In BY THE WAY, MEET VERA STARK, now playing at Penumbra Theatre as part of their 'Womansong' season, the title character is a black actress in 1930s Hollywood who gets her big break playing a loyal slave in an antebellum Southern melodrama. She imbues the stereotypical role with as much humanity and depth as possible, and so begins a long and successful career, until she mysteriously disappears from the spotlight. Vera is a controversial figure because on the one hand her characters perpetuate the stereotypes seen in movies, but on the other hand she makes her characters as real as possible and has built a successful career for herself and opened doors for black actors in Hollywood. The play examines these issues in a funny, entertaining, innovative way, jumping across time and using video of Vera's first movie.
Prepare to be thoroughly enchanted by Oregon Shakespeare Festival's transfer of INTO THE WOODS newly arrived at the Wallis Center in Beverly Hills. It is, without a doubt, the most inventive and inspiring production of this Sondheim musical I have ever seen. Amanda Denhert's direction delights at every turn such that watching this INTO THE WOODS left my heart bursting with unadulterated joy, devastated by its unflinching honesty, and breathless with anticipation of each moment to come.
This summer, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival marks its 31st season in the beautiful seaside setting of Long Island's East End. The Island's longest-running classical music festival this year features 12 concerts from today, July 30 to August 24, featuring the signature mix of renowned and up-and-coming artists and classic and new music that has made it one of the most noteworthy summer music festivals in the country.
This summer, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival marks its 31st season in the beautiful seaside setting of Long Island's East End. The Island's longest-running classical music festival this year features 12 concerts from today, July 30 to August 24, featuring the signature mix of renowned and up-and-coming artists and classic and new music that has made it one of the most noteworthy summer music festivals in the country.
This summer, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival marks its 31st season in the beautiful seaside setting of Long Island's East End. The Island's longest-running classical music festival this year features 12 concerts from July 30 to August 24, featuring the signature mix of renowned and up-and-coming artists and classic and new music that has made it one of the most noteworthy summer music festivals in the country.
I was just a little more than a year into my new side career as a cabaret show reviewer when I first saw a Karen Oberlin show. It was Valentine's Day night 2012 and Oberlin—with guitarist Sean Harkness and guest violinist Aaron Weinstein—would be performing her romance-laced set, Stringing Along With Love, at the Metropolitan Room. At the time, all I knew about Oberlin was that she was considered among New York's best female cabaret singers, and I hadn't researched her performing history pre-show. About a third of the way into her set I leaned over to my wife (it was Valentine's Day after all) and whispered, “You know, she has a real Doris Day quality in her voice and in the way she delivers some lyrics.” This immediately ratcheted up my appreciation for Oberlin since there are four passions I inherited from my Dad—baseball, reading the morning papers, sports writing and Doris Day (well, also Sophia Loren, but that's for another column). Since Dad had grown up during the prime of the Big Band Era of the 1940s, I heard the sultry sounds of a young Doris Day singing songs like “Sentimental Journey” on the family stereo more than a few times. Once I saw Day's strikingly adorable blondness on a record cover and her rocking body in one of her films, I knew what Dad was talking about. As popular, famous, and near iconic as Doris Day became, in my book, as a singer and screen beauty she's always been vastly underrated. Little did I know that Karen Oberlin had been doing a Doris Day tribute show so since 2001 at places like Firebird, Iridium, and the late Danny's Skylight Room, and produced a CD, Secret Love: The Music of Doris Day, in 2002. Karen Oberlin had instantly become my secret love.
This summer, the Bridgehampton Chamber Music Festival marks its 31st season in the beautiful seaside setting of Long Island's East End. The Island's longest-running classical music festival this year features 12 concerts from July 30 to August 24, featuring the signature mix of renowned and up-and-coming artists and classic and new music that has made it one of the most noteworthy summer music festivals in the country.
The 'invaluable' Metropolitan Playhouse--2011 Obie Award winner--revives The Hero, by Gilbert Emery. Directed by Artistic Director Alex Roe at Metropolitan Playhouse: 220 E 4th Street. Previews begin tonight, March 1, with an opening slated for March 8. The show runs through March 30, 2014.
The 'invaluable' Metropolitan Playhouse--2011 Obie Award winner--revives The Hero, by Gilbert Emery. Directed by Artistic Director Alex Roe at Metropolitan Playhouse: 220 E 4th Street. Previews begin March 1, with an opening slated for March 8. The show runs through March 30, 2014.
City Winery Napa at the Historic Napa Valley Opera House hased announce the much-anticipated artist lineup from the soft launch in April through June 2014. Over the next few weeks ten new concert dates a week will be released until the complete schedule of approximately twenty shows per month is announced. All shows begin at 8pm unless otherwise noted. Tickets available at citywinery.com.
I got to sit down for coffee with current Rockettes dancer, Abigail Gatlin, 26, from small-town Cleveland, Tennessee, and learn what life is really like as a Rockette, what goes on behind the scenes, and what it's like transitioning from a small town to New York City and becoming a member of one of the most amazing dance ensembles in the world!
Howard Hawks, the quintessential Hollywood director known for his mastery of many genres, will be the subject of a complete retrospective at Museum of the Moving Image from today, September 7 through November 10, 2013. The Museum will present 39 features. All of the films will be shown in 35mm-many in stunning restorations-except for Red Line 7000, which will be shown in 16mm.
THE STORY OF FILM: AN ODYSSEY is an unprecedented cinematic event, an epic journey through the history of world cinema that is a treat for movie lovers around the globe.
Minnesota Opera is pleased to announce casting updates for the 2013–2014 season, which boasts three company premieres and five productions new to Minnesota audiences. Based on anticipated demand, the boundary-busting production of The Magic Flutewill receive nine performances. Other season highlights include James Valenti starring in the premiere of a revised The Dream of Valentino by Dominick Argento as part of Minnesota Opera's New Works Initiative; Kelly Kaduce in an opulent production of Puccini's soulful Manon Lescaut; Jacquelyn Wagner, Elizabeth Futral, Brian Jagde and Craig Irvin in a stylish production of Strauss' romantic comedy, Arabella; and Verdi's chilling take on the Shakespearean thriller, Macbeth, starring Brenda Harris and Greer Grimsley. Minnesota Opera is also pleased to announce the roster for the 2013–2014 Resident Artist Program, as well as unveil a new website.
Howard Hawks, the quintessential Hollywood director known for his mastery of many genres, will be the subject of a complete retrospective at Museum of the Moving Image from September 7 through November 10, 2013. The Museum will present 39 features. All of the films will be shown in 35mm-many in stunning restorations-except for Red Line 7000, which will be shown in 16mm.
THE STORY OF FILM: AN ODYSSEY is an unprecedented cinematic event, an epic journey through the history of world cinema that is a treat for movie lovers around the globe.
When Dana Lorge's run as a Variety Show hosted ended at the Iguana Restaurant last July-and after winning two 2012 MAC Awards for 'Best Variety Show' and 'Best Variety Show Host'-who knew she'd be reduced to being a cabaret audience member searching for a new showcase? But a Metropolitan Room Mentch has come to the rescue in the form of Bernie Furshpan (the Met Room's General Partner and Manager), who has provided Dana with a monthly forum for her unique brand of cabaret shtick beginning Friday, April 5 at 7-8:15 pm. While the new show won't be the two-hour plus extravaganza of yore featuring more than a dozen performers, Dana's new 'Variety Show' promises to feature a solid group of experienced and well-known cabaret and musical theater pros. For the April 5 opener, the Lorge Lineup features Richard Skipper, her former Award-winning Co-host from the Iguana days; film and stage actor Jim Brochu (of Zero Mostel One-Man Show fame), singers LaTanya Hall (from the CBS show 'Blue Bloods) and Peggy Herman Klat, Rick Crom (Creator of Newsical the Musical), and Mr. Furshpan, who will show off his stand-up comedy chops. But the real star of the show will always be the hilarious, unpredictable, darling Dana, who will both crack you up with her infectious humor and surprise you with her engaging singing performances.
As America prepares to commemorate the 80 th birthday of Willie Nelson on April 29 th, the country music icon will be celebrated as Artist of the Month for April, 2013 by Legacy Recordings, a division of SONY MUSIC ENTERTAINMENT.
Apparently, it is Elvis Week in Nashville (at least according to the fine folks at Loveless Cafe), so before we head out to the theater for a full weekend of show openings and the like, a trip to West Nashville for a slice of the Loveless' Elvis pie is in order (for the uninitiated, that's peanut butter, banana, bacon and homemade whipped cream-the four basic food groups, according to The King.), so before we slip into a diabetic coma, here's installment #7 of Music City Confidential, all the news that's fit to print from onstage, offstage, backstage and beyond…
Outrageously funny, wonderfully engaging and, at times, even heartfelt and sentimental, Avenue Q serves up a full buffet for the discerning theater-goer lucky enough to find himself in the audience of Street Theatre Company's production of the multiple Tony Award-winning musical, directed with flash and sass by Martha Wilkinson and featuring a cast of amazingly adept actors-turned-puppeteers who bring the show to life.
NBC will celebrate the lighting of the world's most famous Christmas tree with a live broadcast from Rockefeller Center in New York City on Wednesday, November 30th from 8 to 9 p.m. ET. The star-studded holiday special will feature performances by Tony Bennett, Justin Bieber, Michael Bublé, Cee Lo Green, Faith Hill, Carole King, Katharine McPhee, Javier Colon and The Radio City Rockettes with a mix of current hits and holiday classics.
NBC will celebrate the lighting of the world's most famous Christmas tree with a live broadcast from Rockefeller Center in New York City on Wednesday, November 30th from 8 to 9 p.m.
Staging one of the theatre's most unique and unclassifiable pieces, Brecht & Weill's THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS for the New York City Ballet, starting May 11 and running through May 16, is just the latest act in a career made up of anomalies, seemingly built upon always attempting to do the impossible - from her Broadway debut, trying to bring balletic bravado to Trevor Nunn's terminally troubled 1988 musical CHESS (a project begun under the guidance of Michael Bennett before his death), up through the trying-but-Tony-winning TITANIC in 1997 and, this century, SWING! starring Ann Hampton Callaway and Laura Benanti and a succession of successful regional ballets and theatre pieces - the gifted and dynamic director/choreographer Lynne Taylor-Corbett continues to challenge herself, her peers and audiences with each of her audacious new endeavors. THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS, starring two-time Tony-winning Broadway legend Patti LuPone as Anna I, is a particularly problematic play - or is it a musical? Or, is it a ballet? A song-spiel? - and in this revealing and engaging discussion, Ms. Taylor-Corbett and I attempt to deduce the themes, analyze the structure and look back at the authors' lives to gain insight into the perplexing America painted by Brecht and Weill in the forty-minute-long theatrical experiment. Also, in this complete conversation, Lynne and I take a look back at her long and varied career and she generously shares her thoughts on where the place of dance is in the twenty-first century, the exhilaration of working with a theatre artist like Patti LuPone, her own inspirations and formative experiences in the theatre, the legacy of Michael Powell and THE RED SHOES, the theatre versus the dance world, her son Shaun's career, and much, much more! Further information on THE SEVEN DEADLY SINS - including tickets - is available here.
For our UPSTAGE playgoer's guide, Roundabout's Educational Dramaturg, Ted Sod, sat down with director Kathleen Marshallto discuss her exciting upcoming musical, Anything Goes - beginning performance on March 10 at the Stephen Sondheim Theatre!
Victoria Theatre Association announces a change in cast for its presentation of The Soundtrack of Your Life. Due to scheduling conflicts, Oscar® nominee Lamont Dozier will be replaced by Grammy® award winner Paul Williams. The Soundtrack of Your Life plays April 23, 2011 at the Benjamin & Marian Schuster Performing Arts Center.
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