this week in lectures, signings, panel discussions, workshops, and Q&As

ADDRESSLESS: A WALK IN OUR SHOES

Addressless presents complicated choices for three homeless New Yorkers over three winter months

ADDRESSLESS
Rattlestick Playwrights Theater online
Thursday – Tuesday through February 13, $1 – $30
www.rattlestick.org

Rattlestick’s virtual, participatory Addressless is an involving piece of activist theater that could only happen online, away from its home on Waverly Pl. The interactive show shines a light on housing insecurity, an issue that has grown during the coronavirus pandemic as New York City shuttles the homeless between hotels and congregate and noncongregate shelters.

Created and directed by Martin Boross of the Hungarian collective STEREO AKT and written by playwright and social worker Jonathan Payne, Addressless is a choose-your-own-adventure style production in which the audience is assigned to one of three teams, trying to help their designated character find safe haven in a harsh city. Louis (Joey Auzenne) is a thirty-three-year-old army vet who is having a difficult time getting a job and a place to sleep. Josie (Bianca Norwood) is a teenage runaway from Buffalo escaping from a drug-addicted mother and an alcoholic father. And Wallace (Shams DaBaron, aka “Da Homeless Hero”) is a fifty-two-year-old single father who’s been homeless on and off since he was ten. The show is hosted by real-life social worker Hope Beaver, who is originally from Texas and now works at a family shelter at Henry Street Settlement, caring for single mothers and their children eight and under.

Addressless is set up as a game, and team members vote on what their character should do over the course of three winter months. Each choice affects how much money the individual has and the state of their health as they attempt to accumulate $1500 to qualify for a housing lottery to live rent free for a year in a new development on the Lower East Side. They choose between sleeping on the streets, which requires the least amount of cash but has the most severe impact on their health, going to a shelter (a kind of middle road), or couch surfing (best for health but most expensive).

A social worker offers choices to military vet Louis (Joey Auzenne) in interactive virtual show from Rattlestick

The teams meet privately in breakout rooms to discuss the options, then vote on the final decision. It is suggested you keep your camera on, and you are encouraged to participate but don’t have to. Being able to see where everyone is zooming in from emphasizes the audience’s privilege: having somewhere to live, owning a computer, laptop, or handheld device, and being able to afford a ticket to the show. (General admission is $30, but there are pay-what-you-can nights beginning at $1.)

Although you’re supposed to comment and vote only on your specific team’s character, the night I went a few people spoke far too often about and voted for all three, which got a little annoying, so hopefully the rules have been clarified since then. I was on Team Wallace, and I found it invigorating to help him make his choices each month. The discussions are about where they will sleep as well as deciding, for example, whether to pose for a photographer for twenty bucks, go to an acquaintance’s work party or attend an AA meeting, or accept a shelter transfer from Manhattan to the Bronx. Depending on what the team decides, the vote is followed by a prerecorded scene depicting the results of the choice. Spoiler alert: There are not a whole lotta good outcomes.

The supporting cast in the prerecorded vignettes includes Faith Catlin as an AA facilitator, Alok Tewari as an ER doctor, Paten Hughes as a high school classmate of Josie’s, Keith Randolph Smith as the photographer, and Michael Laurence as a sales manager, in addition to Chima Chikazunga, Mahira Kakkar, Tara Khozein, Olivia Oguma, and Lisa Ramirez. The production design is by Johnny Moreno, with sets and props by Patricia Marjorie, costumes by Olivera Gajic, music by Tara Khozein, sound by Julian Evans, graphics and animation by Maiko Kikuchi, video editing by Matthew Russell, and integration design by Victoria A. Gelling. It’s not the flashiest online production, instead more DIY that fits in with the overall theme.

It might be a game — Payne (The Revolving Cycles Truly and Steadily Roll’d, The Briar Patch) is a self-proclaimed Dungeons & Dragons geek, so he knows about character and narrative — but it’s built to make you care deeply about the three homeless people, humanizing them, the way you probably wouldn’t if you simply passed them on the street; when I served as Wallace’s banker for December and raised him the smallest amount of money of the three of them, I was truly disappointed in myself, and that failure has stayed with me. Wallace was still upbeat, as that is first-time actor DaBaron’s general nature; during the pandemic, DaBaron, who is also a writer, filmmaker, and hip-hop artist, advocated for the homeless all around the city and particularly the men who were moved to the Lucerne Hotel on the Upper West Side. Auzenne (Wu Tang: An American Saga, Our Lady of 121st Street) plays it much harder as Louis, while Norwood (Plano) gives Josie a distrustful edge.

Based on actual experiences and presented in partnership with Urban Pathways and Community Access, Addressless deals with unfairness and injustice in a way that will make you feel both helpless and furious. At the beginning of the presentation, Beaver says, “I am not an actor. Wish me luck; I’m gonna need it.” She avails herself well as our host, sharing important statistics about homelessness that are likely to surprise you. But like DaBaron, she believes changes can and will be made. As Wallace points out in one vignette, sometimes he just wants to feel “a part of the world again. Like I was fittin’ right in.” But all choices have consequences when you’re without an address.

[To find out more, you can join a virtual community conversation, “Addressing the Addressless,” on February 8 at 5:00; admission is free with advance RSVP.]

ASSASSINS

Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme (Tavi Gevinson) and Sara Jane Moore (Judy Kuhn) share their distaste for President Ford and KFC in Assassins (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

ASSASSINS
Classic Stage Company
Lynn F. Angelson Theater
136 East 13th St. between Third & Fourth Aves.
Tuesday – Sunday through January 30 [Ed. note: All performances have been canceled as of January 25]
www.classicstage.org

The late Stephen Sondheim, who passed away in November at the age of ninety-one, is currently represented in New York City by two musicals, Marianne Elliott’s stirring, gender-switching Broadway revival of the beloved Company at the Jacobs and John Doyle’s far less exciting adaptation of the much less worshiped Assassins at Classic Stage.

Kicking off his final year as artistic director at Classic Stage, Doyle, who began there in 2016, won a Tony for directing Sondheim’s Sweeney Todd in 2005; he also staged a Tony-winning revival of Company in 2006 and helmed Merrily We Roll Along at Watermill in 2008. Despite his familiarity with Sondheim, his Assassins, which sold out almost instantly and has been extended through January 30, misses its mark. [Ed. note: All performances have been canceled because of a Covid outbreak in the company on January 25.]

The show was initially scheduled to open in March 2020, so anticipation only built higher during the pandemic lockdown before it eventually began its run in November 2021. Although no tickets are available, you might be able to grab a cancellation because of the omicron variant; the night I went, there were more than twenty vacant seats, a sign of the times.

Assassins brings together nine men and women who have tried to kill the president of the United States (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

The musical, featuring a book by librettist and TV writer John Weidman, who also collaborated with Sondheim on Pacific Overtures and Road Show, gives nine men and women the opportunity to defend their attempts to assassinate the president of the United States. The carnival atmosphere is facilitated by the Proprietor (Eddie Cooper), on a stage jutting out with the audience on three sides. In addition to directing, Doyle designed the set, which boasts the American flag spread across the floor under a large monitor on which photos of the presidents are posted like targets.

“Hey, pal — feelin’ blue? / Don’t know what to do? / Hey, pal — / I mean you — / Yeah. C’mere and kill a president,” the Proprietor sings in “Everybody’s Got the Right,” continuing, “No job? Cupboard bare? / One room, no one there? / Hey, pal, don’t despair — / You wanna shoot a president? / C’mon and shoot a president . . . Some guys / think they can’t be winners. / First prize / often goes to rank beginners.”

A terrific cast can’t breathe enough life into the choppy narrative, which goes back and forth among the assassins, who are joined by an ensemble of backup singers and musicians. Ethan Slater stands out as the Balladeer, a kind of traveling troubadour, and is almost unrecognizable as Lee Harvey Oswald, the man who killed JFK. Judy Kuhn adds comic relief as Sara Jane Moore, who took a shot at Gerald Ford in September 1975, a few weeks after Manson Family member Lynette “Squeaky” Fromme (Tavi Gevinson) botched her attempt at the Nixon pardoner. Steven Pasquale tries to steal the show as Lincoln killer John Wilkes Booth but is overly dominant while Adam Chanler-Berat is barely there as Ronald Reagan shooter John Hinckley Jr.

Steven Pasquale plays John Wilkes Booth in Sondheim-Weidman revival at Classic Stage (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

Will Swenson is well-educated James A. Garfield murderer Charles Guiteau; Wesley Taylor is naturalized citizen Giuseppe Zangara, who fired at FDR but killed Chicago mayor Anton Cermak instead; Andy Grotelueschen (now replaced by Danny Wolohan) is Samuel Byck, who tried to hijack a plane and fly it into the White House to kill Richard Nixon; and Brandon Uranowitz is anarchist Leon Czolgosz, who shot and killed William McKinley in 1901. The show perhaps works best as an argument for stronger gun control laws.

The assassins are all in period costumes except for Byck, who wears a Santa suit; the ensemble of singers and musicians (Brad Giovanine, Bianca Horn, Whit K. Lee, Rob Morrison, and Katrina Yaukey) wear red, white, or blue jumpsuits. (The effective costumes are by Ann Hould-Ward, with wigs by Charles G. LaPointe.) Some of the cast also have American flag masks that they whisk off when they sing.

Presidential assassins make their case in off-Broadway musical (photo by Julieta Cervantes)

The musical numbers, which range from “Gun Song” and “Unworthy of Your Love” to “Another National Anthem” and “Something Just Broke” and have unconventional orchestrations, don’t stick with you; they simply come and go. The idea itself is a grand one; watching these assassins mix and mingle is at times fascinating, but there is little flow to the book, which too often wilts or becomes confusing as it tries to neither celebrate nor revile the characters, who chose a dangerous path to change the country and their own place in it.

“So many people confuse the right to happiness with the right to the pursuit of happiness,” Sondheim said in Classic Stage’s 2021 “Tell the Story” virtual gala, in which he and Weidman relate the show to the January 6 insurrection, during which the lives of the vice president and the Speaker of the House were under threat. Even given the newfound relevance, though, the show feels dated.

To find out more about Assassins, you can check out Classic Stage’s ongoing Classic Conversations series, which during the lockdown featured members of the cast and crew discussing the revival.

BALLETS WITH A TWIST: MIRAGE

Double Vision is one of several new works being previewed in Ballets with a Twist watch parties

Who: Ballets with a Twist
What: Virtual watch parties for short-film series
Where: Twist Theater online
When: Friday, January 21, 8:00 & 10:00; Saturday, January 22, 2:00, 8:00 & 10:00, free
Why: Tribeca-based Ballets with a Twist has been offering a unique twist on ballet for more than twenty-five years. The company’s short works are all named for and inspired by potent potables, performed together as Cocktail Hour: The Show. Among the pieces that combine drama, humor, mystery, and romance are Absinthe, Grappa, Martini, Zombie, Champagne, Boilermaker, Cuba Libre, and Hot Toddy.

Because of the pandemic lockdown and the continuing spread of various variants, the troupe, founded in 1996 by artistic director and choreographer Marilyn Klaus, has moved outdoors for its latest presentation, Mirage, a four-part suite being livestreamed for free on January 21-22 at 8:00 and 10:00, with an additional matinee viewing on Saturday at 2:00. The short film was directed, photographed, and edited by Emma Huibregtse, with choreography by Klaus, original music by Stephen Gaboury, and costumes by designer Catherine Zehr.

In Ranch Water, Dorothea Garland struts with a top hat on the troupe’s roof. In La Paloma, Garland glories across an old airstrip in Brooklyn, almost floating away in colorful costumes. In Smooth Criminal, Andres Neira channels Michael Jackson at the historic Queens Unisphere. And in Double Vision, real-life partners Claire Mazza and Alejandro Ulloa promenade at a masked ball on the steps of an abandoned castle in Harlem.

After the performances, members of the cast and crew in the studio discuss their process, including Klaus, Gaboury, Zehr, Jennifer Buonamia, Mackenzie Frey, Tori Hey, Margaret Hoshor, Amy Gilson, and Haley Neisser. Mirage is a mere aperitif for the upcoming stage version to be held later this year, which will also feature animated projections by Huibregtse and lighting by Dan Hansell. So grab your cocktail of choice, settle in, and join one of the watch parties taking place this weekend.

VIRTUAL SYMPOSIUM: SURREALISM BEYOND BORDERS

Koga Harue, Umi (The Sea), oil on canvas, 1929 (The National Museum of Modern Art, Tokyo / photo courtesy MOMAT/DNPartcom)

Who: MetSpeaks
What: Two-day virtual symposium on Met exhibition “Surrealism Beyond Borders”
Where: Metropolitan Museum of Art Zoom
When: Thursday, January 20, 1:00–5:30; Friday, January 21, 10:00 am – 1:00 pm, free with advance RSVP
Why: While walking through the Met’s must-see “Surrealism Beyond Borders” exhibit, which continues through January 30, I bumped into an old friend of mine who was not impressed by the show, disappointed that it was lacking in big-name familiar works. However, that’s part of the point. While the exhibition does feature works by Max Ernst, Giorgio de Chirico, René Magritte, Salvador Dalí, Leonora Carrington, Wifredo Lam, Dorothea Tanning, and Joan Miró, it explores the development of surrealism around the world, from Belgrade, Mexico City, the Netherlands, Haiti, South Korea, and Portugal to Egypt, England, Colombia, South America, Cuba, and Canada, where surrealism was often part of sociocultural movements toward freedom and justice.

Divided into such sections as “Collective Identities,” “The Work of Dreams,” “Beyond Reason,” “Thoughts in Transition,” “The Fantasy and Phallacy of Elsewhere,” “Bodies of Desire,” and “Automatism,” the show finds commonalities in different cultures in painting and sculpture and broadens the idea of what qualifies as surreal. Marcel Jean’s oil on wood Armoire surréaliste (Surrealist Wardrobe), made while the French artist was living in exile with his wife in Budapest, welcomes visitors with open doors. Koga Harue’s Umi (The Sea) prefigures Thomas Hart Benton. Ramses Younan’s 1939 untitled painting of a twisted Nut, the goddess of the sky, was a direct response to Magritte and Dalí. Ithell Colquhoun called her double-phallic Scylla “a pictorial pun.” There’s also an experimental film by Maya Deren, Cage by Alberto Giacometti, a copy of the 1941 Martinique arts journal Tropiques, Pierre Alechinsky’s depiction of Central Park, and a corner dedicated to surrealism in Chicago in the 1960s, with protest posters, manifestos, and blues music by Elmore James, Buddy Guy, and others. “Surrealism fights for the TOTAL LIBERATION OF MAN!” the Chicago Surrealist Group declared in 1971. The show indeed goes well beyond borders.

In conjunction with the final days of the show, MetSpeaks is hosting a two-day free virtual symposium consisting of four panel discussions with professors, publishers, artists, and art historians exploring various aspects of surrealism, focusing on time and place. Admission is free with RSVP; below is the schedule.

Thursday, January 20
Surrealism and Place, with Lori Cole, Krzysztof Fijalkowski, Talinn Grigor, fahima ife, and Mark Polizzotti, moderated by Joan Kee, 1:00 – 3:00

On Black, Brown, & Beige, with Robin D. G. Kelley and Fred Moten, moderated by Zita Cristina Nunes, 4:00 – 5:30

Friday, January 21
Surrealism and Time, with Sam Durant, Marie Mauzé, Partha Mitter, and Michael Stone-Richards, moderated by Dawn Adès, 10:00 am – 12:00 pm

Closing Discussion, with Dawn Adès, Joan Kee, and Zita Cristina Nunes, 12:00 – 12:45 pm

MOLLY LIEBER & ELEANOR SMITH: GLORIA REHEARSAL (excerpt)

Who: Molly Lieber & Eleanor Smith, James Lo, Tatyana Tenenbaum
What: Streaming performance and live virtual discussion
Where: Baryshnikov Arts Center online
When: Live Zoom discussion January 19, free with RSVP, 5:00; performance available on demand through January 24 at 5:00, free
Why: Molly Lieber and Eleanor Smith, who have been creating dance works together for more than fifteen years, debuted their latest piece, Gloria, made during the pandemic, outdoors at Abrons Arts Center this past May. The indoor premiere is scheduled for April 8-9 at New York Live Arts. In the meantime, you can catch an extensive rehearsal of Gloria — a name shared by Lieber’s baby — as part of Baryshnikov Arts Center’s excellent digital programming. In the ninety-minute work, Lieber and Smith redefine female objectification, incorporating microphones and mic stands, large mirrors on wheels, and folding chairs as they move about BAC’s rehearsal space, asserting control over their physical form as women. The soundtrack evolves from a long silence, interrupted by screams from Lieber, Smith singing “Getting to Know You” from The King and I, and Lieber mumbling Dan Hill’s “Sometimes When We Touch,” to snippets of patriotic marches, traffic, birds, and Laura Branigan’s 1982 hit, “Gloria.” (The wide-ranging sound design is by James Lo.)

Molly Lieber and Eleanor Smith’s Gloria rehearsal excerpt continues online through January 24 (photo by Maria Baranova)

At one point, Lieber puts the microphone all over Smith’s skin, giving voice to her body. “It’s too much,” Smith repeats later, reflecting on the expectations of others. Lieber and Smith entwine themselves on the floor, take off and put back on their costumes, morph into emotional positions that often evoke sexual contact, and dare the patriarchal system to question who they are and what they want out of life, determined to survive amid all the maelstrom, especially the mass grief caused by the coronavirus crisis. As in such earlier works as Body Comes Apart, Basketball, Rude World, Tulip, and Beautiful Bone, Gloria is emotionally and physically exhausting as Lieber and Smith push each other to the extreme — and then keep going.

The piece was filmed and edited by the extraordinary Tatyana Tenenbaum, whose previous virtual work for BAC includes Holland Andrews’s Museum of Calm, River L. Ramirez’s Ghostfolk, and a celebration of the fiftieth anniversary of Merce Cunningham’s Landrover. Gloria is available for streaming through January 24 at 5:00. On January 19 at 5:00, Lieber and Smith will take part in a live discussion over Zoom, joined by Lo and moderated by Tenenbaum.

MARTHA GRAHAM DANCE COMPANY WINTER 2022 STUDIO SERIES: NEW@GRAHAM WITH HOFESH SHECHTER

Hofesh Shechter will present an inside look at his new work for Martha Graham in January 19 livestream

Who: Hofesh Shechter
What: NEW@Graham with Hofesh Shechter
Where: Martha Graham Dance Company online or via Patreon
When: Wednesday, January 19, $25, 7:00
Why: Over the past few months, the Martha Graham Dance Company’s Studio Series has featured “GrahamDeconstructed”: Acts of Light with original cast member Peggy Lyman, New@Graham with Andrea Miller discussing her new work (Scavengers) for the troupe, and a holiday event with Graham 2 that included highlights from Appalachian Spring. Jerusalem-born, London-based choreographer Hofesh Shechter was scheduled to present in-person New@Graham open rehearsals of his new MGDC piece January 18-19 at the Martha Graham Studio Theater at 55 Bethune St., but because of the omicron surge, the event will be livestreamed only on January 19 at 7:00. Shechter will offer an inside look at the work-in-progress commission, set to premiere in April at City Center.

Shechter, who has also choreographed works for the Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater, Batsheva Ensemble, Candoco Dance Company, Cedar Lake Contemporary Ballet, Nederlands Dans Theater 1, Paris Opera Ballet, Royal Ballet, and Royal Ballet Flanders, has said, “I want audiences to be awakened, to experience my work from the gut. Trusting the gut is to me like trusting nature, or God, or a sense of purpose; a source, a spark. Trusting a higher and better force than our limited oppressed cultured minds.” We’ll have to do that virtually January 19 in preparation for the spring in-person season.

The Studio Series continues February 22-23 with an exploration of the reimagining of Graham’s 1952 Canticle for Innocent Comedians by eight choreographers (Sonya Tayeh, Kristina and Sadé Alleyne, Sir Robert Cohan, Jenn Freeman, Juliano Nunes, Micaela Taylor, and Yin Yue), which will also be part of the City Center season.

A CELEBRATION OF DR. KING

The life and legacy of Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. will be celebrated at BAM on MLK Day (photo courtesy SuperStock)

Who: Dr. Imani Perry, Nona Hendryx, Craig Harris & Tailgaters Tales, Sing Harlem, Kyle Marshall, Reggie Wilson, others
What: Thirty-Sixth Annual Brooklyn Tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.
Where: BAM Howard Gilman Opera House, Harvey Theater at BAM Strong, BAM Rose Cinemas, and online
When: Monday, January 17, free with RSVP, 10:30 am
Why: No one pays tribute every year to the life and legacy of the Reverend Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. quite the way BAM does on MLK Day. On January 17, the Brooklyn institution will be hosting another impressive gathering, both in person and online, featuring a keynote address by Dr. Imani Perry, author and professor of African American studies at Princeton, entitled “Where Do We Go from Here: Chaos or Community”; live performances by Nona Hendryx with Craig Harris & Tailgaters Tales and Sing Harlem; and the eight-minute video King, a recording of a solo by dancer and choreographer Kyle Marshall that incorporates text from Dr. King’s “I’ve Been to the Mountaintop” speech, delivered on April 3, 1968, the day before his assassination.

Kyle Marshall’s King is part of BAM MLK tribute (photo by Steven Speliotis)

“We’re thrilled to welcome the community back as we uplift one another and unite in celebration of Dr. King’s enduring legacy and its relevance today,” BAM co-interim resident Coco Killingsworth said in a statement. ”Brooklyn’s beloved tradition was established a year after Dr. King’s birthday was recognized as a national holiday, and thirty-six years later, his convictions remain an indelible force for equality, dignity, and justice. This year we are expanding our celebration to include more programs and events at a moment when we so deeply need to channel Dr. King’s legacy, leadership, and lessons.”

The day also includes a 1:00 screening in BAM Rose Cinemas of Stanley Nelson and Traci A. Curry’s 2021 documentary Attica, about the 1971 uprising at the prison; a 3:00 community presentation at the Harvey Theater at BAM Strong of Reggie Wilson’s Power, a dance that explores the world of the Black Shakers; the BAMkids workshop “Heroes of Color HQ” for children five to eleven, focusing on underrepresented historical figures; and a digital billboard showing “Salvation: A State of Being,” with contributions by seven Black visual artists (Adama Delphine Fawundu, Genevieve Gaignard, Jamel Shabazz, Frank Stewart, Roscoè B. Thické III, Deborah Willis, and Joshua Woods) honoring author and activist bell hooks, who passed away on December 15 at the age of sixty-nine.

As Dr. King said on April 3, 1968: “Something is happening in our world. The masses of people are rising up. And wherever they are assembled today, whether they are in Johannesburg, South Africa; Nairobi, Kenya; Accra, Ghana; New York City; Atlanta, Georgia; Jackson, Mississippi; or Memphis, Tennessee — the cry is always the same: ‘We want to be free.’ And another reason that I’m happy to live in this period is that we have been forced to a point where we are going to have to grapple with the problems that men have been trying to grapple with through history, but the demands didn’t force them to do it. Survival demands that we grapple with them. Men, for years now, have been talking about war and peace. But now, no longer can they just talk about it. It is no longer a choice between violence and nonviolence in this world; it’s nonviolence or nonexistence. That is where we are today.”