Results tagged “thewilmatheater”

I'm a bit of an Anglophile. I love British just-about-everything, except for the food. But I especially love British humor. And after attending and enjoying a staged reading of Roy Smiles' last spring, I figured I'd really love the fully-mounted production at The Wilma Theater.

The Age of Arousal Ticket Giveaway
12/5/07-12/10/07

The Academy of Music, 8PM, $22-124. (Halloween party $25) This performance runs through November 3.

Madi Distefano, Director of A 24-Hour The Bald Soprano

The final week of this year's DanceBOOM! at The Wilma Theater will feature a whole evening with an old favorite of Phillyist's: BalletX. We loved them last summer at DanceBOOM! and during last fall's PLAF, so we're really psyched to see their world premiere of "I Like You Different," choreographed by company founders Christine Cox and Matthew Neenan, along with fan favorites "Menscheit" and "Frequencies." If this weekend's production is anything at all like past BalletX performances we've seen, expect lots of impeccable ballet technique combined with a modern aesthetic and some really rockin' contemporary music.

Week two of DanceBOOM! at the Wilma kicked off on Broad Street in a big way with the N.E. Frankford Boys and Girls Club, American Legion Post 224 Drill Team and Nicetown Stars Dance Team. The Nicetown girls were adorable, and the drill team was really impressive in their precision. (It was lots of fun to watch terrified people try to figure out how to walk past without getting trampled, too.) None of the performers in either group of the pre-show were over eighteen, so it would be unfair of me to give any real criticism to the groups, but I'm certainly glad that I arrived at the Wilma early enough to see them.

Phillyist goes to a live entertainment. But we find that our dance consumption is sorely lacking of late, which is why we are pleased as punch that it's DanceBOOM! time once again at The Wilma. Three weeks of programming (with a different show each week!) kicks off tonight with "Men Dancing," a celebration of the strength and power that men bring to dance performance, with Chosen Dance Company, danceTactics, Tommie-Waheed Evans, Lionel Popkin, and a special streetside pre-show performance by Kingsessing Morris Men outside on Broad Street. If this year's line-up is anything like last year's, we're sure to see a great show. Stay tuned to Phillyist for the next two weeks' line-ups as well...

What are you doing this afternoon? Working, you say? Why would you want to go and do a thing like that when you could take off early and go catch a reading of Roy Smiles' cast members Scott Greer, Scott Barrow, and Ross Manson." Anything that has to do with Peter Sellers sounds absolutely great to us, so you'd best believe that the reading appeals to the Phillyist staff.

I haven't studied a lot of Brecht. But from what I have studied, I feel very safe in making the assertion that Brecht is either someone that people either adore and worship and elevate, or he's someone whose work people really can't stand. I lean heavily toward the former, which is why I was so excited to see The Wilma Theater's production of .

There are certain things that I'm willing to accept from books that I struggle with on the stage. That's why for me, stage adaptations don't always work. (Okay, so I love in high school—you knew they were all speaking Greek, even if you weren't reading Greek.)

Megan and Mason Wendell

The premise is simple and nothing new: a man, taken into custody for reasons he's not aware of. He is taken to a secret jail and interrogated, tortured even, by two police officers of a totalitarian state that seems like it could be Soviet but might not be. When he won't—can't?—speak, his only living brother, "special" in all the politically correct ways of speaking, is questioned too, used to bait the man who still doesn't understand how he could have been brought to that cell.

Pillowman Ticket Giveaway
10/2/06-10/7/06

The Wilma Theater's annual DanceBOOM! festival, celebrating the best in Philly dance, has its opening night tonight, and the program is pretty loaded. In fact, the performances begin before the show, with an "Afro-Puerto Rican street celebration" out on Broad Street called Fiesta de Loiza, presented by Raices Culturales Latinoamericanos. Reading the description on Wilma's website, we see there will be capes, horned masks, and bat-like outfits, which sounds pretty fun to us. The program proper features performances by Chris Aiken (who's doing a piece with two other dancers to piano accompaniment), Tania Isaac (a pretty amazing performer originally from the West Indies who'll be doing a soon-to-be-one-woman-show about motherhood and the self called Stuporwoman), and experimental dance troupe Reactionaries (performing their piece When Will You Come Home). Tonight's program will be playing through June 17th, but DanceBOOM! will continue through the end of the month, switching over to an entirely different program once every three days, which comes out to three completely separate sets of performances, if you're counting. That's a lot of dance! But we guess that's what the BOOM! is for.

Fun around town, for $10 or less:

Philadelphia does love its centennial celebrations. Here we are, still in the throes of the Franklin tricentennial madness, and we've decided to commemorate a bicentennial birthday, too! The 200th birthday in question in this case belongs to Edwin Forrest, famous Philadelphia actor and namesake of the Forrest Theatre. To mark this milestone anniversary of his birth, Mayor Street has declared today "Edwin Forrest Day."

Continue reading "Frugal in Philly - Im Cabaret, au Cabaret, to Cabaret"