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Television’s biggest night returns to Los Angeles on September 14, as the 78th Emmy Awards take over the Peacock Theater at L.A. LIVE, celebrating the year’s most outstanding television performances and productions.

Hosted by Emmy Award winner Mariska Hargitay, the ceremony will air live coast-to-coast on NBC and stream on Peacock at 5 p.m. PT. The event also arrives during NBC’s 100th anniversary year, giving the network’s centennial celebrations a star-studded centerpiece. 

This year’s nominations are led by HBO Max’s The Pitt, with 25 nominations, followed by HBO Max’s Hacks with 24 (the most nominations ever received by a comedy series in a single year). Apple TV’s Widow’s Bay earned 19 nominations, while Apple TV’s Pluribus received 18. Other highly nominated programs include Netflix’s Beef with 16 nominations, HBO Max’s DTF St. Louis with 13, and NBC’s Saturday Night Live with 11. 

Among this year’s nominees are familiar television names including Steve Carell, Jamie Lee Curtis, Harrison Ford, Lisa Kudrow, Gary Oldman, Michelle Pfeiffer, Carey Mulligan, Sterling K. Brown, Colman Domingo and Keri Russell, alongside a new generation of performers receiving their first Emmy nominations. 

Hargitay, best known for her Emmy-winning role as Olivia Benson on NBC’s Law & Order: Special Victims Unit, brings her own television legacy to the ceremony. She also recently made her Broadway debut in Every Brilliant Thing and directed My Mom Jayne, a deeply personal documentary about her mother, Hollywood icon Jayne Mansfield. The film explores Mansfield’s life and legacy through Hargitay’s perspective as the daughter she left behind, and has received three Emmy nominations this year. 

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South Coast Repertory (SCR) opens its 63rd season Sept. 12 with the acclaimed production of Stephen Sondheim and James Lapine’s Into the Woods, marking the musical’s 40th anniversary. The production runs through Oct. 18 on the Segerstrom Stage in Costa Mesa.

Part of SCR’s American Icons series, the production celebrates Sondheim’s influence on American theater while revisiting one of his most enduring works. Directed by Peter Rothstein, with musical direction by Wiley DeWeese, this marks SCR’s first staging of Into the Woods and its eighth work by Sondheim.

The Tony-winning musical which premiered on Broadway in 1987, combines familiar fairy-tale characters with a darker, more complicated examination of what happens after dreams come true. At the center of the musical are a childless Baker and his wife, who venture into the forest seeking four items needed to break a Witch’s infertility curse and finally have a child. Their journey intersects with the quests of Cinderella, Little Red Riding Hood and Jack (and the Beanstalk), creating a tangled narrative that appears headed toward fairy-tale endings at the end of Act One.

Act Two explores what happens following “happily ever after,” as a new threat forces the characters back into the woods. The story grows darker, examining what people owe one another when their choices have consequences.

Previews run through Sept. 17, followed by opening night Sept. 18. Regular performances continue through Oct. 18, with an ASL-interpreted performance scheduled for Oct. 10.

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Following last year’s smash hit production of The Wedding Singer, The Colony Theatre in Burbank is presenting the 2011 Broadway musical Catch Me If You Can from September 17–October 18. Nominated for four Tony Awards including Best Musical, the show’s book is by Terrence McNally, with music by Marc Shaiman and lyrics by Scott Wittman and Shaiman. It’s based on the 2002 Dreamworks motion picture. The Colony production is directed by Michael Donovan, choreographed by Natalie Iscovich, and Brent Crayon is musical director. 

Catch Me If You Can is a high-flying, splashy Broadway musical that tells the true story of Frank W. Abagnale, Jr., who runs away from home in search of the glamorous life. With nothing more than his boyish charm, a big imagination, and millions of dollars in forged checks, Frank successfully poses as a pilot, a doctor, and a lawyer – living the high life and winning the girl of his dreams. But when Frank’s lies catch the attention of FBI agent Carl Hanratty, Carl chases Frank to the end … and finds something he never expected.

The cast features Blake Jenner (Glee, What/If, The Edge of Seventeen), Joe Abraham, Kevin Bailey, Leslie Stevens, Gabbie Adner, Brad Griffith, and Whitney Kathleen Vigil. The ensemble includes Leonel Ayala, Matthew Mason Baker, Bella Bilandzija, Luc Clopton, Sophie Liu David, Spencer Del Carmen, Jesse Graham, Anne Hart, Caleb Kocsis, Samantha Lawrence-Mata, Almand Martin Jr., and Lucy Schene. Head on over to Burbank and fly away!

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Altadena Music Theatre (AMT) returned last month to active production following the destruction of its performance space in the devastating Eaton fire of January 2025, presenting an eight-performance sold out run of Grease. Now, completing its triumphant return season at the Mountain View Mausoleum, comes the legendary and beloved Little Shop of Horrors, September 3–13. With book and lyrics by Howard Ashman and music by Alan Menken, the AMT production is directed by Sarah Azcarate with choreography by Noel Bajandas and musical direction by Chris Wade. The cast is led by Broadway’s Ruby Lewis (Cirque du Soleil Paramour) as Audrey, James Byous as Seymour, and Lord Kraven as Audrey II. Also featured are Auriaa,Avela Fongoqa,Mueen Jahan, Robert Manion, and Shantilly Tuazon.

Little Shop of Horrors began its onstage life off-Broadway in 1982. It opened on the West End in 1983, was presented on Broadway in 2003, and was revived on the West End in 2007. A new production opened off-Broadway in 2019, where it is still running. The story follows Seymour, a downtrodden and shy florist’s assistant whose life blossoms overnight thanks to an otherworldly and hungry new plant named Audrey II. But there’s a catch — it craves blood. As fame, fortune, and love begin to bloom, so does the madness. The score includes unforgettable, passionate melodies like Suddenly Seymour and Somewhere That’s Green. Musical theatre under the stars before the summer ends! Let’s go!For more, click here.