The Van Wezel Welcomes Patti LuPone, Mandy Patinkin and Alvin Ailey Dance

What better way to spend Valentine's Day than An Evening with Patti LuPone & Mandy Patinkin, appearing together again after their Tony Award^® winning performances in Evita. These Broadway legends will bring their critically acclaimed theatre concert to the Van Wezel Performing Arts Hall today at 8 PM.

Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin are two of Broadway's most venerated performers, having both won a Tony Award^® for their performances in Andrew Lloyd Weber's groundbreaking Evita in 1980. Since then they have both starred in film, television, the concert stage and back to Broadway.  An Evening with Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin brings them together again – at last.   Judith Newmark of the Saint Louis Post-Dispatch described the show:  "An Evening with Patti LuPone and Mandy Patinkin exploits the subtle pleasures of performers who share a style (accomplished), a point of view (cosmopolitan) and level of talent (enormous)."  And Charles McNulty of the Los Angeles Times said: "these two music and theatre legends deliver a sparsely elegant master class in the art of conjuring emotional truth in dramatic song." The show includes choreography by fellow Broadway veteran and friend, Ann Reinking, who won a Best Choreography Tony Award^® for the revival of Chicago, and is accompanied on piano by Music Director Paul Ford.             

Alvin Ailey's American Dance Theater's 2012 North American Tour, led by Robert Battle in his inaugural season as Artistic Director, reaches back into Ailey tradition while stretching out in new directions. Featuring Ailey's extraordinary dancers in a diverse array of acclaimed premieres, new productions and repertory favorites, the Van Wezel Performance is scheduled to include Artistic Director Robert Battle's Bravura Solo Takademe, Ulysses Dove's Episodes and Alvin Ailey's Classic Revelations. "This is the beginning of a new adventure-for the company, for me and for our audiences," stated Robert Battle, who became Artistic Director on July 1, 2011. "It gives me great pride to build upon the inspiring legacy of Alvin Ailey and Judith Jamison. I'm excited for people across the country to witness the world's most amazing dancers as we take the next step in Ailey's inspiring journey." Join Ailey's unparalleled dancers for an electrifying performance that will reveal once again why Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater has brought audiences around the globe to their feet night after night with an incomparable sense of freedom, spirit and joy.

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