Southland Theatre Artists Goodwill Event (S.T.A.G.E.) is the longest-running annual benefit for AIDS worldwide. In its three decades-long history, more than 350 stars of Broadway, film and television have performed music from the Great White Way to the Silver Screen while raising millions of dollars for HIV/AIDS organizations in the Los Angeles area.
Continuing this proud tradition, this year’s 32nd Anniversary Gala will present music from Broadway’s most prolific and celebrated living composer, Stephen Sondheim, performed by an All-Star Cast on June 18, 2016 for two shows, at the renowned Wallis Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts in Beverly Hills.
Choosing a different theme each year, typically showcasing composers such as Leonard Bernstein, the Gershwins, Cole Porter, Lerner and Loewe, S.T.A.G.E. calls on the best and the brightest talents in stage and screen to bring the production to life, and this year is no different. A tough act to follow after the 30th and 31st anniversary galas where STAGE went first to the movies and then back to Broadway from Hollywood with Love, this year director David Galligan and musical director Michael Orland bring us SONDHEIM No. 5.
As recalled by stage and screen legend Carole Cook, making her 30th appearance at the S.T.A.G.E. LA event, “We called it ‘the plague’. They called it ‘the gay disease’. There wasn’t even a name.” The time was 1984. We would come to know the disease as AIDS. But in 1984, all anyone knew was that gay men were becoming ill and sadly, dying. What Michael Kerns and James Carroll knew was that someone had to do something to help ease the suffering and with that Southland Theatre Artists Goodwill Event was born. Calling on former Dramalogue scribe and theatre director David Galligan, the group began what is now a 32-year tradition of putting on a benefit with proceeds to benefit those afflicted with AIDS and their families in the Southern California area.
SONDHEIM No. 5 takes place on Saturday, June 18, 2016 at 2:00 pm and 8:00 pm at the Wallis Annenberg Performing Center for the Arts located at 9390 North Santa Monica Boulevard, Beverly Hills, California 90210. Tickets go on sale April 1, 2015. For more information or to purchase tickets go to www.stagela.com.
