Joey Luft to fete Mother in MGM ‘Meet Me in St. Louis’
Dec
10
2024
Luft & Mom (1954) Judy Garland’s son, Joey Luft 2010 in Hollywood, California. (Photo by Jonathan Leibson/FilmMagic) Our friends at Hollywood Heritage have invited us to attend an event at the Lasky-DeMille historic film-making “barn” on Highland Avenue, across from the Hollywood Bowl. They entreat us to join them at the Fair – the 1903 ...
To historic Sierra Madre Playhouse, for ‘Bob Baker’s Nutcracker’
We’re heading into the beauty time in Southern California, the holiday season when the air grows nippier, the sun seems more yellow and warming than ever, and white caps of snow decorate the San Gabriel Mountains as you venture east toward the desert. And what better stopover than the charming Sierra Madre Playhouse, where this ...
REVIEW: Nickel Boys’ immersion-cinema rings true in sadness
Dec
9
2024
They look innocent, right? And why shouldn’t they? Two young guys growing up in the late ’50s to early ’60s contemporaneous to the launch of the U.S. space program — where the sky was literally the limit — shouldn’t look any other way. But things on the ground were very different for some. Innocence was ...
Special big-screen viewing of ‘BRUTALIST’ in New York/Los Angeles
Dec
6
2024
brutalist/futurist architecture Geisel LIbrary, UC San Diegoarchitect: William Pereira photo by Erik Jepsen It’s really nice that film distributor A24 is going to extra effort to make sure THE BRUTALIST, shot by director Brady Corbet in 70 mm film format, can be seen not just by elites but by a wide-spreading audience projected on the ...
Sugar Plums for the ages, in ABT’s ‘The Nutcracker’ at Segerstrom Center
Nov
26
2024
Her name is Antonietta Dell’Era (1861-1945), and, as legend goes, in 1892 she was the first to dance to Tchaikovsky’s magical foray on the celesta as the Sugar Plum Fairy. That music the brilliant composer concocted to give aural evocation of “drops of water shooting from a fountain.” Ms. Dell’Era’s first performance received good reviews, ...
Westside Ballet of Santa Monica stages vibrant ‘Nutcracker’ starring Tiler Peck, Roman Mejia 1
Nov
23
2024
An invitation to attend a holiday production of “The Nutcracker” — that of Westside Ballet of Santa Monica, with live music from the Santa Monica College Symphony Orchestra, and starring New York City Ballet principal dancers Tiler Peck & Roman Mejia — is an offer a ballet fan finds hard to refuse. Peck is at ...
Don’t freak out! Unless you’re at ZAPPADAN!
Nov
20
2024
Our Los Angeles rock-and-roll-and revolution tour-guide, Dominic Priore, author of “Riot on Sunset Strip: Rock ‘n’ Roll’s Last Stand in Hollywood.”, shares with us news of his impending illustrated lecture, “Freak Out Hot Spots!,” a symposium filled with photos and super-rare footage of all the locations on Frank Zappa’s 1966 map of Sunset Strip hangouts. ...
‘Fifth Beatle’ Billy Preston in impressive, heartfelt documentary 2
There are many documentaries and docudramas about performing artists lately. So much so that people are joking that everyone is getting one. Soon to open will be Maria, starring Angelina Jolie playing the Italian coloratura/diva. But a gripping new documentary, That’s the Way God Planned It: Billy Preston, about the great, nearly gone-missing, Los Angeles-born ...
Death of a dancer: Vladimir Shklyarov
Nov
18
2024
Thanks to the Internet, balletomania is a global phenomenon. YouTube viewing of classical dance from such far-flung spots as St. Petersburg is a boon to fans across the universe — equally, it aids dance critics and scholars. So when word spread that Vladimir Shklyarov, 39, had tumbled from a balcony five floors to his death ...
Joy of Jewishness in Hanukah double bill
Nov
15
2024
What can we do about world events this holiday season? What about this: let it go for a night and experience joy through music. A two-for-one sale of klezmer rock, otherwise known as “Ashkenazi Jewish Roots Music” is on tap at the Carpenter Center in Long Beach. For nearly 40 years, the Grammy Award-winning “Jewish ...