Eat, Drink & Be Literary at BAM cafe

Eat, Drink & Be Literary at BAMcafe

This great event, Eat, Drink & Be Literary presented in partnership with the National Book Foundation which is an yearly event hosted 4 award winning writers Robert A. Caro, John Edgar
Wideman, Sloane Crosley, and Min Jin Lee at the beautiful and majestic BAMcafe.

I was extremely fortunate to attend the event on March 20 when John Edgar Wideman was going to read and be interviewed by Deborah Treisman followe by question answer session.
I love books of all kinds but am extremely moved by writers such as John Edgar Wideman and James Baldwin and many others like them. I have never met James Baldwin and it gives me sorrow but what a delight it was to not only know John Edgar Wideman's work but to finally hear him read his melodious, poetic, personal and painfully poignant words in person.

His work is autobiographical.  His focus is on Black experienc in America with the emphasis on Black American men and their sons.  His personal history is nevertheless bigger and larger than
intimacy with himself and it engulfs the history of Blacks in Americ.  The writing's depth, its grace
and its sensitivity and how the words are strung together in sentenes leave you breathless.

Mr. Wideman himself has such grace, dignity and standing with his cannon of literature that one is just mesmerized. You see, the word creates a sentence, a sentence creates a paragraph, a paragraph creates a chapter and the chapter creates another chapter and another and it becomes a book and gets published if you are lucky but luck has its smallest share in the monumental effort.  Something else is needed to have such an effect on the audiences and readers of the world and that is, craft, talent, earnestness, honesty, poetry, history and some kind of personal pain combined with history of
the world you live in and John Edgar Widem has all of it and then some more.

He is one of the most touching orator I have encountered.  He moved me to such an extent that I have been thinking of him and his great writing since Wednesday and I am so glad that I bought at least two of his books, American Histories and Fatheralong that very night and can't wait to start reading them.


When he read, Last Day, the writing dealing with the nasty, awful doings in the U.S. prison-criminal
justice culture, (at the moment he has a brother who is serving a rather long incarceration), Widemna
reflected on conditions in the present American society, essentially concluding that things both racial and socioeconomic have a long, long way to go before reaching the land of betterment.

It was a worthy evening.  People in the wonderful cafe were so absorbed with the beauty and the
clarity of his words and his speech. 
For me just to see him standing tall with his head held high reciting extremely important and truthful
words was an experience I cherished and will cherish. When one see and hear such writers one feel
so brave and so afarid and so sad and so delighted at the same time. Hope to surpass all obstacles seems possible.

John Edgar Wideman is a MacArthur Fellow and two time PEN/Faulkner award winner.
Deborah Treisman did a great job and question answer session went well but the audience including me were hungry for more.

There are two more writers, Sloane Crosley and Min Jin Lee presenting their work on April 9 and May 1st.  DO NOT MISS.

WRITTEN
BY
BINA SHARIF
Editor/publisher:artsinternational
artsinternational.blogspot.com
binashariff@gmail.com
Cell: 212-260-6207
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'DANCE OF DEATH AND 'MIES JULIE', STRINDBERG

'DANCE OF DEATH'AND "MIES JULIE' STRINDBERG

August Strindberg, Swedish playwright, 1849--1912 wrote plays dealing with the most disturbd
and difficult relationships between lovers about sexual anxiety, lust, misplaced passion, troubles between husbands and wives, not ordinary troubles but desperate and pathological troubles.
Two of his plays, MIES JULIE, (MISS JULIE) and DANCE OF DEATH dealing with above mentioned desires a it's difficulties are being produced by CSC, classical stage company till March 10.

'MISS JULIE' IS NOW TITLED, 'MIES JULIE' adapted by Yael Farber and directed by Shariffa Ali
is set in South Africa after apartheid.  Miss Julie is a very haunting, dark play which deals with class
system, master and servant relationships and it's enormous tensions.  It's like upstairs, downstairs situation...and when sexual passion and desire between the two classes intermingle for whatever reason, attraction, loneliness, control, pathology, the result is going to be losts of smoke, fire and then eventual destruction. It's a sad and scary play because it reveals again and again the status of the occupants of those house hold. It's like society is telling you to, "Know your place and don't cross the boundries"  In Miss Julie the characters do things which  have devastating results.

In original Miss Julie, there are three characters, Julie, the rich man's spoiled and controlling daughter, Jean, her father's servant and Christina, a cook and Jean's fiance. The action takes place in Jean and Christina's kitchen downstairs.

In this new adaptation by Yael Farber, the play takes place in Karoo, South Africa and Jean is now John, a black man whose'ancestors were slaves.  The charcter of Christine has changed from John's fiance to his elderly mother. With these changes, the concept of the play utterly changes.
From sexual desires and sexual frustration of the upper class spoiled young Mies Julie has changed
towards race and the tragic history of it's slavery. With this drastic change the play did not work for me though the actors tried their best but it was a different concept and I kept thinking of the original
play all along. The ghost of John's ancient slaves walking around a few times didn't help either.

'DANCE OF DEATH'
Translated by wonderful Irish playwright Conor MacPherson and directed by Victoria Clark is
about a married couple, Alice (Cassie Beck) and Edgar (Richatd Topol) an army officer who is stationed on an island. They live in a house which was an army prison in the past.  It's a toxic love-hate relationship, more hate than love in which the husband and wife throw insults at each other like a fast and furious tennis match. Then there is another character, Kurt (Christopher Innvar) who is Alice's cousin and perhaps a lover in  her past who surprises the couple by showing up after many years.

The good thing about dance of death is that it has become very jovial and funny and light and that is also the bad thing about the play.  Though we as the audience members enjoy the show and laugh frequently but ones who know Strindberg's work well miss that ferociuos tension in the relationship.  They have been married for 25 years and have been hurting each other for such a long time and sometime one wonders about the waste of lives lacking basic happiness which has no joy in it.  But in this translation I felt as if I was watching a charming comedy and the couple was just kidding and teasing each other out of love and for some fun.  It's fun but the darkness and fire of their relationship is missing. Strindberg was a dark, disturbed writer who had incredibly difficult relationships in his marriages and he revealed lots of personal stuff in his work.  I recently read a trilogy of his plays called, "Road to Jeruslam" in which it was revealed that it was quite autobiographical and it dealt with his horrendous struggles for a happy marriage and relationship with his children beside many other serious problems he encountered throghout his life.  Strindberg was not a jovial writer.
But it was still fun to watch dance of death for a change.
Cassie Beck was excellent.

Reviewed by Bina Sharif
artsinternational.blogspot.com
binashariff@gmail.com
Cell: 212-260-6207
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UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVA AT THE PUBLIC THEATER
CHAMBRE
NOIRE

Reviewed by
Bina Sharif for artsinternational

Directed by:Yngvild Aspeli and Paola Rizza
Actress Puppeteer;Yngvild Aspelie
Percussionist; Ane Marthe Sorlien Holen
Lighting Designer; Xavier Lescat

Chambre Noire is a disurbing story about the life of Valerie Solanas, who was a women's rights
activist and a radical writer who wrote SCUM Menifesto. She had a master's degree in psychology
and issues with men, most men who ran rules and regulations.  She often uttered with great boldness  words such as, "Every man deep down knows he is a piece of shit" She was angry, fearless, reckless
woman who also called herself a, "WHORE" Chambre Noire is a haunting hallucination at the time
when she is dying all alone by herself in a single vacancy hotel room.  She was in and out of mental institutions. She encountered Andy Warhol and was just a minor character in his art space famously known as, 'FACTORY"

She wrote a play and gave it to Andy Warhol to produce and felt extremely ignored when he didn't even returned her calls and one day she took guns to the factory and shot him.  In the play this question is raised many times, "Why did you shoot Andy Warhol?"  She didn't have any precise answer except her hatred towards him because he was one of those men she thought were real scum. But after this incident her mental illness progressed.

Chambre Noire tells the story of valerie Solanas through music, life size puppets, precise and beutifully designed and focused lights and video, thus creating a hallucination which reflects the depth of her complicated and fragmented mind when she is struggling to get out of her collapsing last gasps. Puppeteer/actress Yngvild Aspeli who is also the artistic director of Plexus Polaire orchestrates
life-sized puppets so brilliantly that it's difficult to believe if she is handling a real person or a lifeless puppet with wooden legs.  The lights and her precise handling of Valerie Solanas, (as a puppet) creates beautiful and at times scary images which creates spasms of vertigo like feelings of falling down from a cliff of a wasted life.  The play is beutifully designed.  Images are dark and light with the effect of tunnels full of darkness with some rays of bright light which keeps fading like Valerie Solanas life.  The play has stunning music which is a percussion of signals and alarms and of a dirge of death approaching. This play doesn't have many words, doesn't tell us her whole story but does communicate sadness and sorrow.  The play is fragmented like Solanas mind and it's a beautiful tragedy.

Bina Sharif: Editor/publisher, artsinternational.blogspot.com
Email: binashariff@gmail.com
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Cell: 212-260-6207

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER
EVOLUTION OF A SONERO

Written and performed by
Flaco Navaja
Music:  Five muscians-aka The Razor Blades

Flaco Navaja is a poet, singer and an actor.  He is an original member of UNIVERSES and that famous Def poetry Jam cast.  He is from the Bronx and one can see how deeply proud he is of his roots. There is a saying about being on stage." If you have charm, if you have a personality, if you have humor, that's where you belong-on the stage."  And Falco Navaja has all of that and much more.
He has what's most essential, "THE TALENT" He can sing, dance, crack jokes, recite poetry with all it's essence intact and can tell a great story following all the intricate details.  Story telling is the greatest skill, all theater, all drama is infact story telling. And there is no story if one doesn't follow the details and punch lines and the pauses. Falco Navaja knows that.  Maybe he is the ancestor of Greeks and Sankskrit poets and story tellers who were tragic and comic at the same moment.
Falco knows the impact of his spoken words, his poetry, his beat and his dance.  And god bestowed
upon him the most pleasant and charming face with a smile to kill.

He tells us the sad story of his arrest on his mother's birthday and the beating by his father afterwards and we crack up.  He tells us the story of his wife giving birth on the way to Lenox hill hospital all the way from the Bronx in an Uber driven car with the road jam packed with trafic and baby being born and we sit on the edge of our seats with this anxiety and prayer, "Oh! god I hope everything goes right for him and the wife and the baby"  And there is such relief and joy at the end.

Music is just brilliant.  Falco makes fun of himself, his circumstances and of some musical numbers with devastating humor.  He is the most likeable performer I have seen on the stage in a while.
His body is made for the dance, his face is made for that smile and his self deprecating humor is to die.
I throughly enjoyed this actor and his craft and the muscians were equally talented. Hope to catch them all again soon.

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER
MINOR CHARACTER

Created by New Saloon
Directed by Morgan Green
Based on Uncle Vanya by Chekhov

Reviewed by
Bina Sharif for artsinternational

Checkho, one of the greatest Russian dramatist and a writer of short stories has been translated
in many languages.  The New Saloon takes at least six English translations of Uncle Vanya and
experiment with it.  The experiment is a lot of fun in a very confusing way. Many characters are played by different actors of different race and gender with very little change in costume except a mink look alike stole for Yelena in many scenes. Yelena, the beautiful wife of the intellectual professor, Serebryako is being played by three actors, Medeline Wise, Rona Figueroa and Ron Domingo.  All three of them are on stage many times repeating the lines of their character in different translations and the effect is many times startling in a very good way.  Uncle Vanya is considered a tragicomedy because there is hidden humor in it but all the characters in the play, Vanya as well as in Minor Character are unhappy yearnig for somethin unreachable. Yelena is being asked a profound question in all the different translations , "Are you happy?" and her answer always is, "NO"And that is enough to realize how human these nerous, anxiety stricken, unhappy people are.

And Sonya, the hard working niece of Uncle Vanya and the daughter of the professor Serebryakov
declares herself, "Not pretty" "Very Plain" "Not attractive" in all translations. So no matter which language she expresses her despair of her meager existence in, she seems fragmented and a wounded person like the rest of the characters. They are all seeking something without having the awareness of what is it that they are after. I guess it's happiness they are after like the Citizens of 21st Century
thus making Chekhov, the most classical as well as a contemprary playwright.

Only character in this play who is in total defiance and is a control freak is the professor.  He complains about his gout and ill health but not with any kind of despair but with high volume of shreaking anger and ego. He is the most selfish in his material and emotional needs and wants a huge sacrifice by every one especially Sonya and Uncle Vanya.  Played by David Greenspan, (actor/playwright) who enjoys being on stage like no one else, is pretty good in the role

All actors are dedicated and very funny.  I think this experimental production by New Saloon who took a chance on a great classic has worked but I wish it was a bit longer and had more of Chekho's
beautiful monologues in it. But still it has amazing humor and what we learn is that the core meaning of important words remain the same no matter which translation of great works is being used.

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER

FRANKENSTEIN

Review: by Bina Sharif

Multimedia company Manual Cinema presents the classical story of Frankenstein by Mary Shelly,
interwoen with Mary Shelly's biography and the result is one of the most beauriful, accomplished and stunning movie/theater/performance I hae ever seen.

The shadow puppets are used with live muscians and one can be mesmerized watching the actors
and the muscians creating these hauntingly beautiful images on the screen right in-front of us.
The process is live and so fascinating that one wants to capture every second of this creative process.
I kept going back and forth from the live action and the result being born on the screen.
It is magic, a fantasy, a powerful dream and not a dream at all because you are wide awake and realize fully how talented the whole team is.  Brillant craft created by brilliant craftsmen.  Great talent is for sure great talent ad it is on display in this highly imaginative show.

I am always afraid of monsters and the word Frankenstein scares me but I tell you how fortunate I feel after seeing this production of Frankenstein.  I felt like a child who has been taken to a journey through ancient lands with hills and mountains and thunder and lightening but every moment was a
magical moment of bliss.

This company Manual Cinema was founded in 2010 by Drew Dir, Sarah Formace, Ben Kauffman, Julia Miller and Kyle Vegter, totalky dedicated artists.  Throughout the show I have never seen such concentration by the actors like the one's in this show. This production is highly theatrical and a great pleasure to watch.  I am saddened by the fact that I have never seen any of their work before but I promise that I will never miss any of their future productions.  Bravo to the whole company.

Bina Sharif: editor/publisher
artsinternational.blogspot.com
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Cell: 212-260-6207
binashariff@gmail.com

UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL AT THE PUBLIC THEATER

HEAR WORD! Naija Woman Talk True'
Written and directed by Ifeoma Fafunwa from the Nigerian company iOpenEye Ltd.
Reviewed by
Bina Sharif

"HEAR WORD!" is a combination of very personel stories told by Nigerian women through dance and song.  Performances by women in vibrantly colorful native costumes are extremely powerful
and their stories are sad and depressing.  They are subjugated by men in their society, they are considerd inferior, ordered around and sexually abused. Men are the power, all kinds of power but these actresses are so strong that sometimes one wonders how can they be so subjugated by those men who seems much weaker in their angry power? And these women towards the end show us how they are capable of defiance and they exert that strength and joy through dance and song with great power.

For a while one forgets that these are the same women who has gone through such humiliation by men. But at the same time one is reminded that some men can be nasty and sexual abusers everywhere, since there has been such cases of sexual assaults here as well but still the system in Nigeria seems like rootd in brutality of all kinds towards women but women are not sitting back and taking it, they are fighting back with great strength. One of those women is Sister Esther, a bible carrying Christian who in the most enjoyable manner tells us that sex is a gift of god and she has the right to enjoy it.

The show is a bit long and the stories have the same similar content thus making the show a bit repetitive.  I wish the show ended after the most joyful performane by Sister Esther.
But still the show is informatie, important as well as necessary.

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Cell: 212-260-6207