In a sense, the live arts are built on mistakes. It’s why there’s such a thing as rehearsals in the first place: Artists want the wheels to come off, preferably in private, and as early and unambiguously as possible. Better that than to have it happen during a show. When mistakes show up, artists have […]
Byron Woods
Bio: Byron Woods is the INDY's theater and dance critic.Email: [email protected]: http://twitter.com/byronwoods
Posted inArt
Paper men (and women)
This can’t be a good sign. After all, The Story is only the second journalist-bashing show of the season, and already I’m feeling exhausted. The first was Deep Dish’s Permanent Collection. For its admitted strengths, the constellation of social issues in Thomas Gibbons’ script still apparently couldn’t have been advanced without the convenient presence of […]
Posted inGuides
This home is dirty
It almost sounds like the setup for a standup routine: Once there was this homeless comedy troupe, see? Homeless, sure, but not without resources. Various bars and nightclubs would let them crash at their place–for a night or two each week. And that ice-cream shop was cool–until the unexpected meltdown last September. But they never […]
Posted inNews
Classic Lily
Lily Tomlin is hoping that her gig next week at Duke goes down better than the last one in the area–at Raleigh’s legendary 1970s jazz cabaret, The Frog and Nightgown. “It was hellacious,” she recalls. “I did not go over well. And there was no dressing room. I had to go lie down in the […]
Posted inArt
The vision that stops
It’s the reason there’s a new Independent on the stands each week: The tide of events, of news never ceases. More than that, the world’s understanding and interpretation of those events remain in flux, subject to update. New details from Basra, Kigali or Coahoma County in Mississippi have the potential to inform, change or overturn […]
Posted inArt
When criticism is redundant
Teachers in the performing arts know the discourse: “Well, that was pretty lame.” “Not yet, but getting closer!” They’re the kind of self-critical disclaimers gifted but insecure students make after a disappointing performance, usually because they haven’t adequately rehearsed. But these and other words came from show biz veterans Alan Campbell and Lauren Kennedy, during […]
Posted inNews
Tech toyland?
New tech toys walked hand in hand with theatrical difficulties of longer duration through The Spitfire Grill, Raleigh Little Theatre’s season opener last weekend. A new stage turntable proved a limited blessing when rudiments of characterization and music still weren’t entirely squared away last Saturday night, in a production whose ticket prices probe the highest […]
Posted inNews
New neighbors dance
It’s one of the most exciting moments in the life cycle of regional dance. A group of newcomers either arrive through the gravitational pull of the American Dance Festival or return here after extended sojourns: dance programs at major universities, individual dreamquests on the streets of New York, Chicago or Barcelona. It takes a little […]
Posted inArt
Pictures at an (International) Exhibition
Variations on a theme by David Byrne: In the future, people of all nationalities will be equally visible. Finding audio entertainment might prove a challenge: Radio reception will be very problematic; piped music is really gonna suck. Physical fitness is going to be key. And fashions–colorful short-shorts, skirts and pants, unobtrusive upper body wear–will reflect […]
Posted inNews
Monsters (in progress)
Has it really been four seasons since Carmen-Maria Mandley’s Bare Theatre last refreshed audiences in the Triangle? Her company’s 2001 renditions of Coriolanus and Much Ado About Nothing reintroduced clarity and precision to a playwright more frequently burlesqued than interpreted at the time. In paring back most of the trimmings, Mandley’s decidedly spare, “bare” aesthetic […]