Stage Directors Handbook: 2nd Revised Edition (Stage Director's Handbook)
The Stage (Free subscription) | 12/02/2009
Novello Theatre, London: Adrian Lester has already proved the virtues of colour-blind casting that has seen him playing some of the great classical roles onstage, including Hamlet (for Peter Brook) and Henry V (at the National). But now, in a far more radical step, he leads a colour-specific company in a completely compelling all-black re-imagining of Tennessee Williams' epic, searing 1955 play that...
Chicagoist (Free subscription) | 11/09/2009
Tonight is the only night you can catch this year's Site Unseen : a site-specific performance event featuring theater, dance, music, and visual art by local and international artists. Presented by the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs, this year's event focuses on disability — a theme that emerged from curator Julie Laffin 's personal battles with environmental illness and complications...
Gratuitous Violins (Free subscription) | 11/07/2009
One of the many pleasures of taking in The Royal Family on Broadway was being introduced to Jan Maxwell . I'd never seen the Tony-nominated actress but I'd heard great things about her - and she was terrific as the daughter in a famous 1920s theatrical family. So to catch up on Maxwell 's career, I listened to an interview from last fall with the American Theatre Wing 's Downstage Center program. It's...
Renewable Music (Free subscription) | 11/02/2009
The director/actionist Christoph Schliengensief is planning to build a " Festpielhaus for Africa". More here (in German). Schliengensief is someone I have found to be at his best as a talk show guest on late-night TV: as a passionate social critic and, originally, something of an outsider to the professional arts world, he has always been, at the least, articulate and entertaining, and makes...
Fast Company (Free subscription) | 10/30/2009
Tonight begins the run of the Metropolitan Opera's Damnation of Faust, designed by Canadian powerhouse designer Robert Lepage and his Ex Machina troupe. We promise to give you a run-down of the opera's blitz of techno-imagery on Monday. Meanwhile, here are five high-tech operas that, depending on your tilt, either jar or excite the senses. The Magic Flute South African artist and visual director William...
Blog Town, PDX (Free subscription) | 10/22/2009
(everyone else is doing it!) Days on the Cotton Candy #4 © Maleonn VISUAL ART Marjorie is duly impressed by China's clear economic and artistic superiority, currently on display in the Portland Art Museum 's China Design Now . In conjunction with the exhibit, tonight and tomorrow the art museum is hosting a concert of contemporary Chinese music, performed by the Third Angle New Music Ensemble.The...
ArtsJournal (Free subscription) | 10/22/2009
"[U]ntil recently [Robert] Lepage has been best known among hip theater-goers. His nonoperatic stage works ... can run from 90 minutes to nine hours, are written in collaboration with his actors and technicians, and have nothing in common with anything else on the world stage."...
operaman's blog (Free subscription) | 10/21/2009
For those of you who have had your fill of writing and videos and all that about Glass and Orphée here's your weekly assortment from Operaman's grab bag of opera ephemera. Happy Birthday! Ursula K. Le Guin is 80 years young today! Avid readers among you will know Ms Le Guin as one of the world's foremost writers of fantasy and science fiction novels. She has almost innumerable awards to her...
The Observer (Free subscription) | 10/14/2009
When the mezzo-soprano Denyce Graves and her fellow American baritone Thomas Hampson take to the stage at the Winspear Opera House in Dallas tomorrow night, they will be marking the attempt by the British-based architecture firm Foster + Partners to design an opera theatre for the 21st century. The singers will stand before a capacity audience of 2,300 in Lord Foster's purpose-built oval design, the...
New York Times (Free subscription) | 10/05/2009
Robert Lepage’s nearly nine-hour production is a feast of fluid, almost cinematic stage pictures created by blending sound, video and live performance.
The Guardian - The blog Theatre (Free subscription) | 10/01/2009
Theatre bloggers have been obsessing about the effects of failure this week. And the debate over the arts' love affair with Obama rumbles on "Try. Fail. Try again. Fail Again. Fail Better." Thus spake Samuel Beckett. And failure is providing some interesting conversations this week. The writer and director Chris Goode has recently published on his blog an email exchange that he has had with...
New York Times (Free subscription) | 09/28/2009
Peter Sellars’s exasperatingly misconceived “Othello” stars Philip Seymour Hoffman as Iago and John Ortiz as the title character.
The Guardian (Free subscription) | 09/22/2009
Luc Bondy's version of Puccini's masterpiece at the Metropolitan Opera of New York is strikingly safe Nobody tampers with the traditions of the Metropolitan Opera of New York and emerges unscathed. When they do they risk the kind of audience backlash witnessed last night at the opening gala performance of the opera house's 2009-10 season. Even before the performance of a new production of Puccini's...
The Guardian (Free subscription) | 09/13/2009
The pope plans to meet up to 500 artists from around the world in November as part of efforts to turn the page on the Vatican's sometimes troubled relationship with the contemporary art world. The Vatican said the gathering, to be held at the Sistine Chapel on 21 November, was intended as the first step towards a "new and fertile alliance between art and faith". The director of the Vatican...
Artdaily (Free subscription) | 09/03/2009
INDIANAPOLIS, IN.- The Indianapolis Museum of Art announced today the fall 2009 programming in Tobias Theater, nicknamed “The Toby,” which was reopened after extensive renovations in November 2008. In The Toby, IMA visitors will encounter dynamic, culturally adventurous programs including multimedia performances, film and talks by internationally significant speakers. “This fall, audiences...
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