Zoe Burke - Page 3

Ironweed Productions celebrates its 15th anniversary and launches its 2020 Season with Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Annie Baker's comically off-beat and gently moving play, The Aliens, opening March 5th.

New Mexico Actors Lab founder Robert Benedetti announced today that co-Artistic Director Nicholas Ballas has been named the group's sole Artistic Director, and that Benedetti will now serve as Managing Director in concert with Mr. Ballas.

Blood and Water, the newest production playing at the Aux Dog Theatre (and a world premiere at that) is a strong new piece from Albuquerque based playwright Andy Mayo. Similar to the works of Sam Shepard in construction and tone, the dark comedy examines the relationship between two estranged brothers over one fateful Christmas.

In a hypothetical eternal court, Hitler is tried for his crimes against humanity. His defense? Martin Luther. The prosecutor? Anne Frank. So begins False Witness: The Trial of Humanity's Conscience by Robert Krakow, currently running at The Swan Theatre.

Ironweed Productions presents Water by the Spoonful by Quiara Alegría Hudes as part of a collaboration with Teatro Paraguas and the Santa Fe Playhouse to bring her three-play cycle, The Elliot Trilogy, to Santa Fe. Ironweed's production, directed by Valli Marie Rivera, will run October 3rd through October 20th.

The Santa Fe Playhouse has been a cornerstone of Santa Fe's theater community for almost 100 years. In that time, there have been many Artistic Directors, each charged with moving this venerable 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization forward. The baton of leadership is about to be passed once again.

The 2019 New Mexico Actors Lab season has been a very strong one, and the trend continues with their final production, 4,000 Miles. Amy Herzog's 2013 Pulitzer finalist is about, in large part, the relationship between 21 year old Leo and his 91 year old grandmother, dealing with themes of family, loss, responsibility, and love in a lovely, intimately staged fashion.

A review of the original 1998 production of Diana Son's Stop Kiss refers to the play as a 'small treasure' - not intended as a slight, but I think in reference to the beautifully, movingly simple nature of the script. I would use the same phrase to describe the New Mexico Actor's Lab production (currently running at Teatro Paraguas) - the play is full of small, gorgeous moments that are masterfully directed and acted, creating a lovely and impactful evening of theatre.

Teatro Paraguas, Santa Fe Playhouse, and Ironweed Productions present This fall, Teatro Paraguas, the Santa Fe Playhouse, and Ironweed Productions join forces -with a cast of 17 actors from Santa Fe, Albuquerque, and beyond-to bring Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Quiara Alegria Hudes' masterful epic, The Elliot Trilogy, to Santa Fe. This powerful trilogy consists of Elliot: a Soldier's Fugue, Pulitzer Prize-winner Water by the Spoonful, and The Happiest Song Plays Last. The plays follow Elliot Ortiz from the battlegrounds of Iraq, to a Subway sandwich shop in his home of Philadelphia, to his roots in Puerto Rico, and back to the Middle East to confront a past that has haunted him since the war. The plays span four generations and over 60 years, grappling with the impacts of war and addiction on families and how redemption can be found within intergenerational care, compassion, and wisdom.

The Santa Fe Opera's General Director Robert K. Meya today announced repertory and casting for the company's exciting 64th Season in 2020. On the panel joining Meya for the announcement were the President of the Board of Directors Susan G. Marineau, Andrea Fellows Walters, Director of Community Engagement, and Cori Ellison, the company's first, recently appointed Dramaturg.

Artificial intelligence is very much a part of modern life. Whether it's Alexa, Siri, or even the pleasant voice giving directions via a GPS, we as a society have pretty thoroughly integrated AI into a significant portion of our existence. We connect emotionally with these forms of AI, on some level, too (anyone who has argued aloud with their GPS can verify); but what if it went further? What if these forms of artificial intelligence existed solely for developing those connections? And... what if they took the form of our dearly departed? Such is the premise of Marjorie Prime, the thought provoking new production currently playing at the Santa Fe Playhouse.

Santa Fe Indian School performing arts director Clara Natonabah has no shortage of creative outlets; the Berkeley music grad is a member of the Two Worlds theatrical ensemble, recently performed in the UNM production of 1n2ian by Jay B. Muskett, and is a gifted singer and songwriter. In addition to her personal performance opportunities, she has chosen to take her gifts and use them to shape the lives of young performers at SFIS. I chatted with Ms. Natonabah over her spring break about the all-encompassing performing arts program she has built for her students.

Shakespeare and opera are an intuitive combination. Adding star crossed lovers to the mix is also a logical choice; a memory erasing pandemic in a post-apocalyptic society, though, is a plot element not commonly found with the others. Such comprises the basis for the plot of the Santa Fe Opera's touring production of UnShakeable, however - a lovely, accessible, and moving offering currently traveling through New Mexico and Texas.

Nominations have been announced for the 2019 New Mexico High School Musical Theatre Enchantment Awards.

As exercises in empathy, there are few activities that beat theatre. The very act of creating a character necessitates developing the deepest of understandings of another individual - their good and bad, light and dark, all together and without judgment. Talia Pura's latest play, Demons of the Mind, requires her to do exactly that, with a character based on a real life individual who, by many accounts, would be past empathy.

A chaotic evening during the summer of 2018 led to the Upstart Crows' upcoming departure from their traditional Shakespearean programming - the youth acting troupe had just embarked upon a much anticipated trip to the Stratford Festival in Canada, and as it often does, Murphy's Law applied to their travels. They only barely got to their seats as the lights went down for the first production they were to see - Oscar Wilde's An Ideal Husband - but despite the craziness that preceded the performance, the young actors were enamored with Wilde's wit, and as they left the performance at the end of the evening, a plan to perform some Wilde of their own was quickly formed.