The great problem in the theater world, the thing that gives artistic directors ulcers as they gaze upon one Baby Boomer-and-up audience after another, is this: How do you get kids raised on 24/7 cable, the Internet, instant-access movies and the like to understand that going to the right play can be interesting, entertaining, even thrilling?
MUSICAL THEATER
He may be the last of the old-time Broadway composers, but this summer Jerry Herman entered the digital age in a big way: Two of his classic songs from Hello, Dolly! were prominently featured in the computer-animated children's hit, WALL-E; and nearly his entire catalog of cast albums has been reissued for digital download by Sony BMG Broadway Masterworks.
THEATER REVIEW | TRUE BLUE
The thin blue line has been tapped as the source of countless dramas. Here it is again in the latest offering from the Women's Theatre Project, but from a perspective not often seen.
The gals in blue get their due in True Blue, a world premiere play by Marj O'Neill-Butler that debuts this weekend at the Women's Theatre Project. Pamela Roza, Patti Gardner, Angie Radosh, Laura Turnbull and Jacqueline Laggy play undercover cops whose lives and personal challenges are intertwined.
THEATER REVIEW
Miami Libre tries to be many things: a sexy Vegas revue, a classic musical with a love story, a feel-good immigrant-makes-good drama, a political and musicological screed on Cuba and Miami.
THEATER REVIEW
If a Samuel Beckett devotee were to create a piece for Cirque du Soleil -- which, depending on your view of Waiting for Godot, may not be utterly unimaginable -- the result might look a lot like Slava's Snowshow.
DANCE REVIEW | FLAMENCO IN THE SUN FESTIVAL
It may not boast star names or a splashy presence, but judging from Saturday night's performance of Calle Flamenca, the central show in the Flamenco in the Sun festival, this annual event has become a rewarding addition to the South Florida flamenco scene.
ON STAGE
Just as the XXIII International Hispanic Theatre Festival winds up its three-week run, another theater festival -- shorter, but more geographically expansive -- is about to begin.
THEATER REVIEW | LA CELESTINA
The XXIII International Hispanic Theatre Festival, built this year around a tribute to Spain, draws to a close this weekend with a disquieting, starkly beautiful production from the company run by festival founder Mario Ernesto Sánchez.
What: XXIII International Hispanic Theatre Festival Where: Carnival Studio Theater, Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, 1300 Biscayne Blvd., Miami; Prometeo Theatre, Miami-Dade College Wolfson Campus, 300 NE Second Ave., Miami
Russian clown Slava Polunin, who aims to blow audiences away with Slava's Snowshow at Miami's Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts, experiences his own wintry blizzard as his Yellow Clown encounters one challenge after another. The popular show is in the Sanford and Dolores Ziff Ballet Opera House, 1300 Biscayne Blvd., through Aug. 17. Performances are 8 p.m. Thursday-Friday, 2 p.m. Saturday-Sunday (additional shows 8 p.m. this Tuesday and Wednesday). Tickets are $55. Call...
THEATER REVIEW
Laila Ripoll's El día más feliz de nuestra vida (The Happiest Day of Our Lives) examines the lives of triplet sisters at two meaningful points for the siblings and their country. Part of the ongoing tribute to Spain at the XXIII International Hispanic Theatre Festival, the play was presented in Spanish by the Alquibla Teatro of Murcia.
Remember Let It Snow? The vintage Jule Styne-Sammy Cahn tune conjures a wintry frozen world outside, a warmly cozy one inside. Slava's Snowshow, which will begin previews at the Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts on Thursday, flips that script.
he brightly lit rehearsal studio at Miami's Adrienne Arsht Center for the Performing Arts is a long way from a Havana carnival, but the twisting Cuban dancers shaking the room with sweat-inducing batidora (the supersonic Cuban hip vibration) and screams of agua! and asesina! are doing their best to bring one to life.
That knowing laughter you'll hear through mid-August at Actors' Playhouse is coming from Baby Boomers who are going through the catharsis of seeing their lives onstage. Not their lives, precisely, but actors Margot Moreland, Wayne Steadman, Allan Baker, Maribeth Graham, Barry J. Tarallo and Lourelene Snedeker get close enough to universal truths that Mid Life! The Crisis Musical should seem very familiar to those between 40 and 60 -- or to anyone who loves them. The show runs through Aug. 10 at the...
