My Last Board Meeting
Today is my last board meeting as president of the Kennedy Center. It is likely the last time I will sit in any board meeting as anything other than a consultant. After 29 years of running arts...
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May the Fourth Be with You! A Star Wars Empire Custom Storm Trooper Helmet Show
I traveled to downtown Los Angeles on Saturday to view the Star Wars Empire custom storm trooper helmet show at the Robert Vargas Gallery. The show was cool! Check out the over 800 pictures from all...
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Dazzling Debuts Lend Panache to Washington Opera's Magic Flute
When artist Jun Kaneko's digital sets and inventive costumes for The Magic Flute debuted at San Francisco Opera two summers ago, the critics did handsprings. I'm sure operagoers enjoyed the same...
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Prayers for Ringling Circus Aerialists
Our hearts and prayers -- lots of prayers -- go out to the Ringling Bros. aerialists whose apparatus hovering over 30 feet in mid-air collapsed Sunday morning, May 4, 2014 in Providence, Rhode Island....
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Guess Who Showed Up at Mark Ryden's Latest Art Show?
(Artist Mark Ryden in front of his truly movable art feast, "Memory Lane." Image courtesy of Kohn Gallery/Getty Images/Stefanie Keenan) It may have been 90 degrees last night but that didn't stop Leo...
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K-Mart Painting Working Process
"Drawing for 1000 San Fernando Road" Here's how I start a painting, with a grisaille in acrylic to work out the composition and distill what I'm interested in visually about what I want to paint, in...
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Deconstructing the Poetry Goddess
The notion of the poetry goddess is as far-reaching as it (she?) is elusive, coy, erudite, and sensual. So much of this construction depends on usage and context -- as is de rigueur for many things we...
View ArticleWillkommen to the Power of Theatre: Life Lessons in Broadway's Cabaret
Recently, I remembered how I began the essay in some of my college applications, including the one that presumably helped secure my admission into the University of Virginia, where I studied history...
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This Is Pop: Take It or Leave It
If you know nothing about the band Latimer House from Prague and their debut, All The Rage, a look at the cover art might have you expecting a Dali-esque sound paradox, a collage of varied distorted...
View ArticleThe Wait Is Not Over
Every one of us has had the following experience: All of our lines are busy. Please hold for the next available agent. All calls will be answered in the order received. It is certainly possible that...
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Zoya: World Music Meets Indie Folk Singer-Songwriter
Recently, I met the wonderful and talented Zoya, a singer-songwriter in her senior year at Berklee College of Music. After hearing the North Indian sounds in her music, along with her entrancing vocal...
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Daniel Sprick's Fantastic Fictions
The paintings of Daniel Sprick are nurturing, they are fulfilling. They provide us with something that we are not getting enough of. He provides us with a longing gaze at ourselves. Daniel Sprick is a...
View ArticleFirst Nighter: Noel Coward's Song at Twilight in Top-Drawer Revival
When you look over the plays Noel Coward trumpeted during his fabulous career, few give the impression of being in any direct way autobiographical. Though his first smash was The Vortex in 1924, about...
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Aisle View: The Art of Conversation
After a decidedly lackluster season, finally -- a play! Anthony Giardina's The City of Conversation is an intelligent, provocative, incisive drama about politics, people, ideals and principles, with...
View ArticleCaptain America On a Not So Stereotypical Mission
Intolerance and its by-products have been making a lot of news lately. From Clive Bundy's musing about black people being better off in cotton plantations, to a white supremacist murderous rage at...
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8 Contemporary Novels with a Social Conscience
Years ago, when I was researching my first novel, A Walk Across the Sun, about human trafficking, I stumbled upon a fascinating quote by Moises Naim, the acclaimed journalist: "Paradoxically, it may be...
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Asia Society Offers a Space to Slow Down and Reflect
The Asia Society's current exhibit, 'Golden Visions of Densatil: A Tibetan Buddhist Monastery,' has allowed its curators to foray into unconventional areas of contemplative practices. Along with the...
View Article"The City of Conversation": What's The Price Of Politics?
What is the personal price of political change? In what coin is it paid? And when does it become too expensive? These are the questions that confront Hester Ferris in The City of Conversation, an...
View ArticleDeath Leaves a Heartache No One Can Heal, Love Leaves a Memory, No One Can Steal
This quote refers to both plays infused with Irish sensibility. A lovely revival of Sea Marks has opened at the Irish Repertory Theatre. The play was written by one time television god, Gardner Mckay,...
View ArticleTheater: Octoroon Astonishes; Forbidden Broadway Tickles
AN OCTOROON *** 1/2 out of **** FORBIDDEN BROADWAY COMES OUT SWINGING *** out of **** AN OCTOROON *** 1/2 out of **** SOHO REP An Octoroon is precisely the sort of play you hope to catch when venturing...
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