The Brothers Grimm were in top form when they found and refashioned an old German folk legend into the unforgettable fairy tale Hansel and Gretel. Whether or not one accepts the view that it portrays the hardships of medieval life, there remains something uncanny and not a little frightening about the story, which puts starving children into a life-or-death confrontation with a cannibalistic witch.
This ambitious stage version of Charlotte Bront»’s novel Jane Eyre, adapted several years ago in England by Polly Teale and directed here for Westmont by Mitchell Thomas, is likely to be remembered for a long time, both as a successful show in its own right, and as an example of an adaptation that fulfills the promise of its source material.
In the midst of all the justifiable excitement over the upcoming move from the Arlington to the Granada, it would be a pity to lose sight of the most compelling musical storyline currently involving the Santa Barbara Symphony: the accession to power of new maestro Nir Kabaretti. Although he conducted most of last season’s concerts, the 2006-2007 programs were mostly set before he arrived.
The 1970s have long been regarded as the golden age of contemporary American cinema. Dozens of classics, from Annie Hall to Mean Streets, were produced by maverick directors both within and outside the studio system. Of all the great American films of the 1970s, none has earned a more exalted and esoteric reputation among fans of independent film than Charles Burnett’s debut, Killer of Sheep.
It’s 5:30 on Friday evening, and the long hallway gallery space at Arts Alive! Creativity Center, a converted warehouse on Calle Cesar Ch¡vez, is jammed with people, all listening to artist Robert Shetterly as he introduces his traveling exhibition, Americans Who Tell the Truth. The capacity crowd ranges in age from younger than eight to nearly 80, and in social status from lowly journalists to Congressmember Lois Capps.
Debra Ehrhardt’s sure-footed one-woman show is an immigrant story of a type many Americans are inclined to romanticize (if it is buried far enough in the past), or denigrate, especially if it involves people from the Caribbean or Latin America. The cunning, determination, and perseverance required of a Jamaican person immigrating to this country are not always easy to remember for those privileged enough to have been born here, and Ehrhardt’s courageously straightforward approach foregrounds these qualities throughout her play’s storyline.
The pianists and their fans all turned out for what was surely the solo piano event of the season last Friday night: an all-Beethoven recital by virtuoso Andr¡s Schiff. Schiff, who is in the midst of a very challenging project involving the performance and recording of all of Beethoven’s piano pieces, played the three sonatas of Opus 10-No. 5 in C Minor, No. 6 in F Major, and No. 7 in D Major-all before the interval, and then returned for the Sonata No. 8 in C Minor, Opus 13, “Pathetique.”
Director Sara Martinovich and her Loose Affiliation of Artists (LAA) have accomplished a lot in a little over a year. The company has developed a signature style and established itself as a theatrical team, complete with stars, ingenues, and a growing coterie of fans. LAA delivers much of what Santa Barbara theatergoers want: excitement, accomplished acting, sophisticated dialogue, and a healthy dose of sex appeal.
As the Bowl season stretches deep into fall this year, and the concert-going experience becomes familiar through repetition, it’s a rare artist who can draw in even the most jaded Bowl regulars and win them over completely. On Sunday, Tony Bennett made it look easy. Dressed in a traditional white dinner jacket and sounding absolutely glorious at 81, Bennett appeared with a four-piece jazz combo.
Once upon a time in a city far, far away, where people went out every night of the week and rarely came home before five o’clock in the morning, there lived a woman who embodied the nebulous but absolutely dominant concept of cool known as “downtown.” Tonight, October 4, at the Contemporary Arts Forum, Ann Magnuson and her artistic partner Kristian Hoffman will bring the strange frisson of 1980s downtown New York to Santa Barbara, linking us to a time when the East Village was the center of an avant-garde world.
