Chita & ‘chicas’: WSS’s original ‘America’ dance crew 1
Chita Rivera out front. Behind, L to R: Carmen Gutierrez, Lynn Ross, Liane Plane (unseen behind Chita), Frances Taylor “Chita was so incredible as Anita,” our friend George Chakiris told the audience when I interviewed him in 2015. He played “Riff” in the London production of West Side Story circa 1958/59. Doing that meant keeping ...
Dancer’s ploy for getting on Ed Sullivan Show 1
Dec
30
2021
You want to dance on Ed Sullivan, right? So why not make a dance about … Ed Sullivan? The creators used this ultimate ploy to tickle a narcissist’s fancy and also entertain the public. This tidy dance number, which echoes Bob Fosse’s “Rich Man’s Frug” in many ways, is the work of two choreographers, Hal ...
To Cucamonga, with Joan Didion 2
Dec
26
2021
Ed. note: Writer Joan Didion’s recent death sparked a memory for an unexpected author on these pages. It is Kent Bulza, otherwise known as artsmeme’s tech and SEO specialist. Thank you, Kent! In my freshman literature class I was handed a standard-issue Borzoi College Reader filled with all sorts of names of authors I’d never ...
Beloved Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater stays safe on stage & screen
Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater in Alvin Ailey’s Revelations, 2021 Opening Night Gala. Photo: Christopher Duggan On December 1, the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater returned triumphantly to New York City Center – its home base in the city for 50 years – having foregone its 2020 season (and a great deal of touring) during ...
Hendrix, Sunset Strip, 1969 — part 2 2
Dec
20
2021
ed note: This excerpt from “Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child” by Harvey Kubernik & Kenneth Kubernik, Sterling Books (2021) is published with permission of the authors. Part one is here. Part two is below. Cover image “Jimi Hendrix: Voodoo Child” Wendy Weatherford believes: “What happened there was entirely different from what happened at the Whisky and ...
From our Washington D.C. correspondent, Toni Basil
photo courtesy toni basil, and the kennedy center awards Toni, who choreographed multiple of Midler’s ornate staged pageants, writes on Facebook: So proud to have been with my incredible, long-time friend, Bette Midler, to watch her receive her lifetime achievement award for artistic achievement at The Kennedy Center Honors. Other honorees included Berry Gordy, Lorne ...
‘I can’t dance,’ signals Nicole Kidman as Lucille Ball in ‘Being The Ricardos’ 2
It’s no spoiler to share that in one scene of BEING THE RICARDOS, a cultural cataclysm heading our way December 10 in theatres and on Amazon PRIME, Nicole Kidman, as Lucille Ball, lets drop that her sexy boyfriend Desi Arnaz (Javiar Bardem) is going to teach her how to rumba. The embarrassing display that follows ...
Von Sternberg silent movie, a trove of great early-cinema collaborators, @UCLA Film Archive 1
Dec
9
2021
A double bill of early movies directed by Josef Von Sternburg is set to spool for an in-person audience in January, and it looks particularly luscious. One picture is the director’s final extant silent movie; the second, his first using sound. Set almost entirely in a seedy portside tavern where the doomed and desperate carouse, ...
Love is Love: Pride Night at ABT ‘Nutcracker’ December 15
Dec
8
2021
In the video above, Hee Seo, rehearses for opening night of American Ballet Theatre‘s “The Nutcracker”Friday night at Segerstrom Center for the Arts. The video displays what an exquisite ballerina she is. There is no doubt that every night at the ballet is a pride night for gay men and women. That’s indicated by the ...
A flash of modernism: E.O. Hoppé meets The Firebird 2
Tamara Karsavina, Adolph Bolm in “The Firebird” (1911) A moment of silence, please, for this splendid photograph, a capture of choreographer Michel Fokine’s “The Firebird,” a ballet created to Igor Stravinsky’s stirring score for Diaghilev’s Ballets Russes. Dancing in their originating roles are Tamara Karsavina and Adolph Bolm. Yes, it’s a sensational, dance historic moment. ...