Up Against It - 1989 - Off-Broadway Articles Page 9

Live Arts Bard (LAB), the residency and commissioning program of the Fisher Center at Bard, announces Where No Wall Remains, the third edition of the acclaimed LAB Biennial, temporarily reconfiguring the Fisher Center as a site for innovative and interactive performances and installations (November 21-24). Co-curated by Lebanese live artist Tania El Khoury, a 2019 Soros Art Fellow, and Gideon Lester, the Fisher Center's Artistic Director for Theater and Dance, this four-day festival considers the subject of borders: political borders, physical borders, historical and contemporary borders, borders seen and unseen, the borders of the body, borders between art forms, between performers and spectators, the borders that divide or define us, borders to be crossed, tested, resisted, destroyed, rebuilt, or transcended. Where No Wall Remains follows The House is Open (2014), which explored the relationship between visual and performing arts, and We're Watching (2017), which examined contemporary states of surveillance. This third edition of the festival features nine new performances and installations by contemporary artists from the Middle East and Central America, commissioned by Live Arts Bard. Please see below for dates and times for each work. 

Little Steven has opened the doors on his personal archive of recordings to present an in-depth look at his solo career with a brand new boxed set. RockNRoll Rebel – The Early Work (Wicked Cool/UMe) collects the Rock & Roll Hall of Famer's solo work from 1973-1999 – including Artists United Against Apartheid's landmark 1985 LP, Sun City – together with 51 bonus tracks spanning previously unreleased demos, B-sides, rehearsals, outtakes, classic concert performances, and a number of never-before-heard Steven Van Zandt compositions. Little Steven's RockNRoll Rebel – The Early Work will be available exclusively via the online store uDiscover Music beginning Friday, December 6; pre–orders are available now.

Esprit's opening concert, I Hit My Head and Everything Changed, an impactful evening of music, takes place on Sunday October 6, 2019 in Koerner Hall. The concert program features works by renowned composers Thomas Adès and Alexina Louie, as well as a World Premiere of a commissioned work by Brian Harman, and a compelling concerto for the left hand by Hans Abrahamsen. Artist Moira Ness, pianist Avan Yu, and the Elmer Iseler Singers will all be featured as guest artists. 

Although most recognizable for his starring turns in the hit TV shows Knight Rider and Baywatch along with numerous feature film appearances (Guardians Of The Galaxy Vol. 2, Kung Fury, Click, The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie, Dodgeball, and Marvel's original Nick Fury: Agent Of Shield, among others) and roles on Broadway and the West End in productions of Jekyll & Hyde, Chicago and The Producers, megastar David Hasselhoff is ready to tackle a different role - the role of passionately earnest pop star singing for a new global consciousness in these difficult and troubled times. It's a role not unfamiliar to Hasselhoff whose historic performance of the chart-topping single “Looking For Freedom” on the rubble of the newly fallen Berlin Wall in 1989 became a rallying cry not just to a reunited Germany but for all of the burgeoning democracies that were swept up in the winds of change.

'I do not feel compelled by reason to accept this theory of evolution, nor the periodic table of elements, nor the theory of global warming, nor the supposed crimes against the Jews attributed to one Rudolf Hitler.'  Bad Penny and Sincerity Forever are Mac Wellman plays originally staged in 1989 and 1990.  Absolutely nothing is dated or stale in his evisceration and condemnation of America and its 'littleness and stupidity and bitterness and rage and greed.'

The Marsh San Francisco announces additional performances of Not a Genuine Black Man, the longest running solo show in San Francisco theater history.

Taking the term, 'dysfunctional family', to a completely new level.

La MaMa announces its 58th season, featuring more than twenty world and US premieres, and dozens of artists, playwrights, choreographers, directors, award-winning theater companies and composers, including Philip Glass, Andrei Serban, Estelle Parsons, Germaine Acogny, Evan Yionoulis, Theodora Skipitares, Anne Bogart, Charlotte Brathwaite and many more.

September and October Events have been announced at Irvine Barclay Theatre. See full details below. 

In short, THE LITTLE MERMAID taps into the magic of Disney and brings it to Central Texas. It offers family-friendly summer fun that is accessible to all.

Currently docked at the Carpenter Center for the Performing Arts in Long Beach through July 28 is Musical Theater West's wonderfully vibrant new regional production of THE LITTLE MERMAID, Disney's Broadway stage adaptation of their hit 1989 animated classic, which itself was adapted from the Hans Christian Andersen fairy tale. The resulting show achieves a cheerful, pleasant, and often charming hybrid that honors the original Disney-esque qualities of the film, but also shows what one may call a 'director's cut'---wherein the new 'extras' expand the musical even further in size, elements, and thematic mood. MTW's production is a visual treat.

Jennifer Lopez, Kelly Clarkson, Thomas Rhett, Julianne Hough and Hoda Kotb join the growing list of supporters that have participated in United Cancer Front's (UCF) Dance or Donate Challenge, an awareness and urgently needed fundraising campaign. It was created to help UCF continue their mission of finding a cure for cancer using immunotherapy and targeted treatments.

The Marsh San Francisco announces an extension of Not a Genuine Black Man, the longest running solo show in San Francisco theater history. This funny, honest, and harrowing piece by award-winning actor, playwright, and talk show host Brian Copeland recounts the struggles Copeland faced growing up in what was declared one of the most racist suburbs in America

La Monnaie opens the 2019-20 season not by one, but by two world premieres. In September 2019, at the same time as Pascal Dusapin's Macbeth Underworld at La Monnaie, Le Silence des ombres premieres at KVS. It is an opera adaptation of Maurice Maeterlinck's Trois Petits Drames pour Marionnettes, commissioned to the young French composer Benjamin Attahir and produced in close collaboration with the author and director Olivier Lexa, a team of novice creators of the National School of Visual Arts of La Cambre and a cast of young singers supported by ENOA, the European Network of Opera Academies.

The French Institute Alliance Fran aise (FIAF), New York's premier French cultural and language center, today announced the 2019 Crossing the Line Festival, featuring 11 performances and a gallery exhibition from a geographically, generationally, and artistically diverse group of artists whose work transcends genres and boundaries. All performances are world, US, or New York premieres; they are united by their convention-breaking fearlessness as they confront topics from social injustice to personal demons. Many of the performances pay homage to legendary artists of our time and previous eras, while the theme of migration and its transformational effects on identity informs several others. The festival runs from September 12 to October 12. Ticket are available at crossingtheline.org.

Driving Miss Daisy, Alfred Uhry's Pulitzer-winning 1987 play made famous by a 1989 film adaptation starring Morgan Freeman, is brought back to the stage in a new production by York Theatre Royal.

Celebrating its 37th anniversary, Outfest - the Los Angeles-based nonprofit organization promoting equality by creating, sharing, and protecting LGBTQ stories on the screen - today announced the complete programming lineup for the 2019 Outfest Los Angeles LGBTQ Film Festival, presented by HBO. The nation's leading LGBTQ festival will be held July 18-28, 2019.

"It's like a first date, " says Christopher Schario, Executive/artistic Director of Lewiston's Public Theatre. "It's a total cross population between our institutions and our audiences," he adds. Maine State Music Director Curt Dale Clark concurs: "This co-production is helping the arts in both our communities. It's upping the ante and providing more opportunities for people to enjoy live theatre," The two artistic heads , together with the leads of the production Tanner Callicutt and Katie Brnjac are chatting with Broadway World about the first-ever collaboration between the two theatres, a new staging of the musical GREASE, performed at The Public Theatre June 18-30, 2019.

It's a new season full of new experiences at Scottsdale Center for the Performing Arts. The 2019 20 seaon is jam-packed with legends of world music, acclaimed dance companies, renowned classical musicians, returning favorites and more.

IFC Center today announced an impressive and wide-ranging lineup for the third annual Split Screens Festival (www.splitscreensfestival.com) taking place Wednesday, May 29 through Monday, June 3, 2019, at the IFC Center in New York City. The festival consists of special events offering a variety of looks at history, identity and the mystery of existence itself, including panels on series that explore dystopian realities and alternate timelines, and screenings that transport us into any number of time periods and places, be it a late-1800s South Dakota town or the height of 1980s ballroom culture in New York City.

The Grammy Museum will be hosting NOTES ON LIVING: ALL-STAR JAZZ WITH TALES BY BRIAN DOYLE May 14, 2019 as a joint benefit for WordTheatre in the Schools (WITS) and the Grammy Museum. WordTheatre's artistic director Cedering Fox will be producing and directing this evening of selected stories by award-winning author Brian Doyle, read by a star-studded cast, and accompanied by an all-star jazz band led by Starr Parodi. Cedering opened up some of her early evening time to speak to me.

The Marsh San Francisco announces additional performances of Not a Genuine Black Man, the longest running solo show in San Francisco theater history by award-winning actor, playwright, and talk show host Brian Copeland. This funny, honest, and harrowing piece recounts the struggles Copeland faced growing up in what was declared one of the most racist suburbs in America.

Today, Luther Burbank Center for the Arts (LBC) announced the first 11 new shows to be added to its 2019 2020 season, continuing its tradition of showcasing a diverse lineup of chart-topping musicians, compelling dance companies, and groundbreaking storytellers. Tickets for all shows go on-sale to LBC members today, Friday, April 5 at 12 p.m., and to the general public on Friday, April 26 at 12 p.m. Tickets are available online at lutherburbankcenter.org, by calling 707-546-3600, or at the Luther Burbank Center for the Arts ticket office (50 Mark West Springs Road in Santa Rosa), open Tuesdays through Sundays from noon to 6 p.m.

As I'm going through all my Gypsy CDs (yes, to ensure I have them all either on my hard drive or accessible in the cloud, before throwing them out), I'm finding myself weirdly most drawn to Tyne Daly's recording, from her Tony-winning performance in the 1989 revival. The thing is I know Tyne Daly, I mean I know her work. She's been a familiar and distinctive presence on stage and screen for as long as I can remember and I even have a few musical theater recordings featuring her singing, but hers is not a singing voice I live with on a LITERALLY daily basis like, say, Ethel Merman's, Angela Lansbury's, Bette Midler's, Bernadette Peters's or Patti LuPone's. So to me, Tyne Daly's Rose is a unique sound that I can only identify with Tyne Daly's Rose and, therefore, a character. For today, that's the Gypsy I most feel like listening to.

Was the pairing of Iain Bell and Mark Campbell--respectively, composer and librettist of New York City Opera's (NYCO) world premiere STONEWALL--'love at first sight”? I asked them. We were at the workshop in New York earlier this month that allowed them and director Leonard Foglia to cross the t's and dot the i's (and hear their new work performed).