My friend Erin Gilbreth recently started her own theater company here in New York called American Bard Theater Company. They specialize in putting on Shakespeare plays. Tonight, they open Measure For Measure at the Roy Arias Theater Center on 43rd Street. See their website for more info. And watch the promo video below. So excited!
They were announced yesterday and Bill T. Jones’s Fela! received many! And rightly so. If you haven’t seen this brilliant musical, definitely do go. I wrote about it here. Also, Bill T. Jones is to receive the Jacob’s Pillow Dance Award at this summer’s festival; he’ll be there in person to collect it at their opening night gala in June.
Memphis (the musical Danny Tidwell danced in) also received a few noms. I wrote about that show here and here.
The Tonys air on on June 13.
Photo of Fela! cast by Monique Carboni.
Maks Chmerkovskiy has been nominated for a Fred Astaire award for his dancing in Burn the Floor. Other nominees of note are Holley Farmer for Tharp’s Come Fly Away in the female dancer category and Tharp herself and Bill T. Jones in the choreographer category for Come Fly and Fela! respectively. Also nominated are the female ensemble of Fela! and the male ensemble of Memphis, as well as that show’s choreographer Sergio Trujillo, and Frederick Wiseman is nominated in the film category for his documentary on the Paris Opera Ballet, La Danse. Awards ceremony takes place June 7th at the theater in John Jay College. See the rest of the noms here.
Above photo of Chmerkovskiy from NY Daily News.
Photo of our Danny Tidwell (in back middle, obviously) recording the Memphis soundtrack, with the Broadway cast. Photo by Jenny Anderson, from Broadway.com.
If you’re in NY, or are heading in over the holidays to see the show, here’s the latest list of casting updates. A few DWTS pros (Maks Chmerkovskiy & Kym Johnson, then Edyta Sliwinska & Alec Mazo) are taking over Pasha and Anya’s roles, then P&A return in mid-January to finish out the show, which now ends mid-Feb.
Last week, my friend — the illustrious Taylor Gordon! — invited me to watch her dance in the Radio City Christmas Spectacular. (Taylor, trained in classical ballet, is not a Rockette but a seasonal dancer in the show.) As last year, the show is a lot of fun, very Christmassy, very geared toward the tourist crowd and to children, with a somewhat corny story-line (younger boy strives to and eventually convinces older, more skeptical boy of Santa’s existence). But the dancing and the costumes and the sets are tremendous and are the reason you really go (if you’re an adult, that is 🙂 ).
The Rockettes in particular are wondrous. Talk about astoundingly perfect synchronicity…
The soldier scene is my favorite. They march, they step, they turn in formation in almost mind-boggling unison, and then they fall, one by one, s-l-o-w-l-y, ever so slowly, one after and onto the other, in, again, mind-bogglingly perfect timing.
And now a few pictures of Taylor! She’s in the middle, in the coolly colorful tights.
Pink scarf, green bag, cool tights. So proud of her … again!
As a Santa — I’ve no idea which one.
And as a tutu-clad bear.
And a few more of the Rockettes.
Kick line!
Finale.
Taylor’s also a writer. Visit her blog for her accounts of what it’s like to be in the show.
And here is our friend Michael’s write-up of the evening.
“‘Memphis’ is not a comedy but it’s still a cartoon,” says Charles Isherwood.
I went on Friday night and I don’t disagree but I still liked it a lot. Excellent dancing, singing and acting — excellent performers and very good choreography (by Sergio Trujillo — who did chor for “Jersey Boys” as well). I found the basic story a bit facile and, unfortunately Danny Tidwell (my main reason for going) is not in it very much — he’s a dancer but has no speaking part — but still, it’s definitely worth seeing, especially if you like good singing, fun dance numbers that make you want to get up out of your seat, and a story that’s feel-good in a “Dirty Dancing” kind of way.
I’m out the door (Cedar Lake opens at Joyce tonight) but my review is coming soon — along with more pictures!
In the meantime, watch a good audio / slide show at the above NY Times link.
Above photos by Joan Marcus.
Stephen Hanna is returning to NYCB this winter season. Apparently he’s going to be listed as a guest for the upcoming season, but he’s resuming his principal rank. He leaves the Billy Elliot Broadway cast at the end of this month.
I’ll be excited to see him on the NYCB stage again, especially since the Billy Elliot production, ridiculously, didn’t give him enough to do.
His Billy Elliot replacement hasn’t yet been determined.
I know, this is starting to seem like the Pasha & Anya blog… but I just wanted to let people know that they are dancing in the Broadway on Broadway festival on Sunday, September 13th. Broadway on Broadway takes place every year and is basically a day-long series of free outdoor performances meant to highlight the various Broadway shows of the upcoming season. This year’s event is hosted by Michael McKean, who’s starring in the upcoming Superior Donuts, and will include performances by stars of Shrek the Musical, Next to Normal, Chicago, Memphis (Danny Tidwell is not performing though), Mamma Mia, Hair, Finian’s Rainbow, Ragtime, Billy Elliot the Musical, The Phantom of the Opera, West Side Story, South Pacific, etc. etc. — basically practically everything that’s on Broadway right now. Pasha and Anya are dancing a number from Burn the Floor, obviously.
Performances begin at 11:30 a.m. and take place from 43rd to 47th Streets.
If you missed Pasha Kovalev and Anya Garnis this weekend on WPIX, here’s the video. They talk about their own dancing, Burn the Floor, and do a fairly lengthy demo.