Music: Piano duos are not so common that they can be overlooked when they pop up, and since we’re in the last weeks before the season starts getting underway again, it’s a good time to catch one. On Sunday at the Boca Steinway Gallery, two fine Miami-based pianists, Tian Ying and Anastasiya Naplekova, team up for a concert of standout works for this combination, including Mozart’s Sonata in D (K. 448) and the Second Suite of Sergei Rachmaninov. Also included with those blockbusters is a piece that has fallen into some neglect in current fashion, the Prelude, Fugue and Variation (Op. 18) of Cesar Franck. The Belgian master wrote it for organ originally, but also provided a version for piano and harmonium, and subsequently there came an arrangement for two pianos. One of the benefits of Abram Kreeger’s Piano Lovers series on which these pianists will be heard is that Kreeger features some of the leading pianists in our area, and there are a good number of outstanding ones living right here in South Florida. Here’s a chance to catch two of them in rarely heard, rewarding repertoire. The concert, which costs $25 today (click here for tickets) and $30 at the door tomorrow, starts at 4 p.m.
Film: Repetition is usually fatal to comedy, but obviously no one told Steve Coogan and Rob Brydon that rule. For these two British wags got us giggling back in 2010 with The Trip, a largely improvised travelogue and food riff by this puckish pair, as they tooled around England, talking each other’s ear off and amusing themselves with a string of show business impersonations. They came back for an encore four years later with The Trip to Italy, more of the same with a change of scenery and cuisine, plus a few Don Corleone jokes. Now, opening this weekend is The Trip to Spain. Now they drop the third shoe – The Trip to Spain – with such impersonations as Ian McKellen, David Bowie, Michael Caine and Mick Jagger impersonating Michael Caine, plus some Don Quixote gags. Yes, it is all too similar to their other films, but they manage to be very funny anyway.
Theater: Speaking of familiar formulas, Wilton Manors’ Island City Stage has an annual tradition of an evening of short plays on themes of gay life, usually a little off-color. So it is again with Shorts Gone Wild 5, the fifth edition of the compilation production inspired by City Theatre’s Summer Shorts, with acknowledgement. This year, the numbers add up this way – 6 actors, 4 directors and 8 brief, provocative playlets. They may not all be winners, but those that cannot hold theatergoer interest are at least over in a few minutes. And if the company’s reputation holds, more skits score thumbs up than down. Continuing through Sept. 10. Call 954-519-2533 for tickets.