Ali Ippolito (of Heroes and Villians, Nick Jaina fame) writes music with a haunting poetry and quiet authority that simultaneously tugs, pulls, coaxes, vexes, and inspires. A mezmerizing singer, Ippolito accompanies herself on piano, accordion, and the curious banjolele, giving us fading, sepia-tinged sonic postcards of love and loss.
Her simmering music–as captivating as Tom […]

»read more from "First Thursday Music: Ali Ippolito"

There’re only 3 performances left to go before the historic World Premiere of Sometimes a Great Notion closes forever.
Check out this behind the scenes video with some incredibly insightful interviews with the Notion cast and creative team.

And then drag your Oregon loving friends down to one of the extension performances.
Want to play hooky […]

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{Hank (P.J. Sosko) tries out a new pair of caulk (pronounced “cork”) boots in Sometimes a Great Notion, now EXTENDED through May 10th.}
After a weekend of packed-to-the-rafters houses, we are delighted to announce that Sometimes a Great Notion will extend for yet another week!
Tickets are now on sale for the extra extension week, which will […]

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“Never give an inch” was the motto of the Stamper family–and live it they did!
Recognize that tagline? Well, keep it in mind the next time you play Scene It with your friends. That was the line for the 1971 film Sometimes A Great Notion, directed by and starring Paul Newman. Sharing the title with […]

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{“Wag it and Shag it boys!” Patriarch Henry Stamper (Tobias Andersen), laid up with a broken arm, relies on his sons Hank (P.J. Sosko) and Leland (Karl Miller) to keep the family logging business afloat.}
You asked for it Portland and who are we to stand in your way? Sometimes a Great Notion has […]

»read more from "Extended, by Popular Demand!"

{photo: The Stamper family rests a moment, each in their private world. Vivian Stamper (Sarah Grace Wilson, left) samples from Wallace Stevens’ poetry while patriarch Henry (Tobias Andersen, right) does some reading of his own. Leland (Karl Miller, middle), is awakes to visions of older brother Hank (P.J. Sosko, standing) and cousin Joe Ben (Andy […]

»read more from "“And the River Rises”"

The third and final Fade to Black party is all set to rock the Armory this coming Tuesday evening, April 8th, after the performance of Sometimes a Great Notion (which opens tonight). If the last two parties are any indication, you won’t want to miss out on this opportunity to mix it up a […]

»read more from "Holy Oak, Batman, Fade to Black is Tuesday!"

{photo: The Stamper family rests a moment, each in their private world. Vivian Stamper (Sarah Grace Wilson, left) samples from Wallace Stevens’ poetry while patriarch Henry (Tobias Andersen, right) does some reading of his own. Leland (Karl Miller, middle), is awakes to visions of older brother Hank (P.J. Sosko, standing) and cousin Joe Ben (Andy […]

»read more from "On the Eve of of a World Premiere: Bringing the Oregon Forest to Life"

photo: Ken Babbs and Ken Kesey with Further (courtesy Ken Babbs)
As both a singular voice of Northwest literature and a restless, animating spirit of the ‘60s counter-culture, Ken Kesey widened perceptions and challenged American values at many turnpikes over the last several decades.
Which is why the world-premiere staging of Sometimes a Great […]

»read more from "Join the Conversation: Kesey & Other Great Notions"

There is definitely a buzz charging through the building as Sometimes A Great Notion moves toward opening night. The cast moved onto the set on Saturday (4 days early???? Why doesn’t that happen on MY shows?) And this morning they began focusing the lights.

As you can see, the set is a jagged […]

»read more from "Onstage with the Stampers"

photo credit: Tom Oliver
“If the Northwest has its own musical sound, it’s exemplified on Leviethan Cecil’s 2007 release, Monuments in Memory of Nothing So Far. It’s vintage indie-rock made modern. The lyrics have a dreamlike quality, beautiful and deep. Monuments gets a place in my Top 10 CDs of 2007.”
-Amy Atkins, Boise Weekly
Singer-songwriter […]

»read more from "Strumming A Great Notion: Leviethan Cecil"

Just to get an idea of how Kesey captures the popular imagination, read LAWRENCE DOWNES’ great travelogue in today’s New York Times on Kesey hiding out from the law in the “cliff-hugging city of Manzanillo” in Mexico. Plus you’ll find out where to stay, what to eat and a thing or two about the bus […]

»read more from "Kesey: on the lam in dead-end Manzanillo"

{There’s a reason they’re called the Stampers. Hank Stamper (P.J. Sosko) test drives a new pair of caulk (pronounced “cork’) boots in Sometimes a Great Notion, opening April 4th on the Main Stage.}
I saw a runthrough of Sometimes a Great Notion in the rehearsal hall yesterday.  The company was still digesting new pages of […]

»read more from "The River is Rising"

Jeff Baker on his Bookmarks blog at OregonLive has a great little piece and YouTube link to Kesey on the Tom Snyder-era Tonight Show.
“I just started rereading The Last Go-Round for a column, and it got me thinking about Kesey’s in public. He was always ‘on,’ always aware of himself as a performer and […]

»read more from "Kesey: “The acid is from Switzerland”"

{Ken Kesey as a young man. Photo credit unknown.}

PARIS REVIEW: After you wrote Sometimes a Great Notion, you set out on the bus. What did you want to explore?
KEN KESEY: What I explore in all my work: wilderness…When we got here there was a sense of possibility and new direction, and it had to do […]

»read more from "Kesey to the City"

{From the recent press shoot for Sometimes a Great Notion, taken in the scene shop on the set. Pictured from left to right: Leland (Karl Miller), Hank (P.J. Sosko), Henry (Tobias Andersen) and Joe Ben (Andy Paterson).} note: Those trees in the background? Not in the scene shop. Intrepid photographer Owen Carey shot and […]

»read more from "Felling Trees and Fluffing Skirts"

A few more things you may not know about Kesey’s life and times:
- Ken Kesey was born in La Junta, Colorado, and brought up in Eugene, Oregon. His father worked in the creamery business, and his brother still runs Nancy’s Yogurt.
- He was a star football player and a wrestler at the University of Oregon. […]

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{Yes! This photo is of a scale model, taken by Scenic Designer Tony Cisek}
The first rehearsal for Sometimes a Great Notion was today, allowing cast and staff to get their first glimpse of the designs and ideas that will start to bring this great Oregon novel to life.
The rehearsal began with a Portland Center […]

»read more from "Beginning the Process of Bringing the Oregon Forest to Life"

PCS just passed the 5,000 mark for students attending our productions, or having reservations to attend (i.e. Sometimes A Great Notion). Last year we had about 4,000 total for the year. It was a big help to have a Shakespeare play this year. Almost 3,000 of the students attending went to see […]

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“A painter of anti-heroic subject matter on a heroic scale, wittily and effectively chronicling the fate of our environment.”
—Art in America
Rehearsals began today for PCS’s production of Ken Kesey’s iconic Oregon novel, Sometimes a Great Notion, adapted and directed by Aaron Posner. Fitting then that, in conjunction with this world premiere staging, […]

»read more from "Picturing a Great Notion"

When I think of Ken Kesey, I don’t think of burly loggers and NW Wilderness. In the popular imagination he’s that crazy trippy guy from Electric Kool Aid Acid Test. He’s the founder of the Merry Pranskters, whose cross country trek arguably INVENTED ’60s counterculture.
What’s he doing writing a novel about life chopping down trees […]

»read more from "Ken Kesey and the Merry Pranksters: In Search of New Wilderness"

I am about 200 pages into Ken Kesey’s novel Sometimes a Great Notion (which will arrive on the PCS stage in April) and already I am struck by the sheer subversive glee that Kesey takes in storytelling.
The story, about an Oregon coastal logging family in the midst of a union strike, contains enough […]

»read more from "Cussedness and Columbine: Capturing the Beauty of Oregon (from page to stage)"

Starting in February, the Oregon Psychoanalytic Center and Portland Center Stage put theater on the couch for Formative Stages: Theater and the Life of the Mind, a series of lively post-matinee show discussions on issues, themes and lessons gleaned from PCS plays.
Flexing their considerable insights into the life of the mind, this stellar group of […]

»read more from "Wrap your head around PCS!"