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Reviews
"Giselle" Dazzles at American Ballet Theater
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Monday, 21 May 2018 15:20
- Written by Jack Angstreich
The new season at American Ballet Theater opened strongly with its very first performance on the evening of Monday, May 14th, a marvelous presentation of the beloved Giselle —one of the oldest surviving ballets—set to the immortal, melodious score by Adolphe Adam, with a libretto by the esteemed French writer, Théophile Gautier, after a retelling of a Slavic legend by the great German poet, Heinrich Heine. The ravishing choreography is after that of Jean Coralli, Jules Perrot and Marius Petipa and the current staging is by the company’s director, Kevin McKenzie, with unusually attractive scenography by Gianni Quaranta, appealing costumes by Anna Anni, and effective lighting by Jennifer Tipton.
NYC Theater Review—Jeremy Irons and Lesley Manville in Eugene O’Neill’s “Long Day’s Journey into Night”
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Sunday, 20 May 2018 23:01
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Long Day’s Journey into Night
Written by Eugene O’Neill; directed by Sir Richard Eyre
Performances through May 27, 2018
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| Jeremy Irons and Lesley Manville in Long Day's Journey into Night (photo: Richard Termine) |
Long Day’s Journey into Night
BAM Harvey Theatre, 651 Fulton Street, Brooklyn, NY
bam.org
Encores! Closes 25th Season with "Me and My Girl"
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- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Thursday, 17 May 2018 15:39
- Written by Ellis Nassour
Hello, Dolly! at the Shubert may have audiences humming up the aisles, but Encores! 25th Season closer Me and My Girl at City Center, through May 13, has the cast dancing in the aisles and everyone doing the infectious “The Lambeth Walk.” This revival, with Tony winner Warren Carlyle directing and choreographing, of the show that was the 1937 toast of the West has a great score by British hit maker Noel Gay [real name: Richard Armitage] and enough wise-cracking one-liners to keep you laughing for weeks.
The musical was unwrapped out of moth balls in 1984 on the West End, and arrived two years later on Broadway (Tony nomination, Best Musical). The book, part slapstick antics, part stinging commentary on the British upper class, and lyrics, are by L. Arthur Rose and Douglas Furber. Gay’s score pays high tribute to the British Music Hall tradition.
Two-time Tony winner Christian Borle (Falsettos, Something Rotten) literally seems born to the manor his character, cockney East Ender Bill Snibson inherits. His adroit comic timing and dancing are impeccable (Tony winner, After Midnight; currently Hello, Dolly!) has well chosen Olivier Award-winning Laura Michelle Kelly (Finding Neverland) as the girl of the title.
She and Borle, reunited after their Mary and Bert well into the run of Mary Poppins, have great chemistry. She’s the one “Me” won’t let go of when he inherits millions and a title – in spite of the determined machinations of Duchess Maria, brilliantly portrayed by Harriet Harris, to get him to choose a suitable mate; and the temptations of lascivious (She’s No) Lady Jaqueline, played by long-legged beauty Lisa O’Hare (Gentleman’s Guide to Love and Murder).
Bill has a lot of help from Sir John, Chuck Cooper (Tony winner, The Life; Prince of Broadway), and, thanks to 1984 script revisions by Stephen Fry and director Mike Ockrent for the West End revival, his friend Henry Higgins. golden-voiced Cooper gets ample opportunity to strut his rarely seen comic skills.
Co-starring in the cast of 31, Bill Buell, Mark Evans (The Play That Goes Wrong – who knew he could sing and dance?), John Horton, Simon Jones (Farinelli and the King, many more), and, stealing scenes as his DNA seemingly demands, the irrepressible Don Stephenson as the family solicitor.
Carlyle’s has created a stunning sequence, a tribute to the style of Gene Kelly, that showcases Borle’s debonair side in “Leaning on a Lampost”; and generates huge laughs with Borle and Cooper’s duet, “Love Makes the World Go Round.” Kelly’s big moment comes by way of the poignant ballad “Once You Lose Your Heart,” which became a massive hit for the composers.
The choreography boasts ballroom, tap, and, why the heck not, some contemporary high-kicks courtesy of O’Hare. As always, Carlyle has assembled a winning dance ensemble. There are two memorable show-stoppers: the Act One finale “The Lambeth Walk” [which launched a 30s craze], with Busker costuming and spoons and anything else he could pull out of his hat (including having his dancers have way up the aisles and across center orchestra); and the Act Two opener, “The Sun Has Got His Hat On,” led by dashing Evans.
This Encores!, with the cast off book, is so polished it feels like a true Broadway production. As with all the City Center concert stagins, it was assembled with less than two weeks of rehearsal, so kudos to Carlyle, assistant choreographer Sara Edwards Butler, and assistant director Kasey Graham.
One of the joys of any Encores! is the nearly-30 strong orchestra under the direction of music director Rob Berman. They certainly don’t disappoint with the rousing overture, entr’acte, the Act One finale and the Act Two opener.
To learn more, go to: www.NYCityCenter.org
May '18 Digital Week III
- Details
- Parent Category: Film and the Arts
- Category: Reviews
- Published on Tuesday, 15 May 2018 20:49
- Written by Kevin Filipski
Blu-rays of the Week
Unforgotten—Complete 2nd Season
(PBS Masterpiece)
In the second season of this compulsively watchable PBS Masterpiece series, investigators Cassie Stuart and Sunny Khan once again focus on an initially baffling cold case: the remains of a body found crammed in a suitcase, the deceased killed 27 years before, and (again) no shortage of suspects.
The twists and turns of the investigation are compelling throughout all five hours, thanks to smart writing and finely-shaded performances by Sanjeev Bhaskar and especially Nicola Walker as the detectives. It all looks supremely good on Blu.
Bruckner/Messiaen
(LSO)
The London Symphony Orchestra and music director Sir Simon Rattle tackle a pair of uncompromising works in this excellent 2016 performance: the imposing, epic Romanticism of Anton Bruckner’s hour-long Symphony No. 8, and the subtle shadings of Olivier Messiaen’s 25-minute Coleurs de la Cite Celeste/Colors of the Celestial City.
The playing, of course, is stupendous, particularly by pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard as the exceptional soloist in the Messiaen work; hi-def video and audio are both fine.
Two Thousand Maniacs
(Arrow)
In what was his finest moment of gory exploitation, Herschell Gordon Lewis directed this ridiculously silly 1964 splatter flick about clueless Northerners who stumble upon murderous Southerners and find themselves victims in a re-litigation of the Civil War.
It’s nuttily entertaining in its way (and based on the musical Brigadoon, of all things); an extra Lewis feature, Moonshine Mountain—also 1964—is less interesting foolishness. The films look decent in hi-def; extras include Lewis’s intros to both films and Maniacs commentary, video essays, interviews and an appreciation.
DVD of the Week
Marx Reloaded
(Icarus)
Jason Barker’s breezy 52-minute documentary, from 2011, filters the devastating effects of the then-recent financial collapse through a Karl Marx lens, offering the failures of capitalism as proof that it’s time to take a fresh look at Marx and see how relevant his ideas are in an era of even greater financial inequality.
Barker interviews several philosophers, including the famous Slovenian Slavoj Žižek, and includes a dated parody of The Matrix in its occasionally amusing animated segments. The lone extra, Marx for Beginners, is a diverting six-minute 1978 short.
CD/DVD of the Week
Messiaen—Catalogue d’Oiseaux/Catalogue of Birds
(Pentatone)
Olivier Messiaen’s compositions are drenched in birdsong, from his chamber and orchestral works to even his masterpiece, his lone opera Saint Francois d’Assise. But it’s his massive, multi-part Catalogue of Birds—seven books of thirteen pieces, each based on a bird from a specific region of France, and composed in 1956 to 1958—that’s the apotheosis of these works.
And who better than fellow French pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard to do justice to this often treacherously demanding music, especially the 30-minute centerpiece, The Reed Warbler. On three CDs, Aimard purposefully traverses some of Messiaen’s greatest solo piano music; on DVD, the pianist introduces each of the pieces, along with discussing Messiaen’s technique and legacy.
