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| The Bat flies in, Gee's Bend charms, Jewels sparkle | |
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by Milton W. Hamlin -
SGN A&E Writer The Emerald City entertainment scene is now in full swing with openings, extensions, and previews packing the calendar. Bits&Bytes rarely has an open square on his long-range planning sheet. Read on: DIE FLEDERMAUS, ORFEO HIGHLIGHT OPERA, MUSIC CALENDAR THIS WEEKEND Seattle music fans rarely have the chance to see two full staged operas in one weekend, let alone two operas that range from the sublimely silly to the seriously serious. Early Music Guild, one of Seattle's most successful small music groups, hosts the touring Italian opera company, La Venexiana, and its internationally acclaimed production of Monteverdi's Baroque masterpiece, La Favola d'Orfeo (The Story Of Orpheus). Performances at the historic Moore Theatre in downtown Seattle are tonight and tomorrow at 8 p.m. and Sunday, February 8, at 2 p.m. Special discounts are offered to Seattle Opera season subscribers. Ticket details are available at (206) 325-7066. Seattle's Early Music Guild is celebrating its 32nd year. Two other concerts are offered later in February. The Seattle Gilbert & Sullivan Society inherited the Hans Wolf Operetta Series when the exuberant music champion passed away several years ago. Thus far, the G&S/Wolf collaboration has been a first-class addition to the Seattle music scene. Johann Strauss, Jr.'s beloved The Bat (technically, Die Fledermaus, but this is an in-English production) flies into town for three performances this weekend at Town Hall on First Hill. Performances are tonight and tonight at 7:30 p.m. and Sunday at 2 p.m. Ticket information is available at (206) 682-0796 or at pattersong.org (love that e-mail address!). The Gilbert&Sullivan Society is gearing up for its annual summer production, and this year it's Utopia, Limited, one of the rarest titles in the G&S repertory. It opens July 10 for a three-weekend run. PNB SPARKLES WITH 3-PART JEWELS, NEW YORK TIMES CHECKS IN Pacific Northwest Ballet fans are obviously delighted with the sparkling production of George Balanchine's Jewels, often considered the first full-length plotless ballet when it was introduced in New York in 1967. PNB added the center section, Rubies, to its repertoire more than 20 years ago, but the full three-part work, opening with Emeralds and ending with Diamonds, an incredible salute to the old-fashioned "all-white" Russian ballets, joined PNB's programming only three years ago. The production continues with evening performances Friday, February 6 and Saturday, February 7 at 7:30pm. To no one's surprise, this Jewels is first-class in every way. Emeralds, the all-green opening abstract work, featured Louise Nadeau on opening night. Nadeau has announced her retirement from PNB at the end of this season, "after 19 years of elegant and graceful performances." (A special tribute to her career, featuring her final performances in excerpts from the works most associated with her years at PNB, is scheduled for June.) Danced to two selections from Faure, Emeralds is a classic French ballet that always pleases. Rubies, a PNB favorite for two decades, uses music by Stravinsky. The all-red production has a jazzy quality, and is a stark, striking Stravinsky outing. Ariana Lallone, the long-legged PNB favorite, was stunning, as usual, with Jonathan Porretta and Jodie Thomas taking the leads as the forefront couple. One minor mishap - a fall from a member of the ensemble - startled the audience, but ballet - like figure skating - is always a perilous event. A quick recovery and Rubies was back on track. Diamonds, the classic white and silver fantasy, seemed under-rehearsed on opening night with precision from the corps de ballet clearly out the window. (Friends who went to a performance later opening weekend reported that all was corrected by the subsequent performances.) Diamonds is one of those "everything was beautiful at the ballet" works, where "handsome men lift lovely girls in white...." (as Broadway's A Chorus Line immortalized the experience). Another ensemble member fell in Diamonds, a very unusual experience. Again, a quick recovery and the ballet flowed on. PNB was delighted when the major dance reviewer from the New York Times attended three (as in three) performances of Jewels on its first weekend. His rave review of all three performances and all three casts once again returned PNB to the front page of the New York Times entertainment section. It may be provincial, but Seattle audiences love to read reviews of Emerald City productions in major national papers and magazines & especially rave reviews. PNB continues a busy month with performances of Pinocchio, the company's first production specially developed for family audiences. The new one-hour work, featuring 60 students from the PNB ballet school, is set for a Saturday matinee, February 7, and two matinees on Sunday, February 8. Ticket information on all PNB events is available at (206) 441-2424. PNB's Broadway Festival is the next subscription program, a mixed-repertory bill with works from West Side Story, Carousel and "Slaughter On Tenth Avenue" from Rodgers & Hart's On Your Toes highlighting the four-work program. Check it out. TAPROOT SCORES WITH GEE'S BEND'S SOCIAL, POLITICAL POWER Taproot Theatre, one of Seattle's few theaters that is always driven by its philosophical mission statement, has another winner with the new Gee's Bend, the powerful, personal celebration of the human spirit. The story of African American women in the isolated Gee's Bend area in rural Alabama who became nationally noted for their quilt designs opens Taproot's 2009 season. Karen Lund's on-target direction delivers a play with touching performances that delighted Taproot's loyal subscription audience. Bits&Bytes has rarely seen a spontaneous standing ovation that was as heartfelt as the one at last Saturday's matinee. The 90-minute play has its structural problems but the characters and the brisk Taproot production sail over these narrative concerns. Samantha Rund, making her Taproot debut, is sensational as Sadie, the young woman who marries in 1939 and whose life through 2000 offers the play its structure. Her involvement in civil rights, marching with Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., drinking from a "whites only" drinking fountain, her constant refuge in quilting give Elyzabeth Gregory Wilder's award-winning script a workable structure. Tracy Michelle Hughes, in another Taproot debut, Faith Russell, in two roles in a Taproot encore, and Geoffrey Simmons, who was incredible as Jim in last summer's Taproot production of Big River, add key support in the play's other roles. Taproot, which has used multi-racial casting and "color blind" casting for several years, stages its first production with an all African American cast with Gee's Bend, and SGN, as usual, celebrates and praises diversity in all of its facets. Ticket information about Gee's Bend is available at (206) 781-9706. Tuesdays With Morrie is next on Taproot's calendar. Taproot has several special events on its Gee's Bend's calendar - ask the box office for complete details. |
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