Performing Arts of Woodstock’s timing feels perfect with The Realistic Joneses
The play’s premise is simple. Newcomers named “Jones” encounter next door neighbors who share this same last name. As well as something darker.
Stage & Screen
Buddhist scholar Robert Thurman to speak at Rosendale Theatre screening of Kundun
Sunday, Nov. 17: Set in Tibet between 1937 and 1959, with music by the Minimalist master Philip Glass, Kundun explores the finding and unique education of the child Tenzin Gyatso as he becomes the spiritual and political leader of Tibet. Based on the actual life and writings of His Holiness, the 14th Dalai Lama, the film culminates in his escape from Tibet and journey into exile amidst the terror of the Chinese invasion.
Deconstructing borders: Live Arts Bard hosts Where No Wall Remains biennial
Thursday-Sunday, November 21-24: The title of this year’s festival comes from a Rumi poem, and it’s not an accident that this biennial is timed to coincide with the 30th anniversary of the fall of the Berlin Wall.
World-renowned dancers to perform at Rock the Kaatsbaan! Gala in Tivoli
Saturday, Nov. 16: Celebrating the culmination of Kaatsbaan’s 20th residency season, the event features Stella Abrera (American Ballet Theatre) and Robbie Fairchild (An American in Paris) performing original choreography by Emmy-nominated Sonya Tayeh. The rich program also includes the central pas de deux from Alexei Ratmansky’s The Seasons, Martha Graham Dance Company principal Ben Shultz, She’s a Rainbow by former ABT dancer Melanie Hamrick set to the Rolling Stones, New York City Ballet principal dancers Maria Kowroski and Tyler Angle in Balanchine’s Chaconne, the American Ballet Theatre Studio Company in Escapades by Amy Hall Garner (of Beyoncé’s The Mrs. Carter Show world tour) and more.
Taika Waititi lacerates Nazism with goofball humor in Jojo Rabbit
True, it’s not 100 percent original in its slapstick depiction of Hitler and his minions; Charlie Chaplin got there first, followed by The Producers and Hogan’s Heroes and quite a few more. And it does skim lightly over the enormity of human suffering at the hands of the Third Reich and its enablers. But grappling with such tragedy head-on is the work of a different genre of filmmaking. Jojo Rabbit revels in heaping scorn on the perpetrators, and I haven’t laughed this loudly at a movie in a long time.
UPAC to host Josh Gates Live: An Evening of Legends, Mysteries & Tales of Adventure
Friday, Nov. 15: If Indiana Jones had been born a couple of generations later, into the age of reality TV, he might well have ended up being Josh Gates. Gates’ initial fame came as one of the hosts of the Ghost Hunters series, but the paranormal wasn’t his original area of interest.
The Crucible opens Friday at Pleasant Plains Church in Staatsburg
Friday-Sunday, Nov. 8-16: The old clapboard church is not unlike the clapboard meeting house in which much of the tragic history of the Salem Witch Trials actually unfolded.
10 Hairy Legs perform at Kaatsbaan
Saturday, Nov. 9: Described as “the very best American male modern dancers one could have the good fortune of seeing.”
Hal on the horizon: Shakespeare’s Henry V opens at SUNY-New Paltz
Opens November 14: “We few, we happy few, we band of brothers” has quickened the pulse of folks with military experience (or fantasies) for more than four centuries now, and for good reason.
Cynthia Erivo brings her A-game to disappointing Harriet
This was a movie long overdue to be made. That’s what makes it such an unhappy task to report that, despite several fine performances and one outstanding characterization on the part of star Cynthia Erivo, Harriet is a pretty tepid moviegoing experience.