When the Tohoku earthquake and tsunami devastated Japan in March 2011, plenty of people filmed it and posted the footage. It takes a strong constitution to finish watching even one of those YouTube videos, which conjure a surreal apocalypse more horrifying than anything Hollywood has produced. A seemingly endless black…
In Andalucía, Spain’s southernmost region and the birthplace of flamenco, during the dog days of summer the sun doesn’t go down until after 10:00 p.m., and it’s only then that any self-respecting flamenco festival kicks into gear. The beer and wine flow, kids play in the dirt aisles between sets…
What is money, really? You may think you know the answer, and you could probably produce a few bills as proof. But physical currency is on its way out, like the printing presses that produce it. Money today is an ephemeral thing, as invisible as radiation, digits shuffled and wired…
On August 20-22nd, the Ifé Ilé Afro-Cuban Dance Festival returns to Miami for its 17th year. Annually, the festival offers workshops, panel discussions and performances of Cuban dance and music, led by visiting artists and masters in the field. The 2015 festival is super-charged due to an infusion of funding…
In the minds, pens, and computers of so many playwrights, the small, squalid room holds a special allure. With the notable exception of No Exit, most of these rooms have doors that are really liberating portals to a better world. There’s a problem, though. They’re rarely used. For the tortured…
It’s not exactly common for two sisters to experience a simultaneous meteoric rise to stardom, but prima ballerinas Lorena and Lorna Feijóo aren’t your average siblings. Though the pair danced side by side nearly their entire lives and often competed for the same roles, not an ounce of competition exists…
The renaissance has arrived; no longer does Miami stand in the shadow of NYC and San Francisco. These days, the Magic City holds its own — particularly when it comes to arts and culture. In added proof that the 305 is flush with serious talent, The Juggerknot Theatre Company is producing “The Crocodile’s…
Some homegrown talent is joining Season 12 of the beloved dance reality show, So You Think You Can Dance. Tap dancer Gaby Diaz made the final cut to join the cast. The 19-year-old initially auditioned twice, first in Houston and then in Detroit, on the invitation of the show’s judges…
There’s a neat little cultural gem brilliantly shining from the recesses of shipping containers just north of the Adrienne Arsht Center: MicroTheater Miami. Located on the patio of the Cultural Center of Spain (also known as Centro Cultural Español), MicroTheater Miami is an innovative take on live theatre. The way…
For the last six weeks, Wynwood has been alight with more art making than normal for the summer as Arts for Learning Miami has transformed the neighborhood into a creative campus for its fourth annual ArtWorks Internship program. It culminates with two performances this week featuring work from students in…
Sue Mengers represented dozens of eminent actors and directors during the New Hollywood era of the late ’60s and ’70s. The late talent agent possessed a scabrous wit untarnished by political correctness. About a certain famously gay singer/pianist, she said, “Elton’s the easiest dinner guest ever: He’ll eat anything but…
The Miami City Ballet announced several additions to their corps de ballet for its 30th season. Among the announcements are Ella Titus and Mayumi Enokibara, two recent graduates of the Miami City Ballet School and stars of the Teen Vogue web series Strictly Ballet. The web series chronicled the journey…
The South Miami-Dade Cultural Arts Center will present The Chicago Repertory Ballet Company this coming Saturday night, the first chance for Miami audiences to see this company, just three years old, and already being heralded by the Chicago Tribune as “wonderfully dramatic.” One might add “mightily varied” as well. “I…
Peter London Global Dance Company takes the stage at Little Haiti Cultural Arts Center on July 18 with their annual Heat Wave summer showcase. Featuring a world premiere new work by Peter London, the program will also feature two pieces by choreographer Luis Alberto Cuevas. By fusing contemporary dance and…
When Lindsey Noel Whiting twice takes to the air in Lookingglass Alice, it’s easy to forget everything and lose yourself in the rhapsody. Dangling on silks and maneuvering through ropes suspended from the ceiling of the Adrienne Arsht Center’s Ziff Ballet Opera House, the young actress eschews all inhibitions, making…
Bite size portions of theater, fresh writing and some well known actors, all available at a reasonable price in an intimate, unusual setting has turned Micro Teatro Miami into one of the longest running, and perhaps most unlikely hits, in South Florida’s cultural scene. Using seven shipping containers parked on…
In 2004, before a sex scandal rendered him a candidate non grata, John Edwards distilled this country’s widening income gap and lack of upward mobility into a bumper-sticker meme: Two Americas. The division was between the privileged-from-birth and the perpetual strivers, the haves and the have-nots. By most accounts, this…
Dancer and choreographer Annabel Guérédrat, a native of the Caribbean island of Martinique, creates dance works that fuse her childhood background in dance with her experiences as professor of literature in Paris and as a Butoh dancer. Quite a combination. Deeply ritualistic, her work is a performance study investigating socio-political…
Twenty years ago, long before everybody else was doing it, Miami’s City Theatre launched a festival of ten-minute plays. Summer Shorts, theatergoers’ annual kickoff to the steamy season in South Florida, has withstood a handful of reboots in its two-decade run, experimenting with celebrity actors, adults-only programming, and unprofitable Broward…
Dance Now! Miami closes its 15th Anniversary season at the Little Haiti Cultural Arts Center this weekend on Saturday and Sunday, inviting audiences to get “Into the Heat” of summer by cooling down with the Florida Premiere of Winter’s Breath, one of several dances in the closing “Heat” program. Like…
When Casa Valentina premiered on Broadway last year, it garnered four Tony nominations and numerous critical accolades. Seeing its regional theater premiere at GableStage, it’s hard to comprehend why. Harvey Fierstein’s first play in nearly 30 years examines the laughter, drama and gender crises of a community of heterosexual male…
As both Artistic Director and resident director of Actors’ Playhouse, David Arisco can claim the one thing most denizens of the theater world only dream of: a steady gig. An opportunity that arose purely by chance has now stretched into a 27 year tenure at one of Miami’s most prominent…
