twi-ny recommended events

ECSTATIC MUSIC FESTIVAL

Merkin Concert Hall at Kaufman Center
129 West 67th St.
Monday, January 17, free, 2:00 – 9:00
Festival continues through March 12, $25 per concert, four-concert subscription $80
212-501-3330
www.ecstaticmusicfestival.com

Classical and pop combine in myriad ways during the Ecstatic Music Festival, which begins today with a seven-hour free marathon at Merkin Concert Hall, beginning at 2:00 and featuring performances by Buke and Gass with Victoire, Ne(x)tworks, Face the Music, So Percussion, the Chiara String Quartet, Missy Mazzoli, Gabriel Kahane, Hohn Matthias, NOW Ensemble, Julianna Barwick, Ashley Bathgate with Lisa Moore and Michael Gordon, Vicky Chow with Daniel Wohl, Nadia Sirota and Nico Muhly, and others. The festival continues January 19 with Chiara String Quartet, Nico Muhly, and Valgeir Sigurðsson, January 20 with So Percussion and Dan Deacon, January 22 with Craig Wedren, Jefferson Friedman, and ACME, January 30 with Alarm Will Sound and Face the Music, and February 19 with Roomful of Teeth with William Brittelle, Caleb Burhans, and Merrill Garbus before continuing into March.

MLK DAY 2011

The Rev. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., would have turned eighty-one this month

In the aftermath of the assassination attempt on Arizona congresswoman Gabrilelle Giffords, today’s many tributes to the life of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr., should take on added meaning. At BAM’s Howard Gilman Opera House, the twenty-fifth annual free event, beginning at 10:30 am, features a keynote address by writer Walter Mosley, live performances by the Persuasions and the Reverend Timothy Wright Memorial Choir of the Grace Tabernacle Christian Center, and a screening of NESHOBA: THE PRICE OF FREEDOM (Micki Dickoff & Tony Pagano, 2010). The Children’s Museum of Manhattan continues its Martin Luther King. Jr., Festival with “Raising Citizens: Make a Difference Medal” at 12 noon. At the newly reopened Museum of the Moving Image, associate producer Richard Kaplan will introduce a free screening of KING: A FILMED RECORD . . . MONTGOMERY TO MEMPHIS at 3:00. At Symphony Space, the fourth annual JCC in Manhattan program, “Artists Celebrate Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr.,” includes a keynote address by the Rev. Dr. Suzan D. Johnson Cook, live jazz from Craig Harris, Juel Lane performing choreographer Bridget Moore’s REMEMBRANCE OF THINGS PAST, and singers Neshama Carlebach and Reverend Hambrick with members of the Green Pastures Baptist Church Choir, emceed by Ruth Messinger (free, 6:30). Tonight Jazz at Lincoln Center will present a Jazz Celebration featuring the Juilliard Jazz Ensemble, Cyrus Chestnut, and special guests ($20, 7:30 & 9:30).

BLOOD FROM A STONE

A dysfunctional Connecticut family lets loose in Tommy Nohilly’s BLOOD FROM A STONE (photo by Monique Carboni)

Acorn Theatre, Theatre Row
410 West 42nd St. between Ninth & Tenth Aves.
Through February 19, $61.25
212-239-6200
www.thenewgroup.org

Recalling the long line of such dysfunctional theatrical families as George, Martha, Nick, and Honey from Edward Albee’s WHO’S AFRAID OF VIRGINIA WOOLF? and the Tyrones from Eugene O’Neill’s LONG DAY’S JOURNEY INTO NIGHT, debut writer Tommy Nohilly’s BLOOD FROM A STONE is a flawed but compelling, none-too-subtle, extremely bleak production from the New Group. Nohilly, an actor living in Hell’s Kitchen, sets the play in a working-class home in suburban New Britain, Connecticut, around Christmastime earlier this decade. The prodigal slacker son, military vet Travis (Ethan Hawke), has come home for a few days before planning to take off to find himself out on the open road; ostensibly the voice of reason in the family, he is also a stand-in for the audience; unable to take action, he spends most of his time listening and watching, except when having a quick fling with his married high school sweetheart, Yvette (Daphne Rubin-Vega), who lives next door. Travis’s brother, Matt (Thomas Guiry), is considering leaving his wife and two children for a coworker who is married with four children, while sister Sarah (Natasha Lyonne), the person closest to “normal,” is pregnant again. But the stars of the show are their parents, Bill (Gordon Clapp) and Margaret (Ann Dowd), who are constantly at each other’s throats, screaming, yelling, and cursing, both filled with a hateful venom that feels all too real; this is not a couple that is about to kiss and make up under any circumstance, so don’t expect any Christmas miracles. Clapp is outstanding as Bill, a ticking time bomb ready to explode (or implode) at any moment, while Dowd chews up and spits out Derek McLane’s wonderfully vapid set design. Although Nohilly and director Scott Elliott tend to hit hard — the family’s severe dysfunction is mirrored by the house itself falling apart, with ceiling tiles crashing down as the roof leaks huge splashes of rainwater into the kitchen — there are also moments of great subtlety and tenderness, as when Bill and Travis reminisce over late-night ice-cream cones or Travis almost absent-mindedly massages his sister’s feet. In fact, dairy is a key aspect in the play, as milk, the nourishing substance of youth, is guzzled by several characters over the course of four very tense days. An actor’s writer, Nohilly has created numerous scenes in which the performers shine, although the women are too one-note (the playwright and director even go out of their way to have Rubin-Vega gratuitously run naked across the stage), and the play often feels like a series of vignettes instead of a smooth, continuous narrative, too jumpy and random. It’s also top heavy, with the too-long first act running around an hour and a half, followed by the too-short second act, which clocks in at about forty minutes. Still, there’s a lot to like about this intimate production, which also features fine special effects by Jeremy Chernick.

PLAGUE! BED BUG MYTHS AND REALITIES

Bed bugs creep under box springs and other areas (photo courtesy Dr. Louis Sorkin)

Museum of the City of New York
1220 Fifth Ave. at 103rd St.
Tuesday, January 18, advance RSVP $12, 6:30
917-492-3395
www.mcny.org

Last January, the American Museum of Natural History hosted a summit called “What Do You Really Know About Bed Bugs?” featuring a number of experts headed by entomologist and arachnologist Dr. Louis N. Sorkin, who has been holding public meetings on the nasty creatures since 2006. On Tuesday, January 18, at 6:30, many of those same experts will reconvene at the Museum of the City of New York for “Plague! Bed Bugs: Myths and Realities.” Cosponsored by the American Museum of Natural History and the New York Entomological Society, the event will look at what has been learned about the infestation over the last year and what can be done about it. Moderated by Dr. Amy L. Fairchild of Columbia’s Center for the History and Ethics of Public Health, the panel discussion, which will be followed by an audience Q&A, will include Dr. Sorkin, Councilmember Gale A. Brewer, former director of New York vs Bed Bugs Renee Corea, managing director David Cain of London’s Bed Bugs Ltd., CEO Yasmine Hecker of Prep 4 Bed Bugs, and Ray Lopez of the Little Sisters of Assumption Family Health Service.

JOHN GABRIEL BORKMAN

Alan Rickman, Lindsay Duncan, and Fiona Shaw head a stellar production of Ibsen’s JOHN GABRIEL BORKMAN at BAM (photo by Richard Termine)

Brooklyn Academy of Music
BAM Harvey Theater
651 Fulton St.
Through February 6, $25-$80
718-636-4100
www.bam.org

Written in 1896, Henrik Ibsen’s penultimate play, JOHN GABRIEL BORKMAN, feels as fresh and alive as if it were written yesterday. Frank McGuinness’s new English-language version, directed by James Macdonald and first presented at Dublin’s Abbey Theatre this past fall, is currently having its U.S. premiere at BAM’s Harvey Theater, in a splendid production running through February 6. Ibsen’s dark tale of greed, power, and cold, soulless hearts centers on a once-prominent family torn apart by scandal. John Gabriel Borkman (Alan Rickman) was a successful bank manager who ultimately got caught embezzling funds, serving five years in prison before returning home, where he has been pacing in his upstairs cave for eight more years, never seeing his destroyed wife, Gunhild (Fioan Shaw), or his now-grown son, Erhart (Marty Rea). While Borkman is determined to regain his position, refusing to admit his guilt, Gunhild is battling her twin sister, Ella Rentheim (Lindsay Duncan), over Erhart’s love; after Borkman’s arrest, Ella took in Erhart for six years as Gunhild tried to deal with the shame and suddenly having no money. Neither woman is happy that Erhart, in the meantime, has been spending more and more time with the older Fanny Wilton (Cathy Belton), a free-spirited woman whose husband recently left her. Over the course of one very long night, secrets are revealed in a series of dazzling scenes filled with fast-paced dialogue beautifully delivered by the outstanding cast. Set designer Tom Pye has surrounded the stage with large piles of snow, emphasizing the coldness that has taken over the main characters’ hearts. As Ella and Gunhild, both wearing long, mournful black dresses, give one another icy stares, they drag bits of snow into the middle of the sparse room, where chairs are set up by themselves, continuing the physical and psychological isolation, which is furthered by Borkman’s often vacant eyes. As Borkman speaks with his one friend, Vilhelm (John Kavanagh), and teaches piano to Vilhelm’s daughter, Frida (Amy Molloy), upstairs, the grandfather clock in the back can be heard ticking away, counting the seconds till Borkman’s ultimate destiny. Rickman, Duncan, and Shaw so embody their characters that on January 15, when a disturbance was going on in the right front corner of the audience, Rickman calmly announced, still in Borkman’s voice, that the play should be stopped because someone appeared to be ill. After several moments, the sick man was helped out of the theater, and Rickman and Duncan returned to the scene, picking up right where they left off, as if nothing had happened, their fiery passion as palpable as ever. Although McGuinness’s version was written in response to the economic crisis in Ireland, it is impossible not to think of such figures as Bernie Madoff as the Borkmans fight over their despised name, yet JOHN GABRIEL BORKMAN still winds up a timeless, masterful piece of theater. (An Artist Talk with Duncan, Rickman, and Shaw, moderated by Paul Holdengräber, will follow the January 16 performance [$15, 6:45.])

CONTINENTAL REUNION SHOW

Murphy’s Law will be headlining early reunion show at the Continental Sunday night

Continental
25 Third Ave. between St. Marks Pl. & Ninth St.
Sunday, January 16, $10, 4:00, free after 7:00
212-529-6924
www.continentalnyc.com

After fifteen years of punk and hardcore shows, the Continental got rid of live music in September 2006, a sad thing especially in light of CBGB’s closing for good the next month. But last year Continental owner Trigger staged what was thought to be a one-time-only reunion of musicians who had played the club in the past. Fortunately, the gathering might become an annual event, as the second reunion show takes place Sunday, January 16, beginning at 4:00 with 2 Man Advantage and Murphy’s Law ($10), followed at 7:00 with a free show featuring Honor Among Thieves, CJ Ramone, Waldos, Sea Monster, Trigger’s Allstars, Bullys, the Bebe Buell Band, Threads, Charm School, Heap, Furious George, and Curtis Suburban.

PERFORMANCE 11: ON LINE/TRISHA BROWN DANCE COMPANY

Trisha Brown Dance Company, STICKS, 1973 (photograph by Alfredo Anceschi)

Museum of Modern Art
The Donald B. and Catherine C. Marron Atrium, second floor
11 West 53rd St. between Fifth & Sixth Aves.
Saturday, January 15, and Sunday, January 16, 2:00 & 4:00
Free with museum admission of $20 (includes same-day film screening)
212-708-9400
www.moma.org
www.trishabrowncompany.org

Last fall the Trisha Brown Dance Company continued its fortieth anniversary celebration with a number of site-specific performances at the Whitney. Now it leaps into its fifth decade with a group of shows in MoMA’s atrium as part of the museum’s Performance Exhibition Series, being staged in conjunction with “On Line: Drawing Through the Twentieth Century,” which examines how drawing has changed in the last hundred years, featuring works by such artists as Aleksandr Rodchenko, Alexander Calder, Eva Hesse, Richard Tuttle, Mona Hatoum, and many others. On January 15 and 16 at 2:00 and 4:00, Brown will be presenting STICKS (1973), SCALLOPS (1973), and LOCUS SOLO (1975) as well as the premiere of ROOF PIECE RE-LAYED (2011), adapted from her original 1971 ROOF PIECE. MoMA will continue to explore the intimate connection between dance and drawings with Marie Cool and Fabio Balducci January 17-20, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker January 22-23, Ralph Lemon January 26-30, and Xavier Le Roy February 2-6.