Before we can even mentally ask the question, Chita Rivera answers it in song, launching her cabaret act at the Colony Hotel’s Royal Room with the Kern-Hammerstein standard, I Won’t Dance. Oh, it’s not that the 79-year-old musical theater legend who hoofed her way through such Broadway original casts as West Side Story, Chicago and Kiss of the Spider Woman cannot dance … [Read more...]
Sunday Comment: Why we (Americans) can’t get enough of ‘Downton Abbey’
By Tom Tracy Last year, a parody film short appeared on YouTube offering a send-up of the hit TV period drama Downton Abbey, with mock scenes of the show, faux-interviews with the cast and writers, and a scene recalling the ironing of morning newspapers. The latter was a reference to a brief scene in the opening episode of Season One of Downton Abbey (apparently newspapers … [Read more...]
The View From Home 35: New releases and notable screenings, Feb. 7-29
There are many, many people who would disagree with me (I’m marrying one of them), but I can think of no better way to spend 195 minutes than watching a documentary on Woody Allen. I’m what you might call a Woody Allen fanboy – an apologist, even. I will go on record appreciating his bombs as well as his critical successes (well, most of them, anyway – Cassandra’s Dream and … [Read more...]
The View From Home 34: New DVD releases, Jan. 10-31
As Brian De Palma and Stanley Donen understand all too well, there can come a time in every reverential filmmaker’s oeuvre when loving homage devolves into shameless mimicry. For these aforementioned filmmakers, features such as Dressed to Kill and Charade followed various Hitchcock blueprints so faithfully that the directors’ own voices risked being swallowed in a quicksand … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: Sept. 10-14
Art: Five female artists explore the human figure in an upcoming exhibition called the Figuratively Speaking Invitational at The Art Gallery on the Eissey Campus of Palm Beach State College in Palm Beach Gardens, and there’s much more to it than is first apparent. The artwork consists of classical-styled paintings, modeled and molded ceramics, drawings and video, beautifully … [Read more...]
Exhibit of works on paper shows another side of Cassatt
Mary Cassatt (1844-1926) is known for pretty pictures of women and children, the kind of pictures that make people smile and sigh a lot. But what many don’t know is that, as a working female artist living in late 19th-century Paris, she was a maverick. A driven woman who personally balked at convention, she remained single and childless, apparently by choice, so that she … [Read more...]