Failure is not a word that many people take lightly. It's certainly not something many would like to admit they are dealing with or have experienced. And yet, a local business-turned-movement is celebrating five years of failure this month.
Peter Perez has been a magnet for uncommon musical experiences his entire life. From conducting his youth festival orchestra as a youngster to requesting that his upstairs neighbor, Placido Domingo, “please rehearse louder,” such experiences have led him to his new role as the Grand Rapids Symphony CEO.
“Imagination is the only weapon in the war against reality,” the Cheshire Cat purrs in “Alice in Wonderland.” In today’s post postmodern cultural landscape of the information age, in which “alternative facts” litter our news and going “down the rabbit hole” is a central and daily metaphor in our individual and collective lives, there is perhaps no more appropriate story.
Devin Price was prepared to live the life of a struggling actor in New York City, but it didn’t take the Lansing native long to land a plum role in Motown: The Musical.
In Farmers Alley’s crowd-pleasing, high-energy production of 1940s-era musical revue The Andrews Brothers, straight men dress up as women, white Americans dress up as indigenous Pacific Islanders, and a middle-aged woman dresses up as an ingenue.
By now, most people are familiar with Rosie the Riveter, the symbol representing the legions of women who filed into the workplace during World War II to take over the jobs of men sent overseas. Often, they were working to aid the war effort.
For some theaters, celebrating an anniversary like a 35th season could add extra pressure to selecting upcoming performances. Not for the Wharton Center, who tries to outdo itself every year.
Thursday’s opening night of Disgraced by Actors’ Theatre Grand Rapids provoked the audience to address current issues in society, and look in the mirror at their own biases or preconceived judgements.
More than 40 years after it landed on Broadway, there’s still a whole lot of magic left in The Wiz. Behold and believe: Director Jay Berkow’s buoyant, utterly delightful Western Michigan University Theatre production of this African-American revamp of The Wizard of Oz conclusively proves Wicked does not have the market cornered when it comes to Oz-centric musicals.
In the theater, timing is everything, and it’s difficult to imagine a better week than this one for the Kalamazoo Civic to open “By the Way, Meet Vera Stark,” Lynn Nottage’s bittersweet look at the so-called golden age of Hollywood, when African-American actors frequently found themselves with two kinds of parts to choose from.
“Golf is nothing but a good walk. Spoiled.” This paraphrased Mark Twainism opens “The Fox on the Fairway,” the most recent slamming doors farce from playwright Ken Ludwig, now playing at The New Vic Theatre in Kalamazoo.
Holland Symphony Orchestra Music Director Johannes Müller-Stosch likes to give the audience something a little bit different to close out each concert series.
When Fred Sebulske founded Actors’ Theatre Grand Rapids in 1981, his mission was to provoke conversation through theater.
