By Dale King Evita, the rock opera conceived by composer Andrew Lloyd Webber and lyricist Tim Rice at the height of their musical collaboration, has been packaged, repackaged and committed to celluloid since it was released as a concept record album 40 years ago and hit the stage in London two years later. Director Michael Leeds and choreographer Kevin Black return to the … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: Sept. 12-13
Film: Within every great comic is a dramatic actor yearning to break through. Or that’s how the show business cliché goes. But it is true about Lily Tomlin, who gives a remarkable, tough, smart-mouthed performance in a brief – only 78 minutes – low-budget film called simply Grandma. She is Elle, a lesbian poet whose granddaughter, Sage (Julia Garner), arrives on her Van Nuys … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: May 9-11
Art: The most recognizable art form the West knows from countries such as Iran and Afghanistan is what is generally still called the Oriental rug, a tapestry rich in symbolism, not just of design but of color, shape and size. An ancient tradition that still is alive today, the contemporary rugs of Afghanistan include motifs from that nation’s tumultuous recent history, … [Read more...]
‘Great Beauty’ looks it, but has little heart
The first 15 minutes or so of Paolo Sorrentino’s The Great Beauty is one of year’s most daring expressions of cinema’s intoxicating possibilities. The opening shot starts inside a cannon, with the camera tracking out of it and up and away, like a cannonball, and we get through an entire reel before it settles down. Restless but elegant, it drifts in and around Rome’s ancient … [Read more...]
The Oscar nods: Affleck, Bigelow snubs baffling
To paraphrase Sally Field, “They don’t like him. They really don’t like him.” That is the only possible conclusion to be drawn from the snub of Ben Affleck from the Best Director nominations, announced early this morning in Hollywood. Affleck was assumed to have a lock on one of the five slots in the category for his audience-friendly, fact-based thriller Argo, but it simply … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: May 5-6
Theater: Actress-writer-former bartender Terri Girvin uses all those skills in her one-woman show, Last Call, a funny and touching world premiere at Empire Stage in Fort Lauderdale -- the cozy former Sol Theatre space -- where the play is in its final weekend. As she did each night when she tended bar, served drinks and put up with the tipsy regulars, Girvin gets quite a … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: April 21-22
Theater: Eighteen years ago, a wordless theatrical event involving a gang of street urchins banging on garbage can lids and oil drums, making unlikely percussive music with brooms, sticks and other found objects opened off-Broadway, where it continues to this day. The show is called Stomp and the touring edition plays West Palm Beach’s Kravis Center this weekend only. Even … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: Sept. 9-11
Film: Emerging Cinemas at Mos’Art Theatre in Lake Park has a treat for all children of the ’60s (which I proudly proclaim includes me). It is the hallucinogenic documentary Magic Trip, a celebration of author/guru Ken Kesey (One Flew Over the Cuckoo’s Nest) and his infamous 1964 cross-country ramble in a wildly painted school bus, with his posse of apostles aboard. Too young to … [Read more...]
Only thing to be afraid of here is story, direction, acting
One of the great things about Wes Craven’s Scream was its pop-culture savvy. Its characters couldn’t make very easy marks if they’d seen every important horror movie ever made and, conversely, the psycho killer was an even more cunning villain because he’d seen all of those movies. It was a smart film because Craven, his characters and his audience were on an even keel: They … [Read more...]