MY URBAN KVETCH

Two Coasts, Two Artistic Celebrations

One of my friends recently called me "the, let's face it, basically bicoastal Esther Kustanowitz." (I can see how someone might think that...) But when two arts efforts came to my attention, one on the left coast and one on the right, it was one of those confluences of innovative and contemporary art and performance that I thought was worth a post.

Thanks to my myriad blog connections, I had already heard several times about Off the Wall: Artists at Work, an open-studio project featuring eleven artists working and performing in the galleries of The Jewish Museum in New York from March 16 through 27, 2008.  The project presents experimental work in performance art, video, fashion and music by a group of emerging artists, all 40 and under.The show also includes a lounge with space for visitors to sit, talk, blog and listen to music on mp3 players. Planned lounge events will be offered such as DJ sets, a poetry slam, a Russian-themed salon, a discussion with artists and exhibition designers hosted by NYU’s Center for Religion and Media, and discussions with groups from high schools and colleges.  Parties on two Thursday evenings, March 20 and 27, will feature collaborations with Off the Wall musicians and visual artists. And the event series will be liveblogged by Mobius, founder of Jewschool. Tickets and info here.

And while on the West Coast, I had a lovely oceanview lunch with my friend Susan Josephs, who is involved in a new dance project with Andrea Hodos, who is one of two artists-in-residence for Hebrew Union College in LA. I took some material back about the initiative, hoping to blog about it, and just this morning got a press release about it, so I considered that a sign.

Andrea Hodos is a performance artist and director of Moving Torah (which you can read more about here). Andrea’s company will be joined by rabbinic students in presenting the opening scenes of a new piece developed during her residency. "On Dry Ground" depicts the Israelites' journey across the sea, asking a central question, "How do we harness faith to move forward through fear?" (at Hebrew Union College-Jewish Institute of Religion in Los Angeles)

So, Jewish art and creative expression is alive and well, on both coasts. Anyone want to report from the south, or the middle?.

Where You'll Find Me: Events at Skirball and the JCC, Plus Israelity Tour

This Thursday at 7, I'm honored to be part of the Skirball Center's series on the weekly Torah portion. Titled "AfterWords," the series features writers, teachers and other Jewish thought leaders leading lecture and discussion about the Torah portion. My luck: I have parshat Mishpatim, which is best known for containing some of the most boringly inscrutable laws of the Torah. I will take the best of Mishpatim and present it to you on Thursday night. So see what I do with that challenge...show up on Thursday for an hour and see if I sink or swim. The class is $10. But if you RSVP to me, I'll see if I can get you a discount. (No promises...)  More information about the Skirball Center is here.

Next week (my last week in tour before I leave for the Israelity Tour--check out our frequently updated blog here), I'm doing one of my "Improv for Daters" sessions at the JCC, February 5 at 7pm:

Join us for this improv comedy meets singles mixer designed to improve your dating and relating skills. Singles columnist and improviser Esther D. Kustanowitz will teach you basic improv techniques and games that will make the process of dating easier and more fun. You don't have to be funny, just a single guy or gal willing to listen. Light refreshments provided; post-event mingling encouraged and inevitable. Registration limited; sign up early! ($15 members, $20 for non-members--register here!)

Come and participate; at this event, there will be no spectating--everyone improvises. Don't worry; you've been improvising your whole life and you didn't even know it!!

And if you're reading this on the West Coast, I'm winging your way soon, with the Israelity Tour, bringing great bands (including #1 Israeli hip-hop artist Subliminal and his T.A.C.T. Family; Israeli funk hip-hop group Coolooloosh and singer/songwriter Michelle Citrin) to seven West Coast cities from February 6-18--starting with Seattle, ending in Las Vegas, and hitting most of California in the middle. For precise dates, locations and to buy tickets, see the Israelity Tour section of the Birthright Israel website.

Hope to see you locally, or on the road!

Colbert & Bakkedahl Star in Hazon Purim Spiel at Makor

That's right, those crazy creative kids are at it again, looking at TV and pop culture through a Purim lens. I'm not involved this year, but thought I'd give them a plug anyway, what with the Daily Show involvement and all. Bakkedahl is a regular correspondent and will likely be featured in several of the sketches (like Ed Helms was last year and Rob Corddry was the year before), and Colbert is making a video appearance, in an apparent attempt to appease Jewish members of ColbertNation.

Buy tickets here to either the early (9pm) show or the late show (10:30pm). This show has always been standing room only, and I'm sure this year will be no exception. Maybe I'll see you there...
Happy Purim!

A Musical That Splatters You With Comedy

Given, I did find the listing for the fact that "Evil Dead: The Musical" was coming to off-Broadway through a Google Alert for "Buffy." The somewhat tenuous connection, other than the demonology theme, was that Hinton Battle--who played a dancing demon in the Buffy musical episode--was the choreographer for the show, which began as a Fringe show in Canada, and has been getting pretty consistently good reviews. (Ace, did you ever go?)

Let's face it...I don't have show money these days. So when a friend generously offers me a ticket with no strings, I'm just a girl who can't say no. My friend--a longtime "Evil Dead" fan--had already been to see the show, actually after I told him about it to begin with. He insisted on taking me as his guest to his second time. Halfway through the opening number, in which the cast members, young, attractive and sex-crazy, headed up to a deserted cabin in the woods for no apparent reason, I realized that even though I'd never seen any of the Evil Dead movies, I've certainly seen enough horror movies to understand: this was going to be funny. 

We had the foresight to get seats that were outside the "splatter zone"--shades of Gallagher and Blue Man Group as those in the front rows got shpritzed with a light mist of stage blood. The music and lyrics were a hilarious sendup of the horror film genre that anyone exposed to the ridiculous plots, skimpy clothing, excessive gore and violence of Shocktober flicks will be used to, with special references thrown in for the "Evil Dead" faithful. (The Faithful Dead?)  By the time we get to the song "All of My Boyfriends Get Killed By Canderian Demons," you're thinking, "girlfriend, have I been there."

Musical styles and theater allusions are also parodied/honored, with a particularly effective tango as well as a Mr. Cellophanesque homage/bemoaning of a "bit player" who isn't taken seriously. There are hot chicks in various stages of random and abs-revealing undress and sexual innuendo. There is the "Stiffler" character, who doesn't care about anything other than getting lucky. But everyone in the cast is top-notch, as comedic actors and as dancers. As for standouts, the diminutive Jenna Coker, as sister Cheryl, who is the first of the cabinpeople to turn demonic, is an unstoppable energy source who should be used to generate power for a small developing nation.

But I have to give a literal hand to Ryan Ward (Ash), who acts his literal digits off in a gut-busting display of comedy surrounding the possession of his arm. His comedic control of his out-of-control appendage literally strongarmed its way into my heart. Literally.

If you visit the show's MySpace page, you can get 50 percent chainsawed off your tickets. And you can become Evil Dead's kajillionth MySpace Friend, and join the mailing list so you'll be informed when the CD comes out. (Which should be sometime next year, seeing as how the cast hasn't gone into the studio yet.)

And so concludes a post which my parents will have no interest in, but which is important because it chronicles my excursion from my self-imposed apartment exile back into the real world, only to find it populated with the living dead.*

*No, this does not mean I've rejoined JDate.

This Just In: Jews Continue to Laugh at Selves

Jews are funny, right? We're like, pioneers of comedy and stuff. Why, just yesterday I received a copy of the new "Big Book of Jewish Humor," a reissue and update of a book that was prominently placed in the family library when I was growing up. (Review hopefully to come as soon as I'm done reading it.)

We love to laugh at and around ourselves, until it goes too far, whatever that means. For some people, it's Jewtopia, for others it's the Hebrew Hammer, or Borat...everyone draws his or her line in a different place.

But just a little while ago I found this article about a Second City improv show called "Jewsical! The Musical"--it's premiering in (say it with me now) South Florida at a high school theater and then moves back to Chicago:

Stringing together classic Second City sketches and songs, along with new material, the comedy review delivers an irreverent and funny look at Jewish life and culture for audiences young and old. Scenes include a peek at the first Kosher Thai fusion restaurant; a tribute to Jewish mothers and an ode to JDate, the online Jewish dating service. "The great thing about Jewish culture is it embraces comedy," said Kelly Leonard, the president of Second City Theatricals who came up with the idea for the Jewish musical. "The Jewish comedy tradition is tremendous, Mort Sahl, Lenny Bruce..."

Tremendous indeed. And I'd venture to say if she tried she probably could have come up with one more funny Jew. But I think she was appealing to the South Florida demo. In any case, I'd venture to say that never has so much been contained in a single ellipsis.

Anyone who steals my idea for "Avenue Jew," a Jewish puppet musical about the Upper West Side,
is so dead. Consider that sucker trademarked.

Scarecrows, Dreamgirls and Demons

When your name is Hinton Battle, you're bound to have an interesting life. Add singing and dancing skills, a three-for-three record of Tony nominations to Tony wins, and stints as Jennifer Lopez's dance teacher and as a singing demon in Buffy the Vampire Slayer's groundbreaking musical episode, and you'd be able to say, "Gee, I've had a varied career." It might not even matter to you that even though you originated the role on stage, the part of Scarecrow in the film version of "The Wiz" was taken by Michael Jackson. (And there but for the grace of God...)

But in the coming months, everything's gonna be coming up Hinton...having choreographed "Idewild" and being featured in the upcoming film "Dreamgirls," you know these things run in threes. And in this case, the third thing is thirsty for blood....

Beginning this fall, "Evil Dead: The Musical " hits Broadway, co-directed and choreographed by Battle.This ain't no joke; the show brings to the stage the stories of the first and second Evil Dead movies, and much blood-spattering ensues. I did read somewhere that the first few rows are designated as a "bloodspatter" zone; but somehow this is probably nothing like Gallagher and his watermelons.

If you see it (and survive...), do send a review.

Free to Be Fringe...

With Shabbat starting late and with a freelancer's schedule, there's lots to do in the City on a Friday afternoon in the summer. People are out of town, so the streets are relatively empty; coffee shops have actual free tables near outlets to do fun things like work on one's book proposal (for random example) and try to connect to free WiFi that may or may not actually be working.

But this week, New Yorkers are getting their Fringe on...last week I went to see my friend Marc's play, "Danny Boy" (review is here at Jewlicious). And this past Friday afternoon, I went to a 4:45 show of "Free to Be Friends." It originally ran for seven months at the New York-based Upright Citizens Brigade Theater, and is now back in an expanded format, but for a limited engagement (two things which together may mean that it balances out--I'm not sure about theater math). You have one more chance to see this show, Monday, August 21...follow this link to purchase tickets...

The show is a wild musical parody of two things that are always fun to parody: the 70s and feminism. "Free to Be Friends" counts on the audience's identification with both the awful fashion and the children's TV shows from that period; most notably drawing inspiration from "Free to Be You and Me" and "The Magic Garden," which may or may have not been a metaphor for living an alternate drug lifestyle. It is hootenanny that contains a literal hoot (in the form of an owl named Shylock), but sadly no nanny (unless you count "Gloria Steinem," who appears in a videotaped prologue to the show.

As Betty and Joan, Sue Galloway and Julie Klausner are two progressive 70s era women in love with each other and committed to telling the children out there in the audience all about life; not sugar-coated "Life for Kids," but the way it really is, with political songs like "Pancakes" (lyrics proclaim that everyone loves pancakes and then adds "And we shouldn't be in Vietnam") and a helpful song that explains that "Boys and Girls Are Different in the Pants." Between songs, banter between the two reveals that Joan rescued Betty from a macrame cult called the Macramainiacs, and narrates an activity about making "self-esteem cookies, which are only as good as you think they deserve to be."

Ultimately, the show, which contains lines like "sometimes I can't tell if you're really annoyed or if you're just being Jewish," or "killing, dying and being shot in the head are all part of growing up," is hilarious; the two stars have considerable comedic and musical talent, and a chemistry that makes the premise--can I say it?--sing. At the end of the "episode" of "Free to Be Friends," you wonder what the next episode will bring.

You have one more chance to see this show, Monday, August 21...so follow this link to purchase tickets...and get your Fringe on, already.

We Are Family, and Our Name is Hitler: "Little Willy" at the Ohio Theatre

A paraphrase of the catchy Sister Sledge song, to be sure, but as a headline about the new play "Little Willy," in which the eponymous diminutive William is William Patrick Hitler, it seems quite appropriate, no?

Yes, William Patrick Hitler. Used car salesman. Native of Ireland. And nephew of Adolf. But living life as WPH--or Little Willy, as some of the ladies call him--wasn't all it was cracked up to be.

In "Little Willy," we are taken through the life of WPH as he tries desperately to carve out a place for himself in the world, in any country that will take him and his mother. Along the way, he shills for Volkswagen (pre-farfergnugen), Colgate (pre-tartar control) and pretty much any other product he comes across. And he discovers pretty quickly that no one wants a Hitler.

This play is based on the life of Hitler's nephew, although the viewers senses that hyperbole and dramatic license reign over the play's content. At the end, slides tell you what happened to the real WPH, including the chilling sidebar that [SPOILER ALERT, TURN BACK NOW IF YOU'RE FRIGHTENED BY ALL MY CAPITAL LETTERS] WPH's three sons made a pact never to marry, effectively ending the Hitler line. Which evokes for me the injunction to erase the memory of Amalek. But maybe that's just me.

Mark Kassen, who also wrote the script-- gives a masterful, passionate and frenetic performance, creating a Hitler that is both pitiable and pathetic. Spare, but inventive, staging allows audiences to focus on the actor as he creates the environment using minimal props and only one other actor (Roxanna Hope, playing multiple roles).

Tickets are $15, but there's a MY URBAN KVETCH READER DISCOUNT AVAILABLE on tickets before April 16th. (Discount Code LW10). Tickets are available through TicketCentral or 212-279-4200, and the play runs at The Ohio Theatre, 66 Wooster Street between Spring and Broome, until April 30.

[Cross-posted to Jewlicious]

Heather Gold in "Cookie"

While in San Francisco, I had the chance to meet one of my friend's friends, and make her my friend. And it just so happens that this new friend, Heather Gold, has a one-woman show that she's bringing to NYC for two nights only. While I'm away. But I'd like to support her anyway...

So if any of you New Yorkers are looking for some slightly interactive, partly scripted, partly improvised comedy show about personal, intellectual and sexual identity and that ends in cookies, you've found it...it's Heather's new show:  "I Look Like an Egg, But I Identify as an Cookie."

"I was a tiny, redheaded, Jewish intellectual geek in your average working-class Mafioso-run tourist trap, " Heather notes while the cookies bake in the on-stage oven. But the show is as much about the limitations of these adjectives as it is about their truths. Cookie moves beyond identity politics through the kitchen. As the smell of fresh-baked cookies fills the air, the superficial melts away, and Heather brings the audience together through food, humor, shared experience and Air Supply slow dancing.

While Cookie follows a recipe, it involves the audience in the heart of the mix, letting Heather’s gift for extemporaneous comedy and insight fly. The show is different every night. "Canned comedy has been driving people out of comedy clubs," says Gold, "I’m trying to do for comedy what Alice Waters and the Bay Area did for food: make it local, relevant and organic. I’d rather share something substantial than hand out punchlines like twinkies."

So if it's Twinkies you want, go to the corner deli. But for freshly baked comedy, get thee to the Ars Nova Theater and see Heather's show. And tell her Esther sent you...

Feb 21+22
Ars Nova
511 West 54th (west of 10th)
tix: www.smarttix.com 1.212.868.4444
tix also available at the theatre a half hour before the show
tix $15 - ON SALE NOW

The Wendy Wasserstein Chronicles

"The real reason for comedy is to hide the pain."

"The marriages come and go but your friendships stay, which is the opposite of what it used to be, so that there will be people in our lives for 30 years and often it is not your husband, it's your women friends, male friends with whom you come of age.”

-- Wendy Wasserstein

From the AP:

Playwright Wendy Wasserstein, who celebrated women confronting feminism, careers, love and motherhood in such works as “The Heidi Chronicles” and “The Sisters Rosensweig,” died Monday. She was 55.

Wasserstein, who had been battling cancer in recent months, died at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center, Lincoln Center Theater spokesman Philip Rinaldi said. Andre Bishop, head of Lincoln Center Theater and a close friend of Wasserstein, said the cause of death was lymphoma.

Her writing was known for its sharp, often wry observations about what women had to do to succeed in a world dominated by men.

Wasserstein's works provided a treasury of scenes for actresses seeking strong comedic roles; among the many actresses who cycled through her plays were Glenn Close, Jill Eikenberry, Swoosie Kurtz, Sarah Jessica Parker, Cynthia Nixon, Meryl Streep, Jamie Lee Curtis, Madeline Kahn and Joan Allen.

Wasserstein also wrote for TV and movies; you might remember "The Object of My Affection," which starred Jennifer Aniston as a woman who can't find love except in her gay best friend (Paul Rudd), setting the precedent for thirtysomething women everywhere to say, "well, if Jen can't find love in a movie, I might as well start interviewing Friends of Dorothy now...especially, if they look like Paul Rudd..."

She had a daughter several years ago, at an advanced age, on her own, an experience which she chronicled in Shiksa Goddess, a book of essays on her life experiences.

If I were aspiring to become a playwright, Wendy Wasserstein would have been my idol. Even though I've never seen any of her plays performed, even on the page, her acerbic, brilliant, vulnerable Jewish flavored humor was always palpable, relatable, and human. It's a real loss for the American theater and the NY artistic community.

* Wikipedia
* Internet Broadway Database (like IMDB for theater)
* A Lincoln Center conversation with Wendy Wasserstein
* Buy me some of Wendy's work here