This month-long series of events highlights African American dance and culture.
Joanna G. HarrisDanceCA, For its 10th anniversary season, the Black Choreographers Festival has extended into new and "other" dimensions. Under the leadership of Kendra Kimbrough Barnes and Laura Ellis, this performance included a dramatic work by Joanna Haigood, a ballet-jazz dance by Gregory ...
Programs 2 and 3 provided audiences a broad sampling of great and lesser works by dancemakers past and present.
DanceCA, Choreographers past and present were on display in two recent programs from San Francisco Ballet, and their defining styles (or lack thereof) gave audiences a broad canvas of talent and themes to contemplate. Program 2 (seen Feb. 27) opened ...
Emily S. MendelTheaterCA, “Napoli!,” a robust entertaining World War II comedy/drama by the great Italian playwright Eduardo De Filippo (1900-1984), revolves around the boisterous, amusing Neapolitan Jovine family, who turns to selling black-market goods to friends and ...
Emily S. MendelArt & ArchitectureCA, Georgia O’Keeffe (1887-1986) has a unique place in American art, not simply because she was an early female artist, or because of the length of her career, but because she painted with an individual aesthetic quality. Bright colors, detailed oversized ...
Emily S. MendelTheaterCA, “Gidion’s Knot,” Johnna Adams’ astonishing two-character play, rivets the audience as it explores vital societal issues — children’s free expression and its limits, cyber-bullying and parental versus society’s rights. As you enter the theatre, you find yourself in a ...
A rollicking comedy-of-no-manners exposes the underside of a most dysfunctional household.
Suzanne WeissTheaterCA, Move over George Bernard Shaw! There’s a new kind of war between the sexes being waged in the weird world of performer/singer/songwriter/playwright Taylor Mac (“The Lily’s Revenge”). And not just the same old two sexes that Noah ushered onto his ...
This fascinating, funny, and often poignant production owes much to the women on which it is based, as well as the actors who play them.
Suzanne WeissTheaterCA, Slavery, freedom, power, the position of women, racial inequality, degrees of color — so many serious subjects come up in Marcus Gardley’s uneven “The House That Will Not Stand.” But, for some reason, the Bay Area native, now a New ...
The revolutionary choreographer's legacy shines in these three iconic works.
Suzanne WeissDanceCA, The late Martha Graham was nothing less than an icon in the dance world, permanently revolutionizing the art form with her innovative choreography and methodology. The eponymous company that carries on her rich legacy brought a couple of her most ...
Mikhail Baryshnikov reinvents himself (again) in two one-acts adapted from Chekhov.
Suzanne WeissTheaterCA, In real life Mikhail Baryshnikov is definitely not a Chekhov character. Instead of settling into a boring, if comfortable, retirement, the famed dancer (now in his mid-60s) is constantly reinventing himself. A brief early stint in the movies (“The Turning ...
The Lamplighters emphasize the effervescent in a sparkling new translation of this Viennese operetta.
Suzanne WeissMusicCA, I’ll take mine mit schlag. The Bay Area’s venerable Lamplighters have departed from the usual Gilbert and Sullivan fare to serve up Johann Strauss II’s delectable Viennese concoction, “Die Fledermaus,” in a production that often is as fizzy as ...
