A Standing Ovation for Frost/Nixon
Last night, Peter Morgan’s award-winning Frost/Nixon opened to a standing ovation at 12th Ave Arts on Capitol Hill. Focused around […]
12th Ave Arts
Building the Wall-Dystopian realization of Trump’s rhetoric
The Smell Alone Makes it Hard to Hang on to Your Compassion.
Azerotrop’s Building the Wall, by Robert Schenkkan, which opened this weekend at 12th Ave Arts, was a profound statement not just about Trump’s immigration rhetoric but about how our institutions and greedy powerful individuals corrupt the powerless, who with very few choices at their disposal, unwillingly perpetual evil.
12th Ave Welcomes the Women of Coriolanus
Shakespeare’s The Tragedy of Coriolanus takes place during a time of political transition for Rome. As with any political transition,
Strawberry Theatre Workshop’s “Lydia” at 12th Avenue Arts
Strawberry Theatre Workshop brings Octavio Solis’s award-winning Mexican-American family drama to 12th Avenue Arts.
Lydia, first performed in 2008, tells a twisted story of family, sex, sexuality, and immigration, set in 1970s Texas. In the aftermath of a debilitating car accident that leaves the youngest child in a semi-vegetative state, the Flores family hires Lydia, a recent immigrant from Mexico, as a maid. Sexual, socio-political, and supernatural tensions soon hurtle the family towards the play’s dark conclusion.
Sex with Strangers
ReAct Theatre Celebrates 24 Years with the Seattle Premiere of Sex with Strangers
Laura Eason’s Sex with Strangers has a solid Seattle Premiere in the capable hands of director David Hsieh of ReAct Theatre. This is ReAct’s first show at 12th Avenue Arts on Capitol Hill.
Hsieh has apparently a lucky hand to be the first to bring this 2009 play here as this play’s themes resonate across several local communities. The play ponders questions about internet technology versus old school paper books in our outerworld. Deeper questions reflect tensions within and between writers as they cope with feeling under-appreciated versus over-hyped for the wrong reasons and their impacts on our innerworlds.
This play has one audience among the many people working in tech, and another among the many writers and their readers who fill the Seattle Arts & Lectures talks and populate all those classes at Hugo House.
Beautiful Theory: Proof Talks You Through It
Proof, written by David Auburn and directed by Greg Carter, is The Strawberry Theatre Workshop’s ensemble’s beautiful, suspenseful stage production.
The Pride by Theatre Twenty-Two
In Theatre Twenty-Two’s production of The Pride, audiences are swept back in time to 1958 before being brought to the more modern 2008 interchangeably as they follow the often complicated and captivating lives of the two main characters. Philip (Andre Nelson) and Oliver (Trevor Young Marston) are two young men living in London who are struggling with their sexuality within the social constraints of the societies they’re living in.
The Big Meal-Scrumptious
A Collision of Risk and Craft
Darragh Kennan, Artistic Director of New Century Theatre stated in the program notes of their latest production, The Big Meal, that NTC is interested in “the collision of risk and craft.” They may be INTERESTED in the COLLISION of risk and craft, but what I saw was an inspired perfect ALLOY of risk and craft, creating something that was more potent than either pure element.
The set and staging of The Big Meal, created the perfect medium to express the subject matter; the “moments” in our lives which define and reinforce our connection to our families. With an outstanding cast, an exceptionally able director, Makaela Pollock, a superb set, effective sound & lighting and a Master playwright, Dan LeFranc, the Big Meal served up a scrumptious evening.
Loose Rhinoceros About—What’s a Person to Do?
Eugene Ionesco’s play Rhinoceros (1959) grew from his increasingly lonely witness to the attraction that Nazism held among the circles he traveled in during World War II. Ionesco (b. 1909, Slatina, Romania—d. 1994, Paris, France) and many of his friends would have been around 20 in 1939, the prime age for idealist fervor.
Strawberry Theatre Workshop intentionally produced this play to highlight the challenges of our current presidential election climate. Jess K. Smith’s direction found the play’s
Duels
Disappointing Duels
A world premiere by Nick Stokes, Duels, a play billed as being “made up of a heady mix of Beckett, magic realism and a tragic love story” opened at 12th Ave Arts this weekend. Although I would agree with some of that statement, I disagree with the adjectives used, as it was not “heady”, nor did the love story strike me as particularly tragic. Instead it was a poor script with a lot of pretentious touches, whose director, José Amador, did not seem capable of damage control, as the production did not showcase the considerable talent of two of the most accomplished actors in town: Carter Rodriquez and Marianna de Fazio.