By Dale King There is practically nothing original in the theme of Joe DiPietro’s 1998 play, Over the River and Through the Woods. That’s not a bad thing. In fact, it’s kind of refreshing. The show being staged through Sunday at the Delray Beach Playhouse is as comfortable as a broken-in pair of shoes; as fulfilling as a spaghetti dinner just like Mamma used to make. An … [Read more...]
Season Preview 2012-13: Loss of JAMS hurts, but jazz season looks strong
The biggest news regarding the 2012-2013 South Florida jazz concert season may also be the most unfortunate. The 13-year-old, West Palm Beach-based Jazz Arts Music Society (JAMS), which presented a series of annual concerts at the Himmel Theater at CityPlace in West Palm Beach that were fixtures within these previews, decided in late July to suspend the series until further … [Read more...]
Crowe’s bubbly ‘Zoo’ proves a charmer
What kind of small watering hole in a rural zoo in a family film has a one-sheet poster for The Third Man on its wall? The kind in a Cameron Crowe movie, that’s what. There are no cinephile characters in the film, no justification for the poster’s being there, no subtle connection between this pleasant commercial product and Carol Reed’s masterpiece. Nevertheless, I was … [Read more...]
‘The Tree’: A lyrical, understated portrait of family and grief
We’ve barely been introduced to Peter O’Neill (Aden Young), the patriarch of a family of six in rural Australia, before a heart attack strikes him dead behind the wheel of his truck. With his daughter playfully atop the vessel, and assuming her father is simply having some fun, the truck careens slowly off the road and teeters, with an anticlimactic thump, into the enormous … [Read more...]