To be trapped in Soho in a hellish, multi-room environment that has been, or is, inhabited by mutants or delinquents—this might occur once in a blue moon, but twice in one week? Yup. (And I’m not talkin’ about Topshop.) Once at Here Arts Center, where Los Grumildos was on view last week, and again at Deitch Projects’ Wooster Street space, where Jonah Freeman/Justin Lowe’s Black Acid Co-op is up through August 15.
“Grotesque. Charming. Sordid. Tiny.,” is how the installation by Peruvian artist Ety Fefer is concisely described on the postcard for Los Grumildos, part of Here’s puppetry program. Foot-tall puppets—hybrids of humans and crustaceans, with lobster claws, scorpion tails, and extra limbs—in individual terrariums “play” various instruments, their herky-jerky movements driven by small motors. read more
There are no doubt thousands of New Yorkers frustrated at being stuck in the city this summer; or weary after making it out of the city only to endure packed LIRR trains, beastly traffic, bad weather—or simply bad company. If only they had gone to the theater this past weekend instead of the beach or the Berkshires.
Within ten blocks of a stretch of Broadway, Manhattan played host to two trilogies about bucolic getaways which proved that regardless of how stressful the summer 2009 has been for Americans, it was no different in 1970’s England or Italy of the 1670’s.
On Friday night I attended the first of these trologies, Lincoln Center Festival’s presentation of Trilogia della Villeggiatura, written by Carlo Goldoni and directed by Toni Servillo. read more
The last time New Yorkers had a chance to see Boris Godunov was five years ago when the Met staged Modest Mussorgsky’s 1874 operatic version. In that well-known opera, the title character of Boris (a real historical figure: brother-in-law to the Tsar Fyodor, who succeeded him as ruler of Russia in 1598) is the central role—with an assist from the chorus, who stand in for the Russian people.
In that 2004 Met production, the venerable bass-baritone James Morris played Boris in a commanding performance. When the Tsar died at the end of the opera, Morris tumbled down the steps from the throne in a thrilling coup de theatre.
This summer, Declan Donnellan, the English director (and co-artistic director of the troupe Cheek By Jowl, which often visits BAM) brings the non-operatic version of Boris Godunov (much less performed outside of Russia) to the Park Avenue Armory. The production, from the Chekhov International Theatre Festival in Moscow, is part of the 2009 Lincoln Center Festival. read more
Ariane Mnouchkine/Théâtre de Soleil’s Les Éphémères, which closed this last Sunday, July 19th, is one of those productions that elicits from New Yorkers periodic European theater awe. Much of it is from the mise-en-scène, the overall set-up of the working space on and offstage, contained inside the hulking Park Avenue Armory, co-presenters with Lincoln Center Festival. And then there is its seven-hour total length, split into two shows.
Every detail conspired: from the ushers and greeters, who seem so more polite than the usual. The cast’s dressing area—with communal make-up tables and racks of costumes lit by golden incandescent light, revealed by parted, striped tent curtains. The atmospheric music that summons up things that have nothing to do with real life. The company’s shipping crates, warmed by votive candles, even enchant. read more
In the shadow of American Ballet Theatre’s season-closing performances of Romeo and Juliet, a few weeks after New York City Ballet ended its spring season, it’s time to take a deep breath. The trope that while NYCB has the rep, ABT has the dancers still holds true to some extent, although it is eroding on both sides. ABT prides itself on emphasizing the word “theatre” in its name, evident in the reprisal of story ballets such as Swan Lake and Le Corsaire. But naming Alexei Ratmansky as Artist in Residence was kind of like winning the lottery for ABT, which has repeatedly attempted to add contemporary choreography to its canon, with mixed results. This season, Artistic Director Kevin McKenzie included Paul Taylor’s Airs in this year’s rep, an ideal blend of modern and classical for this company.
Ratmansky created Russian Seasons and Concerto DSCH for NYCB, which hoped he would stay on as resident choreographer. Both were successes and fit the company and its Balanchine pedigree well. read more
In terms of sheer depth of talent, the Twelfth Night that opened at the Delacorte Theater last week is probably the closest thing to the Public Theater’s now-legendary production of The Seagull back in the summer of 2001. But despite countless Tony-winners, TV stars and one blushing recent Oscar-nominee, at the final preview the buzz before curtain was mostly about the rainy weather—and the biggest reaction during the show was when a raccoon unexpectedly ran onto the stage. Such are the unexpected thrills of live theater in Central Park.
It was daring of the Public to mount Shakespeare’s finest comedy given the strong memories New York audiences have of two imported productions from London earlier this decade (Sam Mendes’ Donmar staging which featured the mesmerizing Malvolio of Simon Russell Beale and Declan Donnellen’s raucous all-male, Russian-language version) not to mention that it’s only been only seven summers since their last Twelfth Night—a meandering production (directed by Brian Kulick) notable less for its star turns (most of all, a dull Julia Stiles) and mainly for its songs set to music by a pre-Spring Awakening Duncan Sheik.
Kulick envisioned the fictional island of Illyria as a futuristic waterslide park; this time round, Sullivan paints a pastoral, 18th century Scotland. read more
The great German choreographer Pina Bausch passed away on June 29 within a brutally short week of a cancer diagnosis, at 68 years of age. It was a terrible shock to the world of dance and performance—the end of an era and the sudden, cold beginning of another without her.
Her pieces, performed by Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, a company of characters more intriguing than Dickens’, were life magnified—passionate, dirty, beautiful, violent, and crazy. A lot of their actions seemed more like rituals of torture than dance. But it was definitely theater, set to expansive musical collages, in various Peter Pabst arrangements of dirt and water, among a fallen wall of concrete blocks which we witnessed crashing down, a field of carnations, a human-scaled terrarium. read more
A common (annoying) complaint among New York cultural critics is that there is too much going on in the city. This week, for instance, there are several dance shows that I will not see, with serious regrets. I know – everyone should have such problems. But one show that I will not miss is Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company’s Chapel/Chapter at Harlem Stage Gatehouse, presented by Harlem Stage. Why? Because I missed it the last time around, in 2006, sucked into the cycle of “not enough hours in a day,” and I have rued that decision ever since I watched some video snippets and listened to a litany of raves. read more
Machines machines machines machines machines machines machines is garbage. Literally. The set appears to be largely composed of bits of string and rope, junk from the attic, parts of old tools recombined into bionically repurposed ones, thrift shop furniture, and cardboard sets made futuristic with discarded calculator keypads. In this dismal economy, the show—a production of rainpan 43 and Here Arts Center, where it runs through June 27—reflects parsimonious resourcefulness to the extreme. The pseudonymous heart of the show are Rube Goldbergian inventions that are used (or attempted to be used) to perform mostly banal tasks. Hilarity definitely ensues. read more
As the last days of school approach and the sounds of “school’s out!” ring out near the exits of New York City’s schools, music-lovers are giving a hurrah of their own. Yes, it’s summer—or nearly so—and the sounds of music increasingly can be heard outdoors in parks and bandshells and plazas throughout the city. And for the cheapskate that exists in all of us (yes, all of us: how do you think the upper classes got to be “upper” in the first place?), it’s always a welcome season for finding ways to sample as much music as possible, for as little money as possible.
This year is bittersweet, however, with arts organizations throwing one-time or annual free events for financially strapped concertgoers that crowd into Central Park and Prospect Park and Lincoln Center Plaza to hear the sounds made by performers from the city’s top music organizations—even as some of those ensembles struggle to come up with funds to keep doing what they do. read more
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