Thursday 4/10 It’s just not groovy to live in grime, baby. Shag-alicious hipsters don’t do the shabby, get my drift? In The Secret Adventures of R.E. Cycle, outta-sight secret agent R.E. Cycle soils his radical duds cleaning up the environment after he is freed from a bottle of Tab. The…
Four artists in search of a drama A television set rises out of a huge flower bud in the middle of a room. On its screen, an opera singer warbles and emotes as 16mm film projections of women and water are cast over its surface. In a nearby corner a…
We’d venture that “new” is not the word that immediately comes to mind when you think of classical music. The New Music Miami ISCM Festival will change that perception. Presented by the FIU School of Music in association with the International Society for Contemporary Music, the event brings together some…
Ever heard of someone by the name of Ida B. Wells? She is the largely unknown but fascinating subject of Constant Star, a beautifully produced study of determination and courage now playing at the Florida Stage in Manalapan. Wells was an American original. Born a black slave in the Civil…
Performance art is not for everyone. Even as symbolic movements, seeing the artist’s body intimate acts of self-inflicted violence, humiliation, or sex are always challenging — even for the willing observer. But one thing is certain: Since the 1960s the artist’s body has functioned as a physical resistance to power…
Maybe all you want out of your pop music is a few minutes of escape, a radio-friendly respite from the heavy humdrum of your workaday existence. Maybe you likes to hang with 50 Cent, who survived a few gunshots (and doesn’t let you forget it) to party another day; or…
The story of the Cuban vocal group Los Zafiros is decidedly cinematic. Four handsome lads from Havana’s working-class Cayo Hueso neighborhood formed the group in 1962. Accompanied by a guitarist, the singers perfected a swinging synthesis of American doo-wop and Cuban rumba. Los Zafiros shot to fame on the island,…
Many playwrights draw from their personal experiences, but Edward Albee appears downright obsessed by his. The veteran, venerable playwright returns again and again to familiar subjects: dysfunctional family dynamics and the inescapable isolation of human beings from one another. Who’s Afraid Of Virginia Woolf?, Tiny Alice, The Play About The…
Where in hell does all this stuff come from? That’s a question constantly posed by readers, moviegoers, and half-soused nightclub audiences. What are the sources of an artist’s art? What weird compulsion enables a performer to stand naked before the prying eye of a camera, an empty canvas, or a…
It was only in 1967 that Great Britain struck from its jurisprudence the “common scold,” essentially a crime of catty insolence for which the convicted party — almost always a woman disturbing the peace by nagging a man — was punished via a public ducking into cold water. Nobody likes…
Lili Renteria believes the stage doesn’t exist just to present theater. The stage exists to present possibilities. Hence the choice of an elegant hand fan as the logo of her brainchild Teatro Abanico, a 200-seat theater and gallery space in Coral Gables. “The fan is not just a visual symbol,”…
Thursday 3 Active girls and guys gone wild. Before the late 1980s, Ocean Drive’s Art Deco hotels boasted a slew of Jewish immigrant radicals, many of them retirees from New York City, where they had been active in the civil rights and labor movements and sometimes even in anarchist groups…
More than 40 years into her career, composer and performance artist Meredith Monk describes her intricate vocal arrangements and particular style of dance as primordial, raw, visceral, and tribal. Since the 1960s, the ever-braided artist has forged a unique niche for herself, writing and performing mostly a cappella works that…
SAT 4/5 Home to prehistoric Tequesta Indians, used as U.S. Army headquarters during wars against the Seminole Indians, the southernmost terminus for trade along the east coast of America, and a magnet for urban sprawl and drug-toting ships, the Miami River is also a prime party spot. And while rollin’…
MON 4/7 Frustrated golfers have rarely referred to the legendary course at the Doral Resort and Spa as “heavenly.” Indeed the challenging — often treacherous — 7125-yard course is commonly known by its decidedly unsaintly nickname: the Blue Monster. This week, though, the Monster should be on its best behavior…
SAT 4/5 Slobbering, roly-poly fatsos. Shrieking cherubs in poopy Pampers. Babies are every parent’s bundle of joy. They are also heaven-sent gold mines for manufacturers of infant wear, rattles, pacifiers, and child-safety equipment. In fact analysts predict Americans will spend about $29 billion on baby purchases this year. New mommies…
THUR 4/3 Too many worries about the war have your forehead in a constant furrow. The perpetual pout deepens your frown lines by the second. Worst of all, your utter disbelief in everything that is happening in Iraq has given you a permanent Donald Rumsfeld-style squint. Hello, crow’s feet!Yes, war…
SAT 4/5 The best crossbred bands in the city will mix it up at Cielo Lounge (66 SW Sixth St.) with Latin rhythms, funky grooves, electronica, rap, roots revivals, and other refried Afro beats at the Miami/New York Latin Funk Festival. The Spam Allstars, Lee Williams & the Square Egg,…
Architecture has become selfish and homogeneous — it lacks diversity and a genuine connection with nature.” — architect Lucien Kroll There’s so much wrong about Miami’s urban fabric: poor design, structural monotony, congestion. And a critical problem is our lack of green areas, for shade, for leisure. Perhaps our politicians…
In a hurry? Me too, so I’ll get to the point. This is a review of Floyd Collins, an innovative musical that’s got a week or two left in its run at Actors’ Playhouse in Coral Gables. The story is based on a real incident in the 1920s, when a…
War, as it turns out, is good for absolutely nothing when it comes to anti-war songs. At the risk of sounding like Bill O’Reilly (who, no doubt, listens only to Wagner), it’s time to protest the protesters, most of whom are blowin’, all right, just not in the wind. The…
You know how boys love to play soldier? How they get stern-faced and march out to destroy an enemy whom they believe needs destroying? Well, actors are into that too. Sometimes they soldier on even when Bruce Willis or Mel Gibson isn’t around to help them frown determinedly. Such is…
