Performing Arts

All New People at Arsht Center: Zach Braff’s Play Is Full of Quirky Characters

At 37, actor Zach Braff can identify with the Millennials. But as a creative type, his persona is pure Generation X: neurotic, psychically wounded, emotionally adrift, numb to the malaise of adulthood. That said, he’s not averse to wacky meet-cutes, nimble verbal patter, and puns so bad they’re good, often…

If one of your resolutions for 2013 was to sit your ass in more theater seats and on fewer bar stools, PAX Miami is about to launch an event that will make your transition into “cultured-ness” a lot less jarring. Starting this Friday and repeating every third weekend of the…

If you sat through all 242 minutes of Kenneth Branagh’s unabridged Hamlet movie, masterly as it may have been, chances are there were times when you just wished Shakespeare would get to the damn point already. In Miami wunderkind Tarell Alvin McCraney’s condensed edit of Shakespeare’s greatest tragedy, which he…

On Friday, The Miami City Ballet presented the world preview of “Euphotic,” the most recent work of Liam Scarlett, artist-in-residence at London’s Royal Ballet. Scarlett has an intimate relation with the Miami City Ballet as well as Miami audiences. Almost exactly a year ago, Miami City Ballet presented another world…

Like a show opening with a band’s greatest hit, Tarell Alvin McCraney’s radical edit of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet begins with the master’s most famous phrase of his most famous soliloquy: “To be or not to be.” And off we go, into a 90-minute, one-act version that gets right to the…

Like a show opening with a band’s greatest hit, Tarell Alvin McCraney’s radical edit of William Shakespeare’s Hamlet begins with the master’s most famous phrase of his most famous soliloquy: “To be or not to be.” And off we go, into a 90-minute, one-act version that gets right to the…

The wunderkind is back in Miami with yet another world debut. Liam Scarlett, that is. He who at age 26 has been appointed artist-in-residence at London’s Royal Ballet Company. He who was also the choreographer of “Viscera,” a ballet commissioned for the Miami City Ballet in 2012, which was received…

Some artists dream of performing on stage. Others dream of carrying their craft beyond the stage to blur the line between art and everyday life. Dancers Gabriel Forestieri and Marla Phelan of ProjectLIMB fall into the latter category, and they’ll be showing Miami Beach how to make a more expressive…

Cat Lady may be the first show from Mad Cat Theatre Company to showcase an actual mad cat. This pussy is positively vehement: Played by Ken Clement in a black feline costume, Oliver the cat rails against his owner, Kristina (played by the show’s creator, Kristina Wong). He’s fed up…

Still craving some theatre after a post-Les Mis hangover, but your tastes are a little more comic book than Cosette? The Lost Girls Theatre company has you covered with their upcoming evenings featuring short plays with geeky topics ranging from the zombie apocalypse to The Hobbit.We asked Lost Girls Theatre…

For fans of the epic, enduring stage spectacular Les Miserables, a movie version worth watching has been a long time coming. And because of the play’s enduring popularity, the movie’s all-star cast and the preemptive Oscar buzz – the hype for its Christmas Day opening was undeniably huge. But realistically,…

I hadn’t seen The Nutcracker since I was a little girl. That performance, staged at the university that anchored the Western Pennsylvania town where I grew up, made only the lightest impression on me at the time. Other than there being a gigantic nutcracker statue and a very confusing plot…

Miami Theater: 2012’s Best Productions

If the New Theatre’s 1-Acts Festival were a Black Friday deal, people would be clawing each other’s eyes out just to get a piece. The two shows of the festival (December 21 to 22) will comprise a total of 16 short plays — the works of 16 playwrights, 16 different…

It was a difficult year for theater in Broward and Palm Beach counties. Plantation’s Mosaic Theatre, whose sudden closure was announced this month, was the third quality company to shutter for various reasons, after the Caldwell in Boca Raton and the Promethean in Davie. Luckily, Delray’s Theatre at Arts Garage…

Cirque du Soleilʼs latest extravaganza, TOTEM, will swing, twist, and contort its way into Sun Life Stadium come January 10. TOTEM takes audiences on an evolutionary journey with the human species, from our original amphibian state to our ultimate desire to fly. From tribal spectacles to science and technology, the…

Shaq went on a laser blasting rampage at the upscale Fontainebleau club Arkadia Saturday night. The guy’s a prankster, and no one can stop him.His platinum selling All-Star Comedy Jam was in the house with Courvoisier to celebrate a successful year of touring.Comedians Lavar Walker, Capone, and Finesse Mitchell cracked…

The minimalist musical The Last Five Years is a dead relationship’s post-mortem. Using his own failed nuptials as inspiration, composer and lyricist Jason Robert Brown channeled his universal frustration into this ingenious, 15-part, one-act song cycle charting both the ascent and descent of his relationship with his wife — at…

The name Anton Pavlovovich Chekhov may not mean all that much to many Miamians. Hell, it doesn’t mean much to us either, and we call ourselves writers. But all that will change if Miami Theater Center artistic director Stephanie Ansin gets her way. The smart, chic, and passionate linguaphile is bringing…

Happy at New Theatre: How Content Are We, Really?

GableStage’s Venus in Fur Powerfully Explores Degradation and Desire