EXTRA CRITICUM

Lark Play Development Center, I covet your restrooms.

The other night I had the pleasure of visiting the Lark's new digs, located at 311 W. 43rd for a table read of a very talented friend's new play. The play was great. But since it was a first read (first ever, ever) I will not even mention it by name. Its virgin status ought to be preserved. ;)

But I had the good fortune to visit the loo during a brief break and -- wow! -- I love what the architects have done! Readers of this blog are by now familiar with my rantings about venues. You know that one of my numero uno pet peeves is the sorry condition so many small theatre spaces are kept in. Check out: Please! Take out the garbage! for more on this topic.

More Troubadour Innovation

Duane's excellent post about Lucy Wainwright reminded me of one of my personal favorite folk singers who has been on the road for the past 20 yrs. and is no stranger to the non-traditional venue.

In fact, this coming Saturday, April 2, Cosy Sheridan will be playing to an audience assembled in a livingroom in a Chelsea loft in Manhattan as part of Thomas Boyd's Music Over Manhattan series.

I'll be there. Care to join me?

For Cosy's complete tour schedule visit her website.

Presenting the Intrepid and Independent Lucy Wainwright Roche

cross-posted to Lapis Loquens Blog

Flux doesn’t begin to describe the current business models for many artists in the U.S.  Popular music was the first sector plunged into chaos.  Book publishing, film and theatre soon followed.  The chaos has been different for each sector, but chaos it has been.  I try to follow developments in these other arts, looking for insights that might apply to the theatre world.

Sometimes one person really can make a difference

As I've toured here and there screening our little film, We Pedal Uphill at museums and schools and independent theatres, I've developed a somewhat wry refrain when asked by enthusiastic audience members how the film can be seen more widely. I usually meet their gaze and suggest (rather dryly) "You could pick up the phone and call a theatre owner and ask him or her to screen the film." This usually gets a laugh.

Little did I know, I was actually giving out some useful advice.

Blowin' in the wind (so to speak) in Philly

I’m very excited that the city of my birth, that is, the City of Brotherly Love, that is, where the Phillies play, is having an excellent international arts festival, and I’ve been invited to write about it. I’m certainly planning on grabbing one o’those cheap buses with the free Wi-Fi and making my way 99 miles south for some of the events. I had a chance to see a sneak preview here in NYC a few weeks ago, and have been going over the festival brochure and marking it up with “got to see” and “this looks good!”

The King's Speech Production Design Most Unorthodox

Big thanks to E.C. pal Aaron Mack Schloff for pointing us to this juicy tidbit. Remeber that fabulously distressed studio from The King's Speech, the one in which Geoffrey Rush did his best work? Well... apparently some other men have also done some of their best work there in roles of a different sort. Who knew that that distressed wall (which, you've gotta admit is pretty amazing) also served as a backdrop for naked gay British blokes in a porno shoot?!!

Here's the full story on Queerty.com.

Culture on the Road: Tracy Jacobson and The Music Bus Tour

OK. This is almost too cool for words. A young bassoonist named Tracy Jacobson has a new start-up. She calls it The Music Bus Tour and it will officially launch this May. Here's the basic gist: A bunch of classical musicians board a bus and criss-cross the nation for a few weeks with one simple mission: to bring classical music to ears that otherwise might never hear it in unexpected places such as libraries, public parks, bars, restaurants, churches... you name it.

Some unlikely venues are best left alone

Last night my pal Brenda and I took a chance on an evening concert in the Winter Garden at Ground Zero. The attraction for us, mostly, was the performance by the Knickerbocker Chamber Orchestra of portions of a work-in-progress about legendary city planner, Robert Moses. But, for me, another draw was the unusual venue for the concert.

I had never been before but the Winter Garden is essentially a cathedral to corporate power -- an enormous marble sarcophagus of a lobby with a ceiling height that rivals Grand Central Station's main terminal, except here done in a late 20th C. style, complete with windows everywhere and about a dozen 50' palm trees soaring up toward a sky that will forever remain beyond glass.

Q&A with Linda Mussmann of TSL in Hudson, NY

Some of you may recall the cyber-firestorm that followed my post on Hudson, New York. To date, this post has probably received more intense flame and support than anything we've done here on E.C. Because Time Space Limited is one of the venues mentioned in my post, and because I know Linda Mussmann, its co-Founder and co-Executive Director, (and a three-time mayoral candidate in Hudson) to be a very clever, enterprising and imaginative gal, I invited her to participate in a Q&A with me about living and working as an artist and an entrepreneur in Hudson, NY.

Here's what Linda had to say in response to my questions:

Hospitality Among Presenters: Extinct? or Dying? You Decide

Whenever an artist is invited to present work at a venue, there's an opportunity on the part of the presenter for making someone feel special with very little effort. To some presenters this comes naturally. To others, not so much. Here, in random order, are some of the things I feel every presenter, curator, producer or host ought to think about before they invite us to screen, perform, talk or appear.

You can lead a town to culture but you can't make it drink

Last weekend I spent at a friend's house in Ghent, New York. Ghent is one town over from Hudson. Hudson is a charming little town about 2 hours north of the city along the east side of the Hudson river. In the past couple decades, it's been a magnet for a lot of antique dealers, art collectors (and dealers) and gay and lesbian ex-Manhattanites.

My friend who lives in Ghent has long been lobbying for me to consider joining the throngs of ex-New Yorkers who have relocated out of harm's way of Ground Zero. And I've actually considered it. The town is picturesque, as is the surrounding countryside. But each time I visit, one thing keeps slapping me in the face. Hudson feels like a town that's being dragged to the edge of the culture creek, its head being pushed down toward the water, its citizenry being told "Drink! Drink! It's good for you." And as far as I can tell, the town is not yet entirely convinced.

From the sublime to the sublime: Tennessee Williams at 7:30, Jackie Beat at midnight

Last night was one of those what-a-great-town-this-is kinda nights. My friend Evan and I started out at the Laura Pels [B] at 7:30PM seeing Roundabout's gorgeous production of Glass Menagerie, then headed over to the Westway Diner [C] where we met Andrew after his own performance for a quick dinner, then walked a block and a half to the Laurie Beechman Theatre (underneath the West Bank Cafe) [D] to catch Jackie Beat's show. Actually, I left something out. The evening started at 6PM when Evan and I threw down a couple of shots of Quervo at Happy Hour at Posh [A], a cute little gay bar whose name is apparently meant to be ironic. (In the Alanis Morissette usage, of course.)

All of it -- tacky gay bar, Judith Ivey in a classic Tennessee Williams masterpiece, greasy diner food and completely inappropriate and wildly irreverent drag humor -- was within easy walking distance. How great is that? Here's a little map of our trajectory to drive the point home. (Just think of this as a little bloggy Powerpoint expression.)

I Am SO 1976

I’ve been looking back at my film commentary for this here blog, and it didn’t surprise me that most of the films I wrote about were not current releases. “So what’s up with that?” you ask.

Here's what’s up with that:

Ohio Theatre: The end is nigh?

This just in from E.C. reader/commenter/prize-winner Robin Rothstein who sits on the Steering Committee for the Community Forum on the Ohio Theatre. The loss of the Ohio would be a loss of a piece of NYC theatre history, not to mention just one more casualty in a long and ever-expanding list of closings of small venues friendly to experimentation and risk-taking.

Here's a bit about the Community Forum scheduled for Monday night, April 26th at the Ohio. If you can make it, please do and report back to us here at E.C. about what transpired. We all have a vested interest here, folks.

Screaming into the Abyss. The projectionist can't hear you cause he's not there.

Went to see a movie at the Chelsea Clearview the other night and the house lights were not dimmed for the feature, as is customary.

Several patrons started shouting "House Lights!" I think they thought that there was actually a human being in the booth. Someone who could hear them.