to five theatrical must-sees on Great Performances through May 27. Here is what will be featured: Kenny Leon's 2019 Shakespeare in the Park staging of Much Ado About Nothing, starring Tony nominee Danielle Brooks, the Tony-nominated 2017 revival of Present Laughter, starring Kevin Kline, the 2018 West End revival of John Logan's Tony-winning two-hander Red, the 2015 live U.K. broadcast of the stage version of Rodgers and Hammerstein's 1959 classic The Sound of Music and the documentary Harold Prince: The Director's Life, which spotlights the late Broadway legend Harold Prince. Hot tip: for $5 a month, theater lovers can gain access to the station's sprawling library of Great Performances, including musicals like 42nd Street, Kinky Boots, She Loves Me, An American in Paris, The King and I and Holiday Inn. Get info on how to start watching here!

All Seasons of Submissions Only Will Be Available This Weekend
The new streaming service STAGE's Facebook and YouTube channels will release all three seasons of Andrew Keenan-Bolger and Kate Wetherhead's Submissions Only web series beginning on April 10 at 12PM ET and ending at 12AM ET on April 12. The series follows the friendship of two theater professionals, an actress (Wetherhead as Penny Reilly) and a casting director (Colin Hanlon as Tim Trull), as they try to build Broadway careers. The list of the show's special guests stars is super starry with appearances from Nick Jonas, Audra McDonald, Kristin Chenoweth, Jesse Tyler Ferguson, Michael Urie, Bobby Cannavale, Judith Light, Joel Grey, Chita Rivera, Jeremy Jordan, Adam Pascal, Kerry Butler, Laura Osnes, Lin-Manuel Miranda, Harvey Fierstein and many more!

Alec Baldwin & More Tapped for Livestreamed Reading of Orphans
Emmy winner and Tony nominee Alec Baldwin, Aaron Glenane and Red Line Productions co-founder Andrew Henry will perfomed a livestreamed reading of Lyle Kessler's Orphans with Judy Jerome will read stage directions and descriptions. The 90-minute livestream will be broadcast live on April 11 at 9PM ET from Red Line Productions' Facebook and YouTube pages. Baldwin previously performed Orphans on Broadway in 2013, while Glenane and Henry performed the play in 2015 at the Old Fitz Theatre in Sydney, Australia.  “I love this play and I am excited to, finally, be playing Australia!” Baldwin quipped.

Scribe and Broadway Alum Patricia Bosworth Dies at 86
Patricia Bosworth, known for penning powerful memoirs and definitive biographies of stars like Marlon Brando and Jane Fonda, died at the age of 86 on April 2. According to The New York Times, she suffered complications of pneumonia caused by the coronavirus. An alumna of The Actors Studio, Bosworth's Broadway credits included Inherit the Wind, Small War on Murray Hill, The Sin of Pat Muldoon and Howie. She switched gears to writing fulltime and became an author and journalist, serving as a contributing editor at Vanity Fair. Protest Song: Paul Robeson, J. Edgar Hoover, and the Ongoing Fight for Racial Equality, her final book, is scheduled to be published next year. She is survived by her partner Douglas Schwalbe, stepdaughter Fia Hatsav, stepson Léo Palumbo and five step-grandchilren.