To San Diego, for Fosse’s Dancin’!

Dance · Theater
bob fosse’s dancin’ in rehearsals. Photo by julieta dervantes It will be a reckoning. I have been researching Bob Fosse through his several biographies and of course, critically, through his movies. So, the advent of a major revival of Dancin‘ the original Broadway production created, directed, and choreographed by Fosse, this time directed and staged ...

REVIEW: Three diverse dancers, a crow, and a ritual

Dance
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photo: maria baronova Ashwini Ramaswamy charted her own distinct course onstage at the Baryshnikov Arts Center with an experimental Bharatanatyam (classical dance form of South India) work Let the Crows Come. After a two-year pandemic delay, the bold and refreshing work had its New York premiere and it proved worth the wait.   Ramaswamy, the ...

‘Rivers of Sound’: From the Euphrates to The Soraya

Music
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ed. note: This story by jazz writer, Kirk Silsbee, was commissioned by The Soraya and first appeared on the theater’s blogsite. Composer Amir ElSaffar, the innovative jazz trumpeter and director of the Rivers of Sound Orchestra, is calling his latest new work “a sonic embrace.” ElSaffar penned the expression to describe Emergence, a sound experience ...

‘Honey, I’m home!’: the movie mating-game of Nicole Kidman

Film
Seriously. What’s a woman to do? She tried hard, so very hard. She tried for her kids and she tried for herself — because she loved the guy. But Ricky Ricardo’s serial womanizing accrued to such a degree that it caused a rupture in Lucy & Desi’s fine romance. This story is told in a ...

Lustful doings: Barcelona Flamenco Ballet @ The Alex

Dance · Music
Suspense, intrigue, sex, scandal, love. That sounds like a pretty typical Saturday night in Glendale, California. But the town’s lustful doings will notch up to a new level Saturday April 16, when the historic Alex Theatre presents Luxurîa (“Lust”), a flamenco dance-theater sensation from Spain’s internationally renowned Barcelona Flamenco Ballet. Barcelona Flamenco Ballet artistic directors, ...

Ballet Monte-Carlo’s good-looking ‘Romeo & Juliet, soon at Segerstrom

Dance
Choreographer Jean-Christophe Maillot‘s Roméo et Juliette (1996) created for Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo in 1996 may not be a new production, but boy does it look swankily danced, and designed, by some stunning dancers in these photos. So we’re going. Maillot has been artistic director of the company since 1993. The ballet is staged to ...

‘Long live Sondheim,’ pianist Anthony de Mare soon to pronounce at Royce

Music
It sounds so intriguing doesn’t it? In 2007, Anthony de Mare, a champion of contemporary music and devotee of the musical theater genius of composer/lyricist Stephen Sondheim (1930-2021) embarked on a project that has proven enduring. His big idea was to commission leading composers in jazz, film, theater and classical music, and the pop world, ...

Being alive, with Special Oscar honoree Liv Ullmann

Film
She speaks hesitantly; listening, you wonder if there is a problem, perhaps a cognitive disorder. She meanders, and seems vague and scattered. But if you take the time, just eight minutes, to experience this beautiful set of remarks delivered by actress Liv Ullmann, on the weekend she is receiving a Special Oscar at the Awards ...

Death of a dancer: Kenneth Rinker 1

Dance
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ed. note: artsmeme wishes to especially thank dance writer Susan Reiter for her humanity in contributing this appreciation of the marvelous modern dancer/choreographer Ken Rinker. You may experience a taste of Kenneth in motion in this film’ed excerpt from “The Bix Pieces.” On a September evening in 1972, I had a dance epiphany that has ...

REVIEW: Karole Armitage’s ‘A Pandemic Notebook’ at New York Live Arts

Dance · Reviews
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photo: julieta cervantes There they were, two luminaries of the 1980s NYC dance scene, facing us 40 years later, Karole Armitage and Jock Soto, in simple black and grey outfits. Armitage got everyone’s attention with Drastic Classicism (1981), a fierce, high-gloss, visually and sonically arresting work that shook up ballet conventions with outrageous costuming and ...