Cinema / Theater

Architects Gordon Matta-Clark, Bill Owens, and James Howard Silvers' collective works represent a transitional period in American suburban life; a time when American consumerism was at its largest expansion and postwar suburban fantasy collided with the reality of gas shortages, "stagflation," and a growing unease with the isolation associated with "bedroom communities". The work of these artists and architects is part of a moment when conformity and the established order were being called into question on a mass scale as the "counter culture" movement of the sixties resonated with those affected by the faltering economy of the seventies. At carriage trade Gallery through May 18th.

Alone in Triptych, by Renee Philippi, presented by the Concrete Temple Theatre at HERE is an odd attraction for this temple of the avant-garde. Alone is a straightforward, beautifully acted trilogy of intertwining solos. The title is a bit misleading since each of the three characters is at all times addressing an unseen person, the object of their obsessive attention.

Clear as a bell I remember being taken to the Rivoli, a first-run movie palace on Broadway, to see the film Oklahoma! starring Gordon MacRae and Shirley Jones. Her freshness and lovely soprano was transporting. Seeing her so many years later onstage at the intimate, elegant Café Carlyle conjures the same thrill, her warmth and elegance filling the room. She began her show with a short video of her career, from musical theater ingénue to Academy Award winning prostitute to beloved sitcom mom.

Forget about life being like a box of chocolates! It’s the indefatigable Scott Siegel’s Broadway by the Year franchise that is full of tasty bonbons: classic Broadway numbers performed by extraordinary singers and dancers. Rather than focusing on just one year as usual, Siegel is presenting four programs covering 100 years of musical theater history, a marathon of songs given amazing interpretations by leading ladies and men. The first program took us from 1915 to 1939, heady years in the history of musical theater.

Seduction. Trickery. Power. Shakespeare's best comedy, Much Ado About Nothing will be running for a three week limited engagement beginning on February 21st. Full of wit, hilarity, seduction and trickery - this classic shows how love brings out the best and worst in us. Masquerade balls and mistaken identities leave you on the edge of your seat in this timeless battle of the sexes.

Although Bronx Bombers, about a particularly stressful period in the team’s history, isn’t an impeccably constructed comedy/drama, the show unapologetically hits the sentimental underpinnings that preoccupy macho sports guys and yet still shows that unalloyed machismo that is their public face.

Set in the mysterious Blue Room, playwright, performer, and journalist Toni chlesinger pursues the unsolved real-life story of two artists who disappeared in 1997 from their 19th century loft near the East River on one of the oldest streets in Manhattan.

The heroes of Tiger & Bunny are back for a special limited engagement on March 15 &17 in an all-new feature length film. In this anime, the city of Stern Bild is protected by corporate superheroes who fight crime while promoting their sponsors on HERO TV. Kotetsu T. Kaburagi, a.k.a. Wild Tiger, and Barnaby Brooks Jr.'s partnership comes to a sudden end when Kotetsu is fired and Barnaby is paired up with Golden Ryan, a new hero with awesome powers and a huge ego to match. When they are sent to investigate a string of strange incidents, they discover three superpowered NEXTs plotting to bring terror and destruction.

Beginning January 24th, two of Chicago's most highly regarded Second City veterans, TJJagodowski and Dave Pasquesi, will be entertaining New York audiences with their brand of long-form improvisation. Fans of TJ and Dave forever marvel at their technique, mental dexterity, and uncanny ability to create incredible, hour-long instant plays out of thin air. Laughter always is the best medicine.

The cliché of stiff-upper-lip Britons who rarely show emotion is beautifully discredited in the Roundabout Theatre Company’s new production of Terence Rattigan’s The Winslow Boy in association with The Old Vic, directed by Lindsay Posner. Rattigan, a pillar of British theatre in the mid-twentieth century, managed to find the heartbeat under the calm continence of his characters. Rattigan’s case is helped by the stellar cast of this revival who give life to the Winslow family’s problems and feelings, sustained by Peter McKintosh’s sumptuously upper middle class set and costumes that tell as much about the characters as the writing and the acting.