The theater goes dark and suddenly, a heavily adorned tribesperson appears on stage and that familiar tune begins: “Nants ingonyama bagithi Baba!” The chant gets gradually louder as actors costumed as wild animals start filing in through the isles. Soon, the stage is full of creatures all there for the…
If you’re looking to get your funny bone tickled, then 2015 is going to be a good year. This year the Magic City plays host to some marquee comics from mainstream, observational comics like Jerry Seinfeld and Seth Meyers to improv groups like The Groundlings and Second City and funny…
Did Mad Cat’s Paul Tei select Neil Simon’s The Star-Spangled Girl despite the fact that it’s a bad play or because of it? This is an unusual question to ponder when attending a play, but Mad Cat operates on a different plane of reality from most companies, a headspace so…
An Alonzo King dance is almost unimaginable without facility of movement, those forcefully shifting patterns of gorgeous bodies that make for a seductive surface. Yet what gives greater value to the program this San Francisco-based choreographer’s LINES Ballet is bringing to the South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center this weekend is…
In the world of dance and movement, utilizing film as a medium opens up a new world of options not available in live, site-specific performance. Boundaries can be broken, the laws of physics can be defied — when film is involved, anything is possible. And here in Miami, anything is…
A gray corset-like dress with yellow stripes is worn by a muscular man. Adorning his arms are yellow feathers, giving him the appearance of a bird in flight as he moves gracefully. On this dancer’s head are three bird puppets, held up by a metal pole. Gliding across the stage,…
The best choreographers are prodigious ministers, sealing holy unions between movement and sound. To great effect, Balanchine made it his gospel to “see the music, hear the dance,” the inspiration for Miami City Ballet’s second program of the season, which kicks off this Friday. MCB’s offerings are diverse while representing…
On Monday, organizers of the Guggenheim Museum’s Works & Process series announced that they had chosen Justin Peck’s Heatscape for inclusion in the prestigious series. The Guggenheim’s series offers audiences’ insight into both the creators and performers of forthcoming works. It’s also is meant to preview what insiders believe to…
Fifteen Cuban actors took to a Havana stage Wednesday night and belted out some familiar songs: One Song Glory, La Vie Bohème, and Seasons of Love. The songs are probably familiar to any Broadway enthusiast, they’re all from the Pulitzer-winning musical Rent. Staging a performance of Rent might not seem…
It says a lot that Tarell Alvin McCraney’s radical reinterpretation of Antony and Cleopatra — a GableStage coproduction with New York’s Public Theater and the UK’s Royal Shakespeare Company, and a play anticipated for more than a year — wasn’t the best or second-best or even third-best work GableStage produced…
Most performers will agree that a show never really feels like it is complete until close to the closing night of a run. This sentiment was true for Teo Castellanos when he premiered Fat Boy at Miami Light Project’s Light Box at Goldman Warehouse in 2011. He’s back with a…
On the second day of eighth grade in 1975, Teo Castellanos, a runty Puerto Rican kid in shiny new Pro-Keds, nervously scanned the hallways of Carol City Junior High between classes, on the lookout for his nemesis. The year before, a much bigger kid had approached from behind in drama…
Actors’ Playhouse has an identity crisis. How else do you explain the emotional whiplash induced by its programming every year? This is a theater torn between cutting-edge drama and milquetoast comedy, between shows that push its audience in new directions and ones that reward passive complacency. Two seasons ago, it…
No comedian has done it like Tom Rhodes. After proving himself as a top tier American club comic, life and love took Tom elsewhere. He established a fierce international presence and for decades maintained relevance in both spheres. He is simultaneously both relaxed and hungry to conquer. He’s sharp, newly-sober,…
The December holidays are approaching and along with them, as sure as thicker waists and thinner wallets, The Nutcracker. Big-scaled or modest, all-local or propped up by imported talent, there’s a production of America’s most popular ballet to suit any taste. But please don’t take the predictable assortment for granted…
Ronen Koresh, long a distinguished dancer and since 1991 artistic director of his own company, is fearless in his defiance of borders. Appearing at the Arsht Center this week, the choreography of this Israeli native, now established in Philadelphia, draws from ballet, folk, modern and jazz dance and uses music…
The Knight Foundation announced its Arts Challenge winners this week, awarding 47 projects that will share in $2.29 million. To qualify, the projects must be about art, must take place in or benefit Miami, and the winners must find funds to match the Knight grant within a year. Out of…
Jonathan Larson’s beloved musical Rent is headed to Cuba. Deadspin reports the Spanish-language production will be produced by Nederlander Worldwide Entertainment in partnership with the Cuban National Council of Performing Arts. Nederlander says it’s the first Broadway musical with a full cast, musicians and first-class production elements produced in Cuba…
In this week’s Miami New Times, we profile 30 of the most interesting characters in town, with portraits of each from photographer Stian Roenning. See the entire Miami New Times People Issue here. Dance, the most primal, universal form of self-expression, often takes a back seat in Miami. In a…
In this week’s Miami New Times, we profile 30 of the most interesting characters in town, with portraits of each from photographer Stian Roenning. See the entire Miami New Times People Issue here. These days it’s entirely fair to call Nathalie Zarate a belly-dance superstar. She runs the popular Dreams…
In this week’s Miami New Times, we profile 30 of the most interesting characters in town, with portraits of each from photographer Stian Roenning. See the entire Miami New Times People Issue here. Nery Saenz is a funny guy. Everybody around him can sense it. In fact, his friends and…
Playwright Joshua Harmon may or may not have been thinking of No Exit when he wrote his acrid dramedy Bad Jews. But after seeing the riveting new production of Harmon’s play at GableStage, Sartre’s metaphysical masterpiece seems like a touchstone in at least one sense: It depicts a handful of…
