Want to see me squirm and duck for cover? Try one of these conversation starters: 1. “I met someone who knows you.” What possible good can come from a sentence that begins this way? It’s never followed up with, “It was someone whose life you saved a few years ago and then selflessly asked for … Read more
Maybe the idea of a live puppet rock opera doesn’t catch you–but a live puppet rock opera as conceived and produced by Dan Graham, Tony Oursler, Rodney Graham, and Paul McCarthy? We can’t think of a more alluringly odd quartet of art stars to get together and do a disillusioned send-up of the hippie era … Read more
One of the most beguiling shows of the past year, A Cupboard Full of Hate, is a thoroughly Frenchified thing, performed in a style that’s light on dialogue and heavy on visual tricks. Off-Leash Area’s artistic director, the Paris-schooled Paul Herwig, plays a fitful old geezer who so vigorously hates the world that he locks … Read more
Ron English has pulled off some impressive stunts over the years. His best-known involved illegally plastering over billboards in cities across the country with subversive messages. One, posted in Cleveland last March, featured a picture of a child in a pith helmet and read, “PLAYDATE IRAN.” Another, funnier offering included a black and white rendering … Read more
A company known for working with composers, librettists, and musicians to compose new musicals and operas, Nautilus Music-Theater is trying its hand at an old standard. Man of La Mancha, a 1960s Broadway musical in which an imprisoned Cervantes enlists his fellow inmates to perform Don Quixote, is best known for a catchy reprise called … Read more
Some say M.F.A. programs are better at nurturing egos (for a price) than actual writing careers, but N.M. Kelby–with her Pushcart Prize nomination and M.F.A. from Hamline Universit–is here to tell you that’s not true. Kelby left the Twin Cities for Florida after collecting her degree, but we still have a claim on her. Her … Read more
To many, Cesaria Evora’s swooningly romantic voice embodies the sound of Cape Verde, but at sixty, she may be the voice of its past. With more Cape Verdeans living outside the country than in it, the new sound of this West African island nation is one that captures both the traditional song styles and vocal … Read more
In a stroke of great creativity (and, let’s face it, a move to bring in younger audiences), the SPCO is inviting families to come hear classical music with a slightly gross twist. This particular afternoon features songs inspired by the insect world: Bach’s Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, Kenji Bunch’s “Arachnophobia,” Ervin Rouse’s “Orange Blossom Special,” … Read more
Stacia Rice long has been a fixture on local stages, though we became enamored of her last year when she starred in a blockbuster production of Tennessee Williams’ workhorse, A Streetcar Named Desire. Anyone so capable of unlocking the vintage desperation and fragility of Miss Blanche DuBois, American literature’s most famous coquette, deserves special attention … Read more
We’re not sure that people in, say, San Diego would get such a kick out of hearing a swingy jazz rendition of the Replacements’ “I Will Dare,” but in these parts, such a thing scores high in both the nostalgia and novelty categories, with extra points for being beautifully and creatively executed. This trio, made … Read more