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 ...

REVIEW: Back to New York City Ballet — with sets and intermissions!

Dance · Reviews
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isabella lafreniere, jovani furlan christopher wheeldon’s DGV: danse à grande vitesse Scenery! Intermissions! One takes these for granted – or used to. But experiencing them as part of New York City Ballet‘s opening night marked another step toward normalcy, after the company’s fall repertory season consisted of intermissionless programs featuring ballets that require no time-consuming ...

‘S.O.S.’ cries Diavolo’s timely ‘The Veterans Project’ 1

Dance · Reviews
photo: george simian When Jacques Heim, founder/choreographer/director of Diavolo Dance Theater and one of the most consistently engaging of Los Angeles creative talents, launched The Veterans Project in 2016, hearing of it, I thought of it as an ambitious and laudable community outreach program. Partnering with the “V.A.,” the Veterans Administration, Heim and his dancers ...

Review: ‘Ailey,’ the choreographer, the man, the figurehead, in PBS American Masters doc

Dance · Film · Reviews
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The opening moments of Ailey—Jamila Wignot’s deeply rewarding documentary about Alvin Ailey’s life, work and company—show the choreographer receiving a huge ovation as a Kennedy Center Honoree. Cicely Tyson speaks movingly about the depth of his achievements; his company performs a fervent finale from Revelations as he takes evident pride in watching them. Ailey, 57, ...

Los Angeles, California, home to two choreographer-goddesses

Dance · Reviews
Macaela Taylor, Danielle Agami It’s exciting. For awhile there, things were looking bad. We seemed to be losing the female voice in the contemporary dance space, as men, holding the reins of most operating companies, naturally meted out sparse commissions and jobs to guy-pals. Female dance leaders, critics and scholars sounded the alarm. Foundations, universities, ...

REVIEW: Julia Child, warbly kitchen warrior near to our hearts, in new doc

Film · Reviews
The Chinese philosopher Lao Tzu is ‘said’ to have said, “When the student is ready, the master will appear.” American homemakers didn’t realize it in the post-World War II decade, but Julia Child was the master they awaited – a down-to-earth cookery guru to guide them away from pre-made mixes, frozen variety trays, and the ...

What is this man thinking? Go see ‘Bad Luck Banging or Loony Porn’ 2

Film · Ideas & Opinion · Reviews
Radu Jude, director of BAD LUCK BANGING OR LOONY PORN Photo credit: Silviu Ghetie. Photo courtesy of Magnolia Pictures He resembles an Every Man, doesn’t he? Someone Bertolt Brecht might portray in a play — in the good old days, the 1930s. He is the contemporary Romanian film director, Radu Jude, who, borrowing from Brecht ...

REVIEW: Modern dance’s vivid origins in St. Denis/Shawn historic restagings 1

Dance · Reviews
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DANCES BY RUTH ST. DENIS & TED SHAWN September 30 – October 3, 2021The Theatre at St. Jean’s 150 East 76th St, New York City Bradley Shelver in Japanese Spear Dance by Ted Shawn (1919)photo Julie Lemberger Of the eloquent, elegantly presented sampling of choreography by Ruth St. Denis and Ted Shawn on view in ...

Film review: ‘In Balanchine’s Classroom,’ a dance documentary

Dance · Film · Reviews
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George Balanchine (1960s). Photo: Ernst Hass. As seen in In Balanchine’s Classroom. A film by Connie Hochman. A Zeitgeist Films release in association with Kino Lorber. Watching In Balanchine’s Classroom, the new dance documentary directed by Connie Hochman, you wait and hope for a movie about a significant, if rarefied, subject to add up to ...

Sane dance fans converge on Segerstrom for pleasing ‘Lines Ballet’ performance

Dance · Reviews
It was the United States of Segerstrom last night when the nation’s Capital of COVID-Containment relocated (for just one night, Dr. Fauci) to Costa Mesa, California. There, the much-vaunted performing arts center at least somewhat righted the pandemic cataclysm by launching its season with a knockout dance performance. An upbeat cluster of up to 1,500 ...