In Together Together, Ed Helms, much matured since his Hangover bacchanals, plays Matt, a lonely straight man stuck in a middle-age morass. With no romantic prospects but desirous of a family, and as if feeling the tick of his own biological clock, he makes the unusual decision to father a child through a surrogate. That’s where Anna (Patti Harrison), a single woman 20 … [Read more...]
Archives for April 2021
Florida thriller writer finds past has dark resonance for today
By Sharon Geltner One of the world’s best-selling thriller writers recently moved to Orlando, does most of his research in Jacksonville and has raised money for the Palm Beach County Library System and the Delray Beach City Library, as well as a dozen other in-state libraries. Steve Berry also spoke to Palm Beach donors about Smithsonian Libraries. He ultimately raised … [Read more...]
Arts buzz: Kravis posts classical lineup; Buffett in Delray; PB Opera announces season
WEST PALM BEACH — Major performers and ensembles in the classical music world have been scheduled for the coming Regional Arts season at the Kravis Center for the Performing Arts, in the expectation that vaccinated audiences can return to the West Palm Beach venue. The season, announced April 6, will feature a dozen programs, and include appearances by the much-beloved … [Read more...]
FAU Theatre Lab gets gift to start playwriting program
By Christina Wood Florida Atlantic University’s Dorothy F. Schmidt College of Arts and Letters recently announced the establishment of the Myrna Gordon Skurnick Theatre Lab Playwriting Program and Creative Writing MFA Fellows. Since its founding in 2015, Theatre Lab, the resident professional company of FAU, has pursued its mission to inspire, develop and produce new … [Read more...]
Oscars 2021: Radical reinvention was good thing for awards show
It sounds heretical to say this, because the pandemic has taken such a toll on the film industry this year, but COVID-19 is the best thing to happen to the Academy Awards broadcast. The virus and its social distancing protocols, which previously sank the Golden Globes, Screen Actors Guild and other awards programs prompted Oscars producer Steven Soderbergh – an Oscar winner … [Read more...]
Hap’s Oscar predictions, 2021 edition: ‘Nomadland’ will take top flick
Following a year of COVID-caused theater closings and postponed blockbusters, the Motion Picture Academy will try to put a positive spin on the industry this Sunday evening when the 93rd annual Oscar winners are announced. Understandably, it will not be the usual ceremony. For starters, the main venue will be Los Angeles’s iconic Union train station – featured in such major … [Read more...]
Solve the greatest art mystery of recent times: Who stole the Gardner paintings?
One of the greatest unsolved mysteries of the 20th century is the 1990 theft of Rembrandts, Vermeers, Manets and other old master paintings, valued at $500 million, from Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum. But from now through May 16, the Kravis Center invites you to crack the case by interrogating characters who represent the actual suspects, in an outdoor, socially … [Read more...]
Tommy Emmanuel shows how to be an acoustic guitar hero
If you want to become a guitar hero, history dictates that you should probably play an electric instrument within popular music's broad spectrum of vocal-driven styles. It’s worked for a scroll of icons both living (Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, Jimmy Page, Ritchie Blackmore, Keith Richards, Pete Townshend, Susan Tedeschi, Derek Trucks, Tom Morello) and deceased (Jimi Hendrix, … [Read more...]
Dozen young singers make for a beautiful PB Opera Liederabend
Another night when Palm Beach Opera beats the virus with an outdoor song recital. This time the venue was the spacious veranda of the well-groomed National Croquet Center. Twelve singers, six each from the Benenson Young Artist and Apprentice Artist programs, were accompanied by the distinguished pianist Ksenia Leletkina, whose doctorate is from the Eastman School of Music … [Read more...]
‘Shiva Baby’: Sexual strength, psychic horror — and it’s a comedy
Imagine a female Benjamin Braddock who, unlike Dustin Hoffman’s rudderless graduate, has no trouble getting laid. That’s one way to introduce Danielle (Rachel Sennott), the neurotic heroine, adrift at the precipice of adulthood, in Emma Seligman’s promising debut Shiva Baby. At the shiva where nearly the entire film unspools in more or less real time — the deceased is a … [Read more...]