Upcoming theater and arts in Philadelphia
New City Stage Company concludes its season-long look at at the American political summit with THE WEST WING FESTIVAL, a series of (FREE!) staged readings at the Adrienne Theater Skybox.
View More Presidential Theater: New City Stage Company concludes its season with THE WEST WING FESTIVAL
The Idiopathic Ridiculopathy Consortium gives local audiences the chance to see Christopher Durang at his comic best in a series of seldom-performed shorts, THE DURANG SHABANG! in two performances (6pm and 8pm) at L’Etage Cabaret, on Sunday, May 18, 2014.
View More THE DURANG SHABANG! IRC stages night of seldom-seen Durang shorts
Ed Swidey’s mEEps return for a one-night only show at White Pines place in Elkins Park, May 9, 2014.
View More The Return of the mEEps (White Pines)
Julius Ferraro talks about his new show, MICROMANIA, and how writing about theater has changed the way he looks at it.
View More Micromaniac: Interview with Julius Ferraro about his new work, Philadelphia theater, and how well-paid critics are
On Monday, May 12, 2014 (the day after Mother’s Day), upstart local Shakespeare company Revolution Shakespeare will present a staged reading of the Bard’s classic KING LEAR. The reading’s director, Samantha Bellomo tells Phindie what excites her about the decision to give the reading an all-female cast.
View More Why present an all-female production of KING LEAR? Revolution Shakespeare’s director lays down a persuasive case ahead of their reading
Dunk the master of mystery in a vat of absurdity and you have Alfred Hitchcock’s THE 39 STEPS, a zany adaptation of the 1935 movie.…
View More Video Preview: Hitchcock’s THE 39 STEPS at Theatre Horizon
Together with collaborator Nick Gillette, Ben Grinberg founded Almanac Dance Circus Theatre to offer production of his unique brand of acrobatic theater. Almanac’s inaugural show, Communitas, launches this May 22-24 at Christ Church Neighborhood House. Phindie asked Ben a few questions about the show and his new company.
View More Communitas Organizer: Interview with Ben Grinberg about his dance circus theater
The oldest of its kind in our country, the Annenberg Center for the Performing Arts’ INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN’S FESTIVAL celebrates its 30th birthday in 2014. With a roster of affordable family-friendly presentations of theater, puppetry, and music from around the world, along with a hands-on Fun Zone filled with interactive cultural experiences in the Center’s outdoor plaza (or, in the case of inclement weather, inside in the lobby), this springtime tradition is a great way to introduce kids to the arts, and to reintroduce adults to their magic!
View More INTERNATIONAL CHILDREN’S FESTIVAL (Annenberg Center): A Fun-Filled 30th-Birthday Celebration!
In the vein of last years William Shakespeare’s Star Wars by local publisher Quirk Books, The Renegade Company is holding a one-off Star Wars themed event to raise money for its upcoming productions. Costumes! Shakespeare! Lightsabers! Faux-Southern theater-rockers Jawbone Junctions!
Help us Renegade, your our only hope.
View More May the Fourth Be With You: Renegade Star Wars theater event coincides with announcement of Star Wars VII cast
At rehearsal last week putting the finishing touches on his new dance piece ‘Promises I Never Meant to Keep,’ choreographer Roni Koresh was bleary eyed, wondering if the coffee he was drinking was from three days ago, but otherwise thoroughly engaged
View More No regrets in Roni Koresh’s PROMISES
Last fall, Nichole Canuso Dance Company presented The Garden, which wowed its intimate audiences—only six viewers per show—by weaving them deeply into the action of the dance, and outnumbering them two to one.
View More Midway Avenue (Nichole Canuso): An interview with the artist
What happens when you combine Philadelphia choreographers with dance makers from across the country, give them less than 10 hours to remix and recreate each other’s works, and ask them to show their creations? We’re about to find out.
The Remix Festival, curated by Annie Wilson and Susan Rethorst, is inspired by Susan’s choreographic technique of wrecking—basically radically taking apart a finished work and reconstituting into a new form—and The Wrecking Project.
View More REMIX FESTIVAL: DANCE REIMAGINED
A typical concert dance performance does not usually conjure up thoughts of social justice and governmental reform. At first glance, dance and politics might not seem to go together. That is not to say that the art form is entirely apolitical – different genres of art can certainly serve as a persuasive medium for declaring political statements. From a historical perspective, analysis of the arts can be used to study social change and political reform, and dance is no exception to this.
View More The National Water Dance
The famous five-letter-word and its off-beat aficionados Bingo is a game that has its own fascinating culture with quirky characters for devotees (the stereotype being…
View More If You’re In…. Long Island: BINGO! THE WINNING MUSICAL
In shooting Richard Greenberg’s THREE DAYS OF RAIN, my first photographic challenge was to capture the unique structure of the play: the first act is set in 1995 and involves a brother/sister and their old friend – the son of their father’s architecture partner and oldest friend. In Act II, the three actors play the parents of their Act I characters. So it was a dual challenge to photograph basically two casts instead of one, and to try and paint a visual portrait of what is both similar and different between each character and his/her parent, and to portray the look of two very different decades.
View More John Donges Photographs THREE DAYS OF RAIN (Quince): A Double Assignment
I’M A STRANGER HERE MYSELF, created and performed by Mark Nadler and directed by David Schweizer, is both a lament and a celebration of Weimar Germany and the bohemian lifestyle celebrated by the young during this time. Incredibly impoverished, pincered by a swiftly inflating currency, stabbed by the growth of hate and, underneath that hate, a creeping fascism; yet this impossible position also gave rise to an incredibly fertile undergrowth and the arts mecca which Berlin became.
View More I’M A STRANGER HERE MYSELF (Prince): Intimacy, Song, and Rage in Weimar Germany
And maybe that’s what makes Ellie Brown’s DEAR DIARY, BYE such a fascinating show. The play, directed by Seth Reichgott, presents her 1984 diary. Brown wasn’t so different from any other ten year old – she liked boys, she got sick of her parents, she was teased, and she liked more boys. There’s a pleasure in this kind of uncensored presentation, a la Nature Theater of Oklahoma.
View More DEAR DIARY, BYE (Ellie Brown): Schoolyard scraps and crushes galore
And now, AMERICAN WISDOM, a mainstage collection of three of Josh’s one-acts, is a handshake between Philly and New York, featuring actors and directors from both sides of the ancient and abiding divide—and performing for one weekend in each city. What’s more, it was launched through an IndieGoGo campaign, representing McIlvain’s collaboration with his audiences.
View More AMERICAN WISDOM (SmokeyScout): Interview with Playwright Josh McIlvain
Among the first presentations in this exciting space, THE LOVE SONG OF R. BUCKMINSTER FULLER, shows First Friday, April 4th, at 7 and 9pm. This part theater, part musical, part film is dubbed a “live documentary.” Acclaimed filmmaker Sam Green narrates, accompanied by an original score played by Yo La Tengo. Together they create the movie experience in front of the audience in real time. Nick Stuccio, president and Producing Artistic Director of FringeArts, sat down to chat about this unique offering, as well as the developments with the new space and Fringe Festival.
View More THE LOVE SONG OF R. BUCKMINSTER FULLER (FringeArts): Fringe’s First First Friday
You may have seen the Lantern Theater Company’s JULIUS CAESAR, which recast Shakespeare’s political tragedy in Feudal Japan. You may also have seen the open letter that local playwright and performer Makoto Hirano hand-delivered to The Lantern on “How to Stage Your Show Without Being Super Racist,” which he signed “Makoto Hirano, Dance-theatre artist, actual Japanese person, and actual Samurai descendent,” reposted on Phindie with Hirano’s consent.
View More The fault, dear Brutus, Act II: Interview with Makoto Hirano about “Super Racist” Julius Caesar