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These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: That Time
GENRE: Theater/dance
GROUP: Tongue & Groove, RealLivePeople(in)Motion
ATTENDED: Sat., April 20, 8 p.m., Kimmel Center
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: Tongue & Groove is a critically acclaimed theater ensemble that spontaneously performs unscripted scenes and monologues inspired by personal information anonymously submitted by the audience . . . Especially for PIFA 2013, T&G is collaborating with dance company RealLivePeople(in)Motion, an ensemble that is similarly catalyzed by the audience’s true stories.
WE THINK: Tongue & Groove continues to evolve, tweaking its improv format to fit PIFA's time-machine theme by prompting audience memories about moments in our lives we would like to return to, shared anonymously on Post-it notes stuck to a timeline (write clearly, please!). Mine — the morning of my first wedding in November 1989, to follow my impulse to run away and thus spare myself a year in hell — was not chosen, but audience reactions made clear whose were.
Bobbi Block's talented long-form, realistic improv-ers are smartly teamed with RLPiM, dancers in street clothes who likewise explore real life. Actors dance and dancers act together successfully in the T&G style of creating genuine, rich relationships in an instant and finding humor in human behavior rather than punch lines. Using a variety of formats and styles (monologues, domestic scenes, inter-generational conflicts, instant message exchanges), the hour-long show I witnessed blended stories united by their complex emotional levels: I laughed heartily, yet felt tears rising by the end.
Working against the performers, it must be said, was the ironically named Innovation Studio, which stifles innovation. Whoever chose the high-backed plastic chairs and didn't provide risers apparently never sat in a theater before: in the second of five rows, I couldn't see performers on the floor unless they stood, and I watched through a picket fence of heads. Even the back row of high chairs had trouble, but in the fourth row of normal-height chairs — which would feel close in any of the city's much less expensive but more sensible small theaters — the conditions are miserable. Moreover, shifting for a better view makes the unsteady chairs creak and squeak, producing a steady undercurrent of the-locusts-are-coming sounds. Artists must either build a stage on the beautiful hardwood floor or limit their choices and punish their audiences. How can the Kimmel Center lead us into the future when its designers learned nothing from the past?
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: Five too-short plays about the future.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: FutureFest
GENRE: Theater
GROUP: Luna Theater Company
ATTENDED: Sat., April 20, 8 p.m., Adrienne Theater
CLOSES: April 27
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: Luna Theater Company journeys to the future with their second annual play festival, FutureFest. The world premiere of five one-act plays, FutureFest explores how our visions of the future inform our understanding of ourselves and world today.
WE THINK: In keeping with PIFA's time-machine theme, FutureFest offers five vignettes about possible futures. It’s hard to imagine such a premise without the dystopian societies and Dickian virtual realities we’re used to, and the festival definitely delivers in that respect. There are androids, post-apocalypse scenarios, marriage-counseling simulations, artificial organs and even “head sex,” which is much better than that sweaty, smelly, “real sex” we have now.
Oddly enough, it’s the show’s vignette format that makes it hard to sit through. Sci-fi inventions tend to work best when properly introduced, and then demonstrated more thoroughly, in a longer format, like a novel or feature-length film — enough time for a little world-building. At least three of the stories here attempt to pack so much unfamiliar terminology into so little digestion time that a lot ends up being incomprehensible.
Still, Luna makes good use of the space, piling a lot of post-apocalyptic junk onstage and colorful TV installations in the wall that give the show a more cohesive visual feel. The performances are spot-on, as well. Whether they’re playing familiar types or bunnies that create universes, the actors know exactly who they are and what they want, even if the audience isn’t so sure.
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: Philadanco addresses the Big Bang.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: The Big Bang!
GENRE: Dance
GROUP: Philadanco
ATTENDED: Fri., April 19, 8 p.m., Kimmel Center
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: In this riveting program created just for PIFA, Philadanco celebrates The Big Bang, 13 billions years ago!
WE THINK: Philadanco pulled out the stops for this show, which begins, and ends, with a bang. The bill of fare presents a potpourri of 'Danco's dance styles, in four works that highlight the company's superb technique and demonstrating how its choreography has evolved over the years. It begins with an energetic early work of classic Philadanco style — long, graceful leg and arm extensions coupled with deep, athletic leg work — and ends with a contemplative contemporary dance featuring a bevy of elegant yet physically challenging duets. At the show I saw, throughout the program, people clapped and whupped during the individual pieces; they just couldn’t wait till the work ended to acknowledge an especially impressive feat. And who could blame 'em: this stellar corps delivers heartfelt body and soul for this exhilarating program.
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: Dan Deacon is in your iPhone.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: SENDMSG
GENRE: Music/multimedia
GROUP: Dan Deacon
ATTENDED: April 12, 8:30 p.m., Kimmel Center
CLOSED: April 12
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: Internet Hall of Fame inductee Ray Tomlinson sent the first email in 1971, forever changing the landscape of communication technology. Musing on that critical moment 40 years ago, [Dan] Deacon has crafted a one-of-a-kind musical experience, with his signature combination of music and tech.
WE THINK: Despite the connections that can be drawn between the potent energy of the first sent e-mail and Dan Deacon’s own raucously energetic live shows (think rave meets punk), Ray Tomlison’s crowning achievement was mentioned all but about once during Deacon’s performance last Friday. The rest of the night played out like any one of Deacon’s other shows, with the exception of it’s criminally short duration of roughly an hour and fifteen minutes.
Deacon spent the night playing MC/DJ/bizarro boot camp corporal, organizing various dance-based games to cuts from his entire catalogue throughout the set. A notable one of these games involved making the audience build a “dance tunnel” that wound out of (and back into) the theatre. The real star of the night, however, was the Wham City Lights smartphone app. When working correctly, all the audience had to do was lift the phone in the air, tilt it to Deacon’s specifications, and the dark-lit theatre turned into a pulsating light show worthy of any festival rave. Deacon’s shows are their own form of electric church, and in this repurposed space, everybody felt the love.
–Sameer Rao
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: Dance like you've got yellow fever.
Remember that cover story I wrote on Barred for Life? It was about this guy, Stewart Ebersole, who right now is a marine geologist, but also the author and photographer who traveled around the country taking pictures of people with Black Flag tattoos. It's an awesome book and it gave me a chance to drone on about the band for a bit.
The book is getting an official release party Sunday night, with cheap drinks, loud music and maybe some punk-related movie-watching at Tattooed Mom, which is kinda sort where the Barred for Life project got going in the first place.
Sunday, April 21, 7-10 p.m., free, with DJ Brown Jeff is spinning all the "hardcore era hits," Tattooed Mom, 530 South St., tattooedmomphilly.com.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: Where Heaven's Dew Divides
GENRE: Dance
GROUP: Germaine Ingram Project
ATTENDED: April 18, 7:30 p.m., Innovation Studio at the Kimmel Center
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: Percussive dancer/choreographer and vocal improviser Germaine Ingram, modern dancer/choreographer Leah Stein and a company of dance and music artists channel key moments and personalities from the history and memory of Philadelphia’s religious life of the late 18th and early 19th centuries.
WE THINK: Shows that draw inspiration from social injustice can come off like a lecture performed in a theatrical way. There is so much intent to make a point it's soapbox art. Fortunately, Where Heaven's Dew Divides opts for a more open-ended approach.
That's a neat feat considering the piece gleans inspiration from George Washington's house slaves, African-American religious leaders of the late 1700s, the role of women in the black church movement and Philadelphia's yellow fever epidemic.
All those inspirations are evident in the work, yet the piece is abstract enough that it's not like you're getting hit over the head with all that backstory. Rather, Where Heaven's Dew Divides is a rhythmic ode to the capacity for human expression in dance, music and song. A percussive tap dance is like a conversation between three people. Yet, the whole thing is uplifting. The collective spirit of this first-rate cast flat-out moves you. That's the beauty of well-done art.
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: A Zen Buddhist Drumline.
These huge arts festivals can be overwhelming — how to figure out what's worth seeing? CP's sending someone to nearly every event PIFA's putting on over the next month to help you decide, so check back with Critical Mass all month long for comprehensive, ongoing reviews.
SHOW: Hiraki: Tsunami Loss & Hope
GENRE: Music
GROUP: KyoDaiko Taiko Drummers of Philadelphia
ATTENDED: April 18, 7 p.m., Shofuso Japanese House & Garden
CLOSES: April 18
BRIEF SELF-DESCRIPTION: A specially commissioned work by Kaoru Watanabe that memorializes the victims of the 2011 catastrophe and the resilience of its survivors.
WE THINK: The weather was just foreboding enough to cast West Fairmount’s Shofuso Japanese House and Garden in a haze that gave the garden setting the look of an oil painting atmosphere, all swirling and muted tones that the KyoDaiko ensemble hollowed through. The couple dozen drummers are all of varying skill levels (between one and eight years, according to the program) but this aids the idea of a communal taiko performance. Watanabe, himself a classically trained fue (Japanese wooden flute) and taiko player, opened the performance with his solemn fue, slowly gliding his way to the bridge overtaking the garden’s center island. A sole dancer, wearing a white geisha robe and face paint, twisted among the drums like a specter before the KyoDaiko drummers emerged.
It’s astounding how impactful taiko drumming can be with its sparse arrangements and, keeping with its historic origin, emphasis on minimalism. The Hiraki piece played with multiple dynamic levels of loud vs. soft. The performers themselves echoed the ghostly dancer with rhythmic chants, appearing to honor those lost in the recent tsunami. At its most climactic, the drummers were trancelike and damn near funky, like a Zen Buddhist Drumline. I’d like to see Nick Cannon behind an odaiko next time.
PREVIOUSLY IN PIFA: All hail Stevie Wonder.
The Big Bang Theory sucks ass. I mean, I assume it does. When I want something silly and dorky, I go for Community. (This is totes the darkest timeline amirite?)
Somehow all that was supposed to be me talking about City Paper's Science + Tech Issue, which came out today to coincide with Philadelphia Science Festival and Philly Tech Week. Here's what's in it:
TECH! Emily Guendelsberger talked to that Drexel prof who turned the Cira Centre into the mother of all Pongs. (See Also: video of the thing in action).
SCIENCE! Check out this COMIC about a very nervy lady! I'm crazy proud and excited about this projected. Written by Jess Bergman. Illustrated by Evan Lopez. Edited by Emily G. So cool. (Evan also did the cover.)
PICKS! And of course we've got lots of suggestions on what to do during all the fests. James Randi! Developing Philly! Robots locked in mortal combat!
REFERENCE! This blog title is swiped from the greatest comic of all time (by Michael Kupperman).
Atta boy, Mike
It’s fair to wonder what a solo show from Michael Nesmith – the most enigmatic of former Monkees – would be like. Is there loping country-rock? Is there conceptualizing befitting the music video and cult film (he helped produce Repo Man, you know) pioneer? Does he wear a wool hat?
In short: Yes, yes and definitely no.
With this weekend’s passing of Vince Montana, Jr., the backbone to all that was disco, Philly soul and local Latino and Nuyorican soul — Philly International Records, MSFB, the Salsoul Orchestra — has gone. He was the vibe and the vibraphone and deserved a place in every music hall of fame that would have him. Luckily, there’ll be a place for him amongst the next fleet of inductees into Philadelphia’s Walk of Fame. I spoke with Vince for CP here. A true treasure.
The rumors have been greatly exaggerated. Word went around that master chef Georges Perrier might be retiring from the whisk and the sauce pan but the comes news that he’ll take over Chip Roman’s Mica May 7-11 with a menu of his own designing. Guess Georges just wanted to be free of his bricks and mortar locations.
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