Fame or Famine

Two nights of erotically themed performance art will be accompanying the Art Space festival in Baltimore this Friday and Saturday. The Baltimore Erotic Arts Festival, the brainchild of Suzannah Gerber (aka Klawdya Rothschild in the burlesque world) takes place on Friday the 18th and Saturday the 19th.
All Around the Edge
Friday night’s theme is “Before the Edge”,  with art and performances with sexual themes that are playful and teasing, such as a Atomic Cheesecake Pinup Pageant and performers such as

Eliza Charming
ShortStaxx
Lee Luscious/Lee Harrington
Coco Mource
Dix Washington

and other art and performances on the site. The headliner is the famous sex educator, performance artist, …read more

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As I was going through the slurry of fine arts news that Google sends my way each day, I came across an interesting connecting thread between two very different types of theatre: Spanish.
The Bard for Our Time
As the Spanish speaking segment of the U.S. (as well as the rest of the world) continues to grow, it’s no surprise that the great playwrights such as William Shakespeare would be translated into that language. Indeed, it has been for ages; other languages, as well (I saw Othello in Japanese once, and got chills).
But here’s a twist on it: Romeo y Julieta is …read more

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It may finally happen. I may be able to go and see a performance of a dance piece I’m writing about. Best of all, it features my homeboy, Ethan Steifel, who started his stellar career right down the road from me at the Monona Academy of Dance.
Twyla’s Interpretation of Heaven & Hell
Ethan works with Herman Cornejo and other dancers from American Ballet Theater at Lincoln Center’s Opera House to convey a balletic journey through a “post-modern idea of the world.” Bloomberg News called the latter part of the ballet “too long and too diffuse” and concluded there was “nothing new.” …read more

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If you’re not involved in the Twitter community, don’t become so. It will turn your phone and your computer into a banal and tedious little bird that intermittently interrupts your train of thought or activity with useless facts about people you’ve never met.
Unfortunately, I’m firmly esconced in the twitterverse, which is why I am able to let you know that the Resident Production Stage Manager for the Shakespeare Theatre Company, M. William Shiner, is “tweeting” about his work. It’s a way to get a glimpse into the life backstage, and my daughter, who is looking at going into backstage work …read more

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At first I thought this was going to be some good news, an article in The Toronto Star: “…the idea of upper class forming cultural elite no longer valid” This would be a good thing, right? It means that we are all part of the arts, that it’s just as much a part of the lives of the lower and middle classes as those of the upper, right?
Well, yes, but only in the sense that “hardly at all” is considered a “part”:
“Status is now attached to material consumption, not cultural consumption,” Goldthorpe tells me. “People with status show who they …read more

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I’ll be stage managing the show portion of this festival in the beautiful Memorial Union Theatre in Madison, WI. But the entire weekend is going to be loads of fun:
 he Madfest Juggling Festival is approaching!! The 47th Annual Madfest will take place on January 17,18, 19, and 20. There will of course be a Juggling Extravaganza stage show, on Saturday the 19th of January, at 7:00 PM in the Wisconsin Union Theater, featuring special guests The Passing Zone and Sean Blue.
Join us a day early for our usual Thursday night practice from 6 P.M. to Midnight in the On Wisconsin …read more

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I did a performance, years ago, with Douglas Rosenberg, Heidi Latsky, and Larry Goldhuber at P.S. 122. It was great fun – lots of neat projections, cool music, and the two of them dancing together…le sigh.
It put PS 122 into a soft spot in my heart, and so I read reviews like this one with great joy. Thanks to Foot in Mouth for pointing the way, and in case you just want to see the dance and ignore all the wordiness, here you go:

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Every once in a while I like to indulge in this pleasant little vice. I’m not proud of it – it’s a little embarrassing, to be honest – but at the same time, it’s almost necessary, a requirement of the Bachelor of Science degree that I earned (and will be paying off…forever).
I have to indulge in the completely worthless and futile speculation of the Chicken or the Egg, or, to put another way, the true roots of the Influences of Change in Art, Music, and Literature.
It involves discussion like this:
“This seeming dichotomy is explained by the stages of development the …read more

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While attending the Podcast Expo in Ontario, CA recently I got to have a conversation with the lovely Charlotte Marie, a model and actress in the LA area. I mentioned the rumors I’d heard of the dearth of theatre, and she was quick to point out that she was also involved in a production called “Shadow Hour“, produced by the Actors Space (in Sherman Oaks).
The Actor Space, founded and run by acting coach Joe Palese (Hill Street Blues, Days of Our Lives), premieres its first full length play SHADOW HOUR beginning October 6 th 2007 in its new Sherman Oaks …read more

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One of the more interesting pieces in today’s concert is Valerie Green’s "Naked Heart." It utilizes a different kind of movement vocabulary and accompaniment than most of the other pieces in the concert. Valerie, who graduated from the program just before I joined it, has a "choreographic work and teaching style influenced by her apprenticeship with the Erick Hawkins Dance Company"
I read this after we teched her solo, and I can definitely see it. I think I pleased her when I mentioned that her word seemed more based on "feeling" than beats and measures, and there are moments when she’s …read more

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