Spectacle: Artery, Indy Week

The most amazing season, eh? A closer look at DPAC's new Broadway line-up

Zack Smith — Mon, 04 Mar 2013 13:23:00 -0500

To summarize the lineup of touring Broadway shows coming through the Durham Performing Arts Center’s new season as succinctly as possible: Hope you like Andrew Lloyd Webber.

Sir Andrew’s work may be found in three of the seven new shows announced at DPAC’s SunTrust Broadway Preview Event on Friday, specifically the touring version of the recently-closed revival of Evita, the 2011 West End musical version of The Wizard of Oz film with new songs by Lloyd Webber and Tim Rice, and a whole concert featuring songs from Lloyd Webber’s extensive oeuvre, including The Phantom of the Opera and Cats.…

Some assembly required? Meow Meow in Beyond Glamour at PSI Theatre

Byron Woods — Thu, 14 Feb 2013 14:54:00 -0500

BEYOND GLAMOUR
Meow Meow
3.5 stars (out of 5)
PSI Theatre, Durham Arts Council
Through Feb. 14

It doesn’t always look that way, I know. But critics usually don’t go to a show for the purpose of basking in their own smugness and perceived superiority over the material, the genre, the company or the audience.…

Mary Poppins is witty and colorful, if not supercalifragilisticexpialidocious

Zack Smith — Wed, 13 Feb 2013 14:37:00 -0500

MARY POPPINS
* * * 1/2 stars
Through Feb. 17
Durham Performing Arts Center

The touring production of the stage musical version of Disney's Mary Poppins, co-created by Les Miserables and Phantom of the Opera hitmaker Cameron Mackintosh and appearing at the Durham Performing Arts Center through Feb. 17, is an odd experience, depending on which version of Mary Poppins you know. If you're mostly familiar with the 1964 film with Julie Andrews, this version jettisons many of the songs, scenes and plot points, creates a completely different conflict for the second act and adds a handful of new characters, including a nemesis for the titular magic nanny.…

Cirque du Soleil's athletic prowess compensates for show's flaws

David Fellerath — Fri, 17 Aug 2012 18:51:00 -0400

Cirque du Soleil's Dralion - Images by Independent Weekly

CIRQUE DU SOLEIL: DRALION
* * * stars
PNC Arena
Through Aug. 19

Cirque du Soleil is a global juggernaut, but it's still a surprisingly youthful institution. In contrast to, say, those 19th-century animal drivers Ringling Bros and Barnum & Bailey, Cirque is a babe.…

Chicago brings the razzle-dazzle, but not the Brinkley

Chris Vitiello — Wed, 01 Aug 2012 09:19:00 -0400

CHICAGO
3.5 stars (out of five)
@Durham Performing Arts Center
Through Aug. 5

I never thought I’d say this, but I’m glad I missed Christie Brinkley last night.

A buzz of disappointment ran through the opening-night crowd for the brash and bawdy musical Chicago at the Durham Performing Arts Center.…

Boneshaker author Cherie Priest talks steampunk at ConTemporal in Chapel Hill

Zack Smith — Fri, 22 Jun 2012 09:47:00 -0400

Why should you head to ConTemporal, the Chapel Hill-based science fiction convention that focuses heavily on the retro-futuristic concept of steampunk? We’ll let the con’s literary guest of honor Cherie Priest tell you why.…

It's wrestling, but is it art? Food trucks and smackdowns tonight in Raleigh

Craig D. Lindsey — Thu, 07 Jun 2012 13:24:00 -0400

There’s art to be found in men beating the crap out of each other. There is also wholesome, family entertainment located there too.…

Love never dies, but many terrible musicals have: Sitting through Andrew Lloyd Webber's Phantom sequel.

Zack Smith — Wed, 06 Jun 2012 16:12:00 -0400

This past Christmas, I received two books on the history of Broadway flops, Not Since Carrie and Second Act Trouble. They’re fascinating reads, both illuminating some hidden treasures of the theater and in recounting the brazen excesses that doom many a Broadway flop to its fate.…

Baby steps: Learning to love anime at Animazement

Zack Smith — Tue, 29 May 2012 16:32:00 -0400

Stuck in the doorway outside the Raleigh Convention Center on a rainy Sunday, I'm at least treated to the spectacle of a small army of middle school-to-college-aged individuals communing in makeup, corsets and the odd Pokemon hat. It's the last day of Animazement, the popular Raleigh event that attracts thousands of fans of Japanese animation or "anime," and I'm on a mission—to join in on their fandom.…

Philip Glass' Satyagraha: Sounds are beautiful, but stamina is required.

Kate Dobbs Ariail — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 14:43:00 -0500

SATYAGRAHA
The Met Live in HD, live in theaters Nov. 19
Rebroadcast 6:30 p.m. Dec. 7
Regal Brier Creek, North Hills, Crossroads

Philip Glass is one of those artists who make you work for the satisfaction that is ultimately to be found in his music.…

Khan artistry: Why you should visit the NC Museum of Natural Sciences' exhibit on the Mongolian warlord

Craig D. Lindsey — Fri, 02 Dec 2011 13:52:00 -0500

So, tonight is First Friday and, as always, downtown Raleigh will have a bevy (that’s right, I said bevy!) of happenings that wandering folk can dip into.…

Breaking blood: After guilty pleasures, more thoughts about Twilight

Laura Boyes — Thu, 01 Dec 2011 15:54:00 -0500

Spoiler alert: If you want to be surprised by anything that happens in the film, read this after you’ve seen it.

Let me state at the outset that I thoroughly enjoyed the latest Twilight movie. This is not Jean-Luc Godard.…

Rings of fire: Notes on The Met's Siegfried

Kate Dobbs Ariail — Fri, 25 Nov 2011 07:35:00 -0500

SIEGFRIED
The Met Live in HD
Regal Brier Creek Stadium 14

All my life, I’ve been hearing—words and music—the epic story of Siegfried, the hero of the eponymous third section of Richard Wagner’s four-part opera inspired by Norse mythology, Der Ring des Nibelungen, or the Ring Cycle. I had my mother’s childhood books on the Ring (published by the Metropolitan Opera Guild in 1939), and my father liked to tell the story to his children, because his father had told it to him.…

Rakish but satisfying Don Giovanni at Met in HD. Up this weekend: Wagner's Siegfried

Kate Dobbs Ariail — Fri, 04 Nov 2011 14:38:00 -0400

Don Giovanni
Metropolitan Opera
Simulcast @Brier Creek Stadium 14, Saturday, Oct. 29
Rebroadcast: Wednesday, Nov. 16

The digital revolution has made many wonderful things possible, but culturally speaking, one of the grandest is the live-in-high-definition broadcast of opera from the world’s major opera houses. The leader in bringing the enormous multi-art undertaking that is grand opera is New York’s Metropolitan Opera, with its Live in HD programming, now nearing its fifth anniversary.…

What will Iron Man 3 mean for Wilmington and North Carolina?

Craig D. Lindsey — Wed, 02 Nov 2011 15:25:00 -0400

Last Thursday, Chris Cooney, co-owner and COO of EUE/Screen Gems studios in Wilmington, confirmed at a press conference that Marvel Studios would be shooting Iron Man 3 at their studios.

Yes, there’s a really good chance Wilmington locals will see Robert Downey Jr., Gwyneth Paltrow, Scarlett Johansson and other A-listers who will return to film the third chapter in Marvel’s chief superhero franchise, which will be directed by Shane Black (who directed Downey in Kiss Kiss Bang Bang).

Needless to say, local fanboys, like Raleigh film blogger and comics aficionado Isaac Weeks, are curious to find out what the movie will be about.…

Remembering SPARKcon 2011: Raleigh shows off local artists

Tom Elrod — Thu, 22 Sep 2011 11:37:21 -0400

Despite some rain and colder weather, the four-day event called SPARKcon, the sixth-annual celebration of Raleigh's creativity, was well-attended and included a number of great showcases for local and independent artists.

SPARKCon is organized around various “Sparks,” collaborative groupings of artists around a theme.…

Exclusive video preview: Paperhand Puppet Intervention's THE SERPENT'S EGG

Byron Woods — Thu, 04 Aug 2011 18:51:50 -0400

Exclusive rehearsal footage from THE SERPENT'S EGG, the new musical puppet pageant by PAPERHAND PUPPET INTERVENTION. For more info on the show, read our preview from the Aug. 3 INDY.…

Now clean and sober, Steve-O doesn't "have to hurt himself anymore"

Craig D. Lindsey — Fri, 29 Apr 2011 11:01:00 -0400

There are many dumb things Steve-O regrets. Taking a leap from a plane without a parachute into an ocean is one of them.…

The Met's Nixon in China, to be rebroadcast tonight, is a spectacular success

Kate Dobbs Ariail — Wed, 02 Mar 2011 12:01:00 -0500

NIXON IN CHINA
Metropolitan Opera
Rebroadcast @Regal Brier Creek, Regal North Hills
6:30 p.m., March 2; tickets here

The Metropolitan Opera’s HD re-broadcast of the most recent in its series of simulcasts is coming up tonight, and anyone interested in either contemporary music or global power politics may want to clear the evening’s calendar for the presentation of this wonderful new production of one of the 20th century’s great operas.

Nixon in China, with its thrilling score by John Adams (who conducts), libretto by poet Alice Goodman, choreography by Mark Morris and staging by Peter Sellars (whom many call a genius), is a rich experience.…

The "legacy" of TRON is real: Looking back at a ground-breaking movie

JP Trostle — Fri, 17 Dec 2010 10:08:00 -0500

The one thing you need to know about TRON: It isn’t a great movie, but it’s an important one.

Released in the summer of 1982, at the end of the first computer game boom, TRON tried to plug into the immense popularity of video arcades.…

It's Pandemonium, but only through Sunday; rest of tour cancelled

Joshua Jones — Fri, 01 Oct 2010 17:31:00 -0400

PANDEMONIUM
Raleigh Memorial Auditorium
Through Oct. 3
Whether it's the haunting overtures made by glass bottlebellows or the claxon of squonkaphones and bicycle horns, Pandemonium, a new show by Stomp creators Luke Cresswell and Steve McNicholas, found numerous ways to inspire its Raleigh Memorial Auditorium audience last night. But this is no Stomp redux.…

Slumdog Millionaire composer A.R. Rahman discusses his Wednesday show at RBC Center

Laura Boyes — Wed, 29 Sep 2010 14:21:33 -0400

A.R. Rahman's multimedia spectacular, the Indian equivalent of Lady Gaga's Monster Ball, rolls into Raleigh for one last American tour date before he opens the Commonwealth Games in Delhi. We spoke to Rahman last week, and he told us that his double Oscar win for Slumdog Millionaire was "the ultimate, a dream come true for any musician."

It has certainly made him the most recognizable desi musician in the West.…

Prairie Home confessions: The news from Symphony Lake

Brian Howe — Thu, 16 Sep 2010 13:04:37 -0400

In my car on the way to Koka Booth Amphitheater in Cary last Saturday, I tuned my radio to NPR just in time to hear Garrison Keillor say “Lutherans,” followed by riotous laughter. It didn’t really matter what the set-up had been: It was one of many comfortingly familiar cues built into Prairie Home Companion, Keillor’s long-running radio variety show.…

Stalking the Norris: The Bloody Cinema of ActionFest

Zack Smith — Mon, 17 May 2010 03:37:00 -0400

The bullet-ridden, blood-splattered poster outside Carolina Cinemas Asheville declares ActionFest “the film festival with a body count.” Indeed, over the next few days I’ll see about every possible way for a human being to be shot, impaled, exploded or receive a roundhouse kick to the head on camera. A few efforts might even be Oscar-worthy, head-kicks and all.…

Notes from IgniteRaleigh: To be a spark, and not to be rickrolled

Karlie Justus — Thu, 04 Mar 2010 10:34:40 -0500

Important takeaways from last night's IgniteRaleigh 2, held Wednesday night in Lincoln Theatre: Raleigh boasts the third-highest concentration of modernist homes behind Los Angeles and Chicago, there is only one female boxer action figure and sexting is beneficial for relationships.

The unique event—and those very random facts—was part of Global Ignite Week, a social media meme turned PowerPoint phenomenon that spans 60 cities on six continents.…