Porchlight Music Theatre is proud to partner with Hershey Felder Presents - Live from Florence on its next live streaming world premiere Anna & Sergei with Hershey Felder as “Sergei Rachmaninoff.” Anna & Sergei, with a book by Felder and direction by Felder and Stefano DeCarli, will be livestreamed starting Sunday, May 16 at 7 p.m. CDT and is available for streaming through Sunday, May 23.
It also features special guests Ekaterina Siurina as “Natalia Alexandrovna Rachmaninoff” and Igor Polesitsky as “Dr. Golitzin.” Tickets for Anna & Sergei are $55 per household and are available for purchase at www.PorchlightMusicTheatre.org. This production will benefit national US theatres and arts organizations including Porchlight Music Theatre.
Tickets are now on sale at www.PorchlightMusicTheatre.org and include the live broadcast and a week of extended “on-demand” viewing access to the recording (available one-hour after the live broadcast ends). The broadcast will also be available for latecomers to purchase through the week of “on demand” access. Viewing access for all ends Sunday, May 23 at 11:59 p.m. CDT.
Taking place as a memory play in the house in which Rachmaninoff died in Beverly Hills, Anna & Sergei is the story of a very strange and little-known real-life meeting between the famed Russian composer and pianist and Anna Anderson, the woman who claimed to be the Grand Duchess Anastasia Nicholaievna Romanov, the sole surviving member of the Romanov Dynasty. Anna & Sergei features many of Rachmaninoff’s most beloved melodies and music.
Anna & Sergei is directed by Felder and Stefano DeCarli with DeCarli Live film company (film production and live editing); Erik Carstensen (live broadcast and sound design production); Meghan Maiya (historical and biographical research); Camilla Saccardi (costumes and hair). Company management is by Samantha F. Voxakis.
Ticket holders will receive their live stream link Friday, May 14, via the email used to register for the event. The performance may be streamed from a smart TV, computer, smartphone or tablet.
ABOUT HERSHEY FELDER (Writer and Performer)
Named to Time Magazine’s 2016 Top 10 Plays and Musicals, Hershey Felder has played over 6,000 performances of his self-created solo productions at some of the world’s most prestigious theatres, consistently breaking box office records. American Theatre Magazine has said, “Hershey Felder is in a category all his own.” His shows include: George Gershwin Alone (Broadway’s Helen Hayes Theatre, West End’s Duchess Theatre); Monsieur Chopin; Beethoven; Maestro (Leonard Bernstein); Franz Liszt in Musik; Lincoln: An American Story; Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin; Our Great Tchaikovsky and A Paris Love Story. His compositions and recordings include “Aliyah,” “Concerto for Piano and Orchestra;” “Fairytale,” a musical; “Les Anges de Paris,” “Suite for Violin” and “Piano;” “Song Settings;” “Saltimbanques for Piano and Orchestra;” “Etudes Thematiques for Piano;” and “An American Story for Actor and Orchestra.” Felder is the adaptor, director and designer for the internationally performed play-with-music The Pianist of Willesden Lane with Steinway artist Mona Golabek; producer and designer for the musical Louis and Keely: ‘Live’ at the Sahara, directed by Taylor Hackford; and writer and director for Flying Solo, featuring opera legend Nathan Gunn. Felder has operated a full-service production company since 2001, and in 2020 created a new brand, Live from Florence, that operates a “theatre at home broadcast company,” based in Florence, Italy. Previous broadcasts have included Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin; Hershey Felder, Beethoven; Hershey Felder as George Gershwin Alone; Hershey Felder as Claude Debussy in A Paris Love Story; Hershey Felder, Tchaikovsky; Hershey Felder as Sholem Aleichem in Before Fiddler; Hershey Felder, Puccini; Hershey Felder, Backstory – The Story Behind the Creation of Berlin, Gershwin & Bernstein and Cooking French in Florence with Jeff Thickman and Felder. He has been a scholar-in-residence at Harvard University’s Department of Music and is married to Kim Campbell, the first female prime minister of Canada.
ABOUT HERSHEY FELDER PRESENTS – LIVE FROM FLORENCE
Hershey Felder’s arts broadcasting company, Hershey Felder Presents – Live from Florence, produces high quality streaming arts programming for international audiences, both for the period while theatres remain closed during the COVID-19 pandemic, and beyond. Since the start of the pandemic, Felder’s live streams have generated over $2.6 million in sales. Felder has donated 80% of these proceeds mainly to theatres in the United States, as well as several abroad, arts organizations, schools, artists and publications that have been financially impacted by the worldwide health crisis.
Video on Demand streams of earlier broadcasts – Hershey Felder, Puccini with international opera stars Nathan Gunn, Gianna Corbisiero, Charles Castronovo and Ekaterina Siurina; Hershey Felder as Sholem Aleichem in Before Fiddler featuring Klezmerata Fiorentina; Hershey Felder, Tchaikovsky; Hershey Felder as Claude Debussy in A Paris Love Story; Hershey Felder as George Gershwin Alone; Hershey Felder, Beethoven and Hershey Felder as Irving Berlin and the cooking show, Cooking French in Florence with Felder and internationally renowned chef Jeff Thickman – are available for “on demand” purchase at www.hersheyfelder.net.
ABOUT PORCHLIGHT MUSIC THEATRE
Porchlight Music Theatre is the award-winning center for music theatre in Chicago. Through live performance, youth education and community outreach we impact thousands of lives each season, bringing the magic of musicals to our theatre home at the Ruth Page Center for the Arts in the Gold Coast and to neighborhoods across the city. Porchlight has built a national reputation for boldly reimagining classic musicals, supporting new works and young performers, and showcasing Chicago’s most notable music theatre artists, all through the intimate and powerful theatrical lens of the “Chicago Style.”
Now in its 26th season, Porchlight's quarter-century production history includes more than 70 mainstage works with 15 Chicago premieres and five world premieres. Porchlight’s commitment to the past, present and future of music theatre led the company to develop the Porchlight Revisits and New Faces Sing Broadway program series, both quickly becoming audience favorites.
Porchlight's education and outreach programs serve schools, youth of all ages and skill levels and community organizations, most notably the ongoing collaboration with Chicago Youth Centers. Porchlight annually awards dozens of full scholarships and hundreds of free tickets to ensure accessibility and real engagement with this uniquely American art form.
The company’s many honors include 178 Joseph Jefferson Award (Jeff) nominations and 45 Jeff awards, as well as 33 Black Theatre Alliance (BTA) nominations and 12 BTA awards. In 2019, Porchlight graduated to the Large Theatre tier of the Equity Jeff Awards, and was honored with eight nominations in both technical and artistic categories and won three awards in our inaugural year in this tier, most notably Best Ensemble for Duke Ellington’s Sophisticated Ladies.
Through the global pandemic, Porchlight has emerged as one of Chicago’s leaders in virtual programming, quickly launching a host of free offerings like Sondheim @ 90 Roundtables, Movie Musical Mondays, Porchlight by Request: Command Performances and WPMT: Classic Musicals from the Golden Age of Radio. For the 2020-2021 season, Porchlight’s fall schedule included all-new ticketed virtual programs including Broadway by the Decade, New Faces Sing Broadway 1987, New Faces Sing Broadway 1961, Chicago Sings Rock & Roll Broadway and the return of The Ruffians’ Burning Bluebeard as well as collaborations with Hershey Felder and L.A. Theatre Works. Porchlight continues to announce new premium and free offerings in 2021.
Porchlight Music Theatre is proud to partner with Hershey Felder Presents - Live from Florence on its next live streaming world premiere Anna & Sergei with Hershey Felder as “Sergei Rachmaninoff.” Anna & Sergei, has a book by Felder and direction by Felder and Stefano DeCarli, will be livestreamed starting Sunday, May 16 at 7 p.m. CDT and is available for streaming through Sunday, May 23. Also features special guests Ekaterina Siurina as “Natalia Alexandrovna Rachmaninoff” and Igor Polesitsky as “Dr. Golitzin.” Tickets for Anna & Sergei are $55 per household and are available for purchase at PorchlightMusicTheatre.org. This production will benefit national US theatres and arts organizations including Porchlight Music Theatre. Tickets are now on sale at PorchlightMusicTheatre.org and include the live broadcast and a week of extended “on-demand” viewing access to the recording (available one-hour after the live broadcast ends). The broadcast will also be available for latecomers to purchase through the week of “on demand” access. Viewing access for all ends Sunday, May 23 at 11:59 p.m. CDT.
Porchlight Music Theatre is partially supported by generous contributions from Actors’ Equity Foundation; Allstate; Bayless Family Foundation; Michael Best & Friedrich LLP; Chapman | Spingola, LLP; Abe and Ida Cooper Foundation; Gen Ops Plus; Elegant Event Lighting; Glimpse Vision; James P. and Brenda S. Grusecki Family Foundation; Hearty Boys; A.L. and Jennie L. Luria Foundation; The MacArthur Fund for Culture, Equity, and the Arts at Prince; the Pritzker Traubert Foundation; Ryan and Spaeth, Inc.; Daniel and Genevieve Ratner Foundation; The Saints and Dr. Scholl Foundation.
The season program is partially supported by a grant from the Illinois Arts Council Agency, a state agency, and by a CityArts Grant from the City of Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs & Special Events.
Porchlight Music Theatre wishes to thank members of the Matching Gift Corporate Program including abbvie; Allstate; Lloyd A. Fry Foundation; Peoples Gas; Pepsico; Polk Bros Foundation and The Saints.