If Broadway lyricist Sheldon Harnick only wrote Fiddler on the Roof, he would have earned a major place in the annals of musical theater. In fact, he is credited with almost two dozen shows, often collaborating with composer Jerry Bock, on such titles as Fiorello!, She Loves Me, The Apple Tree and The Rothschilds. This is a milestone year for Harnick. Late last month, he … [Read more...]
Postcard from Broadway No. 1: Eight days, 12 shows, and 42 degrees
I’m up in New York, where the temperature when my plane landed was a brisk 42 degrees, up considerably from the previous few days. Good thing I brought my winter coat. Over the next eight days, I'll be seeing 12 shows. That means I’ll be in the theater whenever there is a performance, including a rare Tuesday matinee of that perennial favorite, the Easter Bonnet Competition. … [Read more...]
‘King and I’ brilliantly reimagined at Maltz
Unlike most audience members, reviewers yearn to be surprised. If civilian theatergoers take comfort in the familiar, critics crave an encounter with the unexpected, particularly in a show they have viewed countless times before. Not that director-choreographer Marcia Milgrom Dodge makes novel staging choices for the sake of being different, but nor does she settle for the … [Read more...]
Oliveira powerful in Beethoven with Judd and Symphonia
The American violinist Elmar Oliveira, gold medal winner at the Tchaikovsky Competition in Russia in 1978, has been assiduously working on raising his local profile in the past several years, having made a mark for himself on the national and international scenes since then. A part-time resident of Jensen Beach and a teacher at Lynn University in Boca Raton, he has made … [Read more...]
Organizers happy about 2014 Boca Fest outcome
By Dale King Festival of the Arts Boca 2014 has been relegated to the history books. But organizers are happy with the memories. The festival’s website is filled with comments about the 10-day event that marked its eighth annual incarnation this year, taking place in Boca Raton’s Mizner Park Amphitheater and at the Cultural Arts Center. Perhaps the most striking website … [Read more...]
Theater roundup: ‘Full Monty,’ ‘Fighting Over Beverley,’ ‘Rags,’ and ‘Sister Act’
In 1968, Broadway was aghast (and titillated) when a tribe of hippies went naked in Hair. Thirty-two years later, a handful of unemployed steel workers strip down to nothing onstage in The Full Monty and it is practically family entertainment. OK, I guess it depends on the family, but if you have a taste for untoned, scrawny, fat or aging bodies, then The Wick Theatre has the … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: Feb. 21-23
Theater: The Wick Theatre in Boca Raton is like Forrest Gump’s box of chocolates: You never know what you’re going to get. In its brief three-production history, the company has served up extremes of quality and lack of quality, but at least there are more of the former so far. So our fingers remain crossed for the Wick this weekend as it opens with David Yazbek’s sly, … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: Feb. 14-16
Art: Everyone loves a mystery, and it’s even better when it involves a work of art. This Sunday, scholar Robert Simon will explain how he identified a Leonardo da Vinci painting, Salvator Mundi, painted for France’s King Louis XII and last seen in the collection of that noted aesthete, King Charles I of England, in 1649, the year he went to the chopping block. It did make one … [Read more...]
With ‘Old Times,’ Dramaworks takes on the puzzle of Pinter
Seven years ago, director J. Barry Lewis introduced Palm Beach Dramaworks’ up-for-any-challenge audience to the enigmatic work of Harold Pinter with a production of Betrayal. While some theatergoers were taken aback by its reverse chronology, that play was relatively straightforward compared to the next Pinter shoe to drop. Opening this Friday and continuing through March 2, … [Read more...]
Weekend arts picks: Jan. 18-20
Film: Having delayed its opening until January, the month for dumping sub-par movies on the market, Jack Ryan: Shadow Recruit will get no awards or be taken the least bit seriously, but this reboot of the franchise based on the late novelist Tom Clancy’s CIA analyst action hero is still pulse-racing entertainment, far better than expected. Chris Pine, the young Captain Kirk of … [Read more...]