Green Day’s ‘American Idiot’ is power punk with soul at the Detroit Opera House

By Vivian DeGain

Power punk? Muscle dancing? Fantastic celebration of life with pounding performances and beautiful ballads? Yes.

“Green Day’s American Idiot,” nominated in 2010 for the Tony Award Best Musical and winner of the 2010 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album, is live in Detroit and features the music of Green Day, and the lyrics of lead singer Billie Joe Armstrong.

Written by Armstrong and Michael Mayer and directed by Meyer, who won the Tony Award for “Spring Awakening,” “American Idiot” creates a power punk-rock opera on the stage of the Detroit Opera House.

Starring Van Hughes as Armstrong and cast of 20 gorgeous singers and dancers who share a radiant energy pulsing with the controlled punk rhythm, the musical includes over 20 Green Day songs like, “Boulevard of Broken Dreams,” “21 Guns,” “Wake Me Up When September Ends,” “Holiday” and the title “American Idiot” from Green Day’s 2004 Grammy Award-winning, multi-platinum album.

DOH offers a day-of-performance student rush tickets for a limited number of orchestra pit seats. Each day, 2 hours prior to show time at the Detroit Opera House box office, bring a valid student ID to purchase the reduced $25 price – cash only. This offer is available only in-person at the box office, with a limit of two tickets per person.

“American Idiot” was nominated for three Tony Awards.

It is described as a story of three boyhood friends searching for meaning in a post 9-11 world. The title alludes to the story of anyone who would leave suburban security and seek identity, fame or creative fortune in urban grit or the sands of Afghanistan. Places that are dangerous and real.

The three friends split into individual broken paths. One is blocked by pregnancy, one by drugs, and one by inertia then a call to military service. Their stories are loosely woven into broadcast images while Green Day’s music delivers all that we expect and many things we don’t expect – like an occasional female voice.

In one extraordinary scene, a shadowy woman’s figure descends from the sky in a haze of muted color and strobe lights. At first she appears an angel wrapped in a grey gown, but then as the image becomes clearer, she is covered in a blue burka from head to foot. 

Through the magic of aerial flying, she arrives in a hospital ward where four GIs struggle to survive, then rise from their own dreams to sing a very powerful ballad.

The “American Idiot” creative team includes choreography by Olivier Award-winner Steven Hoggett (“Black Watch”); music supervision, orchestrations and arrangements by Pulitzer Prize-winner Tom Kitt (“Next to Normal”). The Tony Award-winning scenic design by Christine Jones and the Tony Award-winning lighting design by Kevin Adams is featured in the touring company.

Tom Hulce, award-winning actor and producer who once lived in Plymouth, Michigan, said in the previews of the show, “Since its inception, audiences have been surprised by the emotional journey the show takes them on, told almost exclusively through Green Day’s songs, including many they are already familiar with and love.”

This is a powerful rocking show. “American Idiot” is adored by Green Day fans, hailed as genius by the national critics, and is already legend in theater history.

Green Day’s ‘American Idiot’ runs until Sunday at the Detroit Opera House, 1526 Broadway in Detroit. Performances at 8 p.m. Tuesday-Saturday; 7:30 Sunday; and 2 p.m. Saturday and Sunday. Tickets $25-$75 at the Fisher Theatre box office, the Detroit Opera House box office, all Ticketmaster locations, by phone at 1-800-982-2787 and at www.ticketmaster.com. Information, www.BroadwayInDetroit.com.

By Vivian DeGain

Published Journal Register Newspapers Nov. 10, 2011

The Chamber Music Society of Detroit will host a “spectacularly gifted” artist Saturday, said the new CMSD president and classical musician Stephen Wogaman.

“Violinist Sergey Khachatryan is arguably the most young and talented performer ever from Armeniaon the international stage,” Wogaman said. “This will be a very exciting concert, as one of his only two stops in the United States this season. He just appeared in Chicago and nearby in Toronto.”

The 27-year-old Khachatryan, born in Yerevan, Armenia, won First Prize in the Jean Sibelius Competition in Helsinki in 2000, the youngest winner ever in the history of the competition.

Khachatryan also garnered First Place in 2005 at the Queen Elisabeth Competition in Brussels. His international recognition intensifies with performances along side the major orchestras in Berlin, Amsterdam, France, Paris, London, Tokyo, New York, Boston, Philadelphia, San Francisco and L.A.

The violinist will be accompanied by his sister Lusine Khachatryan on piano, as each make their Detroit debut in this season’s Chamber Music series. Ms. Khachatryan, an international award winner in her own right, shares the distinction with her brother of recording two CDs.

“Our program features Bach’s Chaconne for Solo Violin, a Shostakovich sonata — music written for the chamber music setting, composed in secret as Shostakovich really wanted to write music living within in the context of Soviet Russia – and a very early Beethoven,” Wogaman said.

The program includes Beethoven’s Sonata No. 2 in A major for Violin and Piano, Op. 12, No. 2; Bach’s Partita No. 2 in D minor; and Shostakovich’s Sonata for Violin and Piano, Op. 134.

“Shostakovich’s work is full of his inner most passions. The story goes that he kept this composition packed in a suitcase by the front door, ready to flee sudden arrest to the gulag, as artists feared in those times,” he said. “It’s very unlike his State-mandated orchestrations.”

The Bach Chaconne will be familiar to the Detroit Chamber audience because it was performed by Arnold Steinhardt and discussed by actor Alan Alda and Steinhardt at the CMSD in March 2010.

They described the chaconne as intensely passionate, fiery and heart-rippingly sad, probably written as Bach grieved his wife’s sudden death.

“This Detroit audience is very familiar with the chaconne,” Wogaman said. “This is a remarkable, sophisticated audience that has been listening together for 40 years. They have such an informed passion for the music. They listen to every single note. Collectively, their ear surpasses audiences in New York and many places internationally.

“Of course, the artists respond to the appreciation and expectations of the audience.”

Wogaman took the helm as CMSD president in May. Prior, he served as chief executive of the Canton Symphony Orchestra in Ohio and the Allentown Symphony Orchestra in Pennsylvania.

He’s also performed as piano recitalist, chamber musician and teaching artist throughout the eastern United States and Spain and Central America.

As pianist of the Whitney Trio in 1989, Wogaman’s performing debut in a live broadcast concert was at the National Gallery of Art in his home town of Washington D.C. He studied at the Eastman School of Music, the Universityof Louisville and the Indiana University School of Music, where he completed a Doctor of Music degree. He and wife Michele developed New Performing Arts in the 1990s, a non-profit music outreach organization reaching an audience of 2 million Kentucky children with live performing arts programs in their schools. He often transported his own grand piano on a rented truck. He’s also developed programmatic partnerships with several classical music institutions including the Eastman School of Music, Oberlin Conservatory, Indiana University Opera Theater, New England Conservatory, and New World Symphony.

Saturday’s CMSD concert features a Pre-Concert Talk at 6:45-7:30 p.m.with Dr. Steven Rings, assistant professor of music at University of Chicago, who will discuss the evening’s repertoire.

Sergey Khachatryan performs at the CMSD at 8 p.m. Saturday (Nov. 12) at the Seligman Performing Arts Center, 22305 West 13 Mile Roadin Beverly Hills, on the campus of the Detroit Country Day School. Single concert tickets, $75-$43. Call 248-855-6070 or visit www.ComeHearCMSD.org.

By VIVIAN DeGAIN

Oakland Press Oct. 11, 2011

Meadow Brook Theatre is celebrating the start of its 46th season with several ways to venerate the old and the new. Cushy new seats in the theater, new hand rails and new carpeting make a tired old room fresh again.

There is also the deep-rooted MBT traditional to begin its season: A spooky October thriller. And MBT’s Artistic Director Travis Walter is fashioning this season with six Michigan premieres, new to Michigan but not necessarily new to the stage.

Walter selected one of his childhood favorites to open this season, Ray Bradbury’s “Something Wicked This Way Comes.”

Bradbury’s work, originally published in 1962, is a tale of a dark carnival that rolls into an innocent sleepy town – a dark carnival with a freakish power to make the old young and the young old.

The carnival is filled with sideshow characters who display wayward genetics, perverse images from Bradbury’s imagination based on the sad and real experience of exploited people trapped in strange bodies through no fault of their own — and deformed characters who appear normal but have chosen to be monsters.

It’s a tale about the art of deception and the seduction of eternal youth. It takes its characters along a hidden path through a house of mirrors and a carousel ride that spins time and terror.

Bradbury’s classic battle of good versus evil takes place on a magical set designed by Kristen Gribbin.

Her multi-dimensional townscape with layers of perspective is phenomenal. Is it concrete or gauze? Frozen or vapor? There are half-a-dozen building facades, seven doors, four windows, four balconies, several porches, a sewer, a trap door, and a Ferris wheel behind it all.

And the brightest and best talents on stage are the youngsters who are central to the story, two young actors in the roles of two 13-year-old boys eager to grow-up too fast.

Jacob Zelinski plays Jim Nightshade, a boy alone with his mother after death has visited three times and snatched his father and two brothers. Ryan Lynch plays Will Halloway, a blonde boy with a father past 60, a boy who is less daredevil and more the son of a quiet librarian.

Zelinski and Lynch do a first-rate job and act beyond their years. Zelinksi, a freshman at U of D Jesuit High School, brings a rich physical and emotional complexity to his role, one that feels confident and right to the audience.

Lynch, an 8^th grader at Hart Middle School in Rochester, is true to the softer, younger character.

Both boys have been on the MBT stage before.

Another amazing performance is delivered by Lisa Lauren Smith as the Dust Witch. Her tricks of voice, dancing and twitching are a treat.

In a cast of 17, adult lead roles star Paul Hopper as Tom Fury, Marty Smith as Mr. Halloway and Aaron Alpern as Mr. Dark.

Fitting to the dark thriller, MBT’s special effects create doom, dread and delight and Bradbury’s talent for a twisted and anxious story is set here in his version of the “1930s in Green Town, Illinois.”

But in some ways, this is a show that needs more work or more magic. MBT needs stronger professional performances from veterans Marty Smith and Alpern – the two adult leads in the show. Perhaps they need more rehearsal. Perhaps at this critic’s viewing at the second show that day in opening week, the actors were exhausted or under the weather. But at times Smith seemed tongue tied or stage stuck. Alpern seemed flat and one dimensional.

There is no doubt that all the elements are in line at MBT for a really GOOD Halloween spook. This critic wants to believe these vets will dig deeper and make it happen for every show in the next few weeks and that the audience will rally to see it live! After all, weak acting scares. Forgetting lines on stage frightens. We will depend on MBT to scratch it’s way back to the top.

Meadow Brook Theatre presents ‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’ through Oct. 30. Performances generally at 8 p.m. Wednesdays-Fridays; 2, 6 or 8 p.m. on Saturdays; 2 and 6:30 p.m. on Sundays. Tickets: $30-$39. Tickets at the MBT box office (248) 377-3300 or www.ticketmaster.com. For more information, visit www.mbtheatre.com.

MBT 2011-12 Season

A Christmas Carol Nov. 19-Dec. 23

Nunset Boulevard Jan. 4-29

Mary Stuart Feb. 8-March 4

Spreading It Around March 14-April 8

From My Hometown April 18-May 13

XANADU May 23-June 17

‘Consider the Oyster’ at the Purple Rose

Made in Michigan comedy glimmers like a pearl

By Vivian DeGain

Published in The Oakland Press July 13,2011

As the name suggests, “Consider the Oyster,” a new comedy now playing at The Purple Rose Theatre Company in Chelsea, might arouse images of romance, sexuality and both the simplicity and complexity of life in the natural world. The scent and texture of the salty mollusks are prized as aphrodisiac. The smooth inner shell shines with iridescence and its lining, a treasure. But the exterior of the oyster is a tough nut to crack, gritty and abrasive with razor sharp edges.

Michigan playwright David MacGregor may have started with such images as the bedrock for his comedy “Consider the Oyster,” a World Premiere at the Purple Rose, but his dialogue and character development are fresh and delicious – and well placed in the able hands of Director Guy Sanville and the cast who have produced a sweet and salty pearl.

Set in a loft apartment in downtown Detroit any day now, “Consider the Oyster” opens with Gene Walsh and his friend Eliot watching football on television to see the Detroit Lions win the Super Bowl.

Capturing the glorious moment and wanting to preserve it forever, Gene proposes marriage to his sweetheart Marisa. It may have been an impulsive pass, but the young lovers are very happy together and she accepts. They are engaged over the protests of the game official — her micro-managing mother.

From here, a series of unexpected events befall young Gene as he becomes like a cork at sea.

He tumbles over the coffee table and breaks a leg. Science, in the form of the regenerative oyster shell offers a magical elixir to his healing bones. Gene’s friendship with Eliot, his role as a school teacher, and his impossible future mother-in-law all destabilize and nearly capsize his romance.

It this bit of a revisionist Frankenstein tale, Gene is no longer the captain of his own ship.

MacGregor surprises Gene and the audience with cross currents and rip tides, but his skillful writing and progressive plot keep us afloat.

Purple Rose Artistic Director Sanville directs this very worthy ensemble cast in the open-stage floor theater where actors are sometimes as close to the audience as can be.

The actors keep it close and real, despite moments of absurdity or even hysterics.

Michael Brian Ogden plays Gene with a sexy tension that rides along with every comic twist and tragic turn. His humor is physical, originating from the body as cleverly as his lines originate from his very smart discourse and timing. Ogden has presented excellent work this season both at the Purple Rose and at the Jewish Ensemble Theatre as an actor, a playwright, and as a character on stage who is a playwright.

Matthew David plays Eliot, Gene’s bedrock and best friend. His performance is as solid and as inspired as his role. Stacie Hadgikosti plays Marisa and the lovely Sarab Kamoo is Kay, Marisa’s mother.

Rhiannon Ragland performs as A Woman – and her physical humor is a match for Ogden. She’s a convincing misfit and it’s a wonder that she doesn’t break a leg in her virgin sail on high heels. She is outrageous as a gender-confusing, gender-regendered, gender-challenged Venus, arising like her myth from a clam shell, a goddess born as a full grown woman.

Venus, as painted by Botticelli, is grace personified with long and flowing auburn hair. Venus, as painted by MacGregor and Ragland, arises from the scratchy exterior of the shell, with a face covered in a mop of hair like seaweed on the sand.

“Consider the Oyster” is MacGregor’s fourth play to be staged at The Purple Rose, including “Vino Veritas” which will be made into an independent film (this summer in Lincoln, Nebraska) “Gravity,” and “The Late Great Henry Boyle.”

The crew for this Purple Rose production includes Dennis G. Crawley as set designer, Danna Segrest for properties, Sally L. Converse-Doucette for costumes, Reid G. Johnson for lighting and Tom Whalen for sound. Stephanie Buck stage manages.

“Consider the Oyster” is a funny, improbable romance, but a romance worth seeing and a summer delight worth the drive to Chelsea.

The Purple Rose Theatre presents the world premiere of ‘Consider the Oyster’ by David MacGregor through Sept. 3 at the Purple Rose, 137 Park Street in downtown Chelsea. Tickets are $25-$40. Performances are at 8 p.m. Wednesdays, Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays, with matinees at 3 p.m. on Wednesdays and Saturdays, 2 p.m. Sundays. Call 734-433-7673 or visit www.purplerosetheatre.org.

January 20, 2006

Vivian DeGain

Today, the Hebrew calendar date is 20 Tevet, 5766, which counts six thousand years of the Hebrew calendar/ and some 4,000 years of written/ oral Hebrew history, dating to the time of Abraham.

And from that history, two of my favorite stories quote the wisdom of Rabbi Hillel and Rabbi Shammai: two great scholars born a generation before Jesus.

Hillel and Shammai are often compared with one another because they were contemporaries, and the leaders of two opposing schools of thought. The Talmud records over 300 differences of opinion between the two schools.

According to the history: Rabbi Hillel was born to a wealthy family in Babylonia, but came to Jerusalem without the financial support of his family, and supported himself as a woodcutter. It is said that he lived in such great poverty that he was sometimes unable to pay the fee to study Torah and because of him that fee was abolished. He was known for his kindness, his gentleness, and his concern for humanity.

One of Hillel’s famous sayings, recorded in Pirkei Avot (Ethics of the Fathers, in the Mishna) is: “If I am not for myself, then who will be for me?And if I am only for myself, then what am I? And if not now, when?

Rabbi Shammai was an engineer, known for the strictness of his views. Writers from the Talmud tell that a non-Jew approached Shammai saying that he would convert to Judaism if the Rabbi could teach him the whole Torah in the time that he could stand on one foot. Shammai drove him away with a stick!

Hillel, on the other hand, converted the man, by telling him, “That which is hateful to yourself, do not do to your neighbor. That is the whole Torah; the rest is commentary. Now go and study.”

Christians recognize this as the essence of the Golden Rule.

Jews credit Rabbi Hillel, and quote the story with two sets of emphasis – one to respect all people – and the other to “go and study….”

Just as these 10 commandments in Hebrew above the Ark (altar) are from Hebrew scripture, this instruction has become familiar world-wide.

Thank you all for coming this evening to share my joy as I begin my life as a Jew, with my Hebrew name Chaya Tova bat Avraham v’Sara.

Since my first meeting with Rabbi Joseph Klein was in August, 2004, this celebration represents 17 months of formal study with my teacher (Rabbi means teacher in Hebrew) about Jewish history, culture, holidays and religion –  as well as my own intensive interpersonal investigation.

I began this study as a “grown woman on the outside,” but as a six-year-old Jew on the inside … six, only for having been a good listener to many discussions with my Jewish friends and mentors since college.

But as you can imagine, the process of conversion invites us to question so much more than content. At any age, at any time, a deeper study of one’s faith also connects us to a lifetime of inner identity, dreams, memories, fears, steps and missteps.

This time of study with Rabbi Klein has been the best in my life of much study. My Rabbi has guided me through my assigned and elective reading list of hundreds of books, numerous classes here with other adults, weekly religious services and holidays, and through a wonderful 2-week study trip in Israel.

As a caring guide, he listened with an intuitive wisdom that has anticipated my volumes of questions, some from me as the 53-year-old writer, wife and mother of three, and some from me as the six-year-old Jew.

You see, as writer Anita Diamant says in her book, “Choosing a Jewish Life,” that is the “go and study” part of Rabbi Hillel’s message, the significant one that I respect so much about Jewish people.

Jews are called “the people of the book” – for the volumes of Hebrew scripture they write, and for an active, intensive debate about that text and context, and for the implied requirement to “go and continue to study.”

Because I am a writer, this fits me all so well.

But as a six-year-old Jew, I had so much to learn. At least once a month I met with Rabbi Klein. “There are no stupid questions” he would remind me. His counsel has been gracious, generous and something I will always be grateful for. He’s been my technical editor for work I’ve published over this course of study. He has asked me the deeper questions I had overlooked or avoided for myself. He took me and my husband Doug for walks through Jerusalem on the evening of Rosh Chodesh (Hebrew for a new month) to the Kotel, the Western Wall.

He asked me, as did the Rabbis this afternoon who were my Bet Din, my court, and as you have been asking me, so, why do I want to be Jewish?

For me, there are a hundred answers, and each day a few more.

Today, I can best answer this way.

For years I have always thought of myself as more Jewish, less Christian, more feminist, less traditional, more secular, less religious. I’ve read about Judaism, Hinduism, Buddhism and practiced meditation, but I am a Westerner. Ultimately, I believe in one God, but not an exclusive faith, and that our human intention with God’s help is to make the world a better place.

Jews call this Tikun Olam, “to heal the world,” words echoed in the poem I just read by Edmund Fleg “I am a Jew Because…”

I have come to love Jewish people, your traditions and brilliance… And I love your discourse…when introducing discussion about controversies here at Temple Emanu-El for instance, Rabbi Klein often begins the discussion with the adage, “We’ve all heard that for every three Jews, there are four opinions…”

I have wanted to be Jewish for a long time.

So for me, it’s more about why do I want to become Jewish NOW?

Because now at age 53, I choose to study and do what I want, and that is to learn and to love Judaism.

Because at age 53, after 27 years, our youngest is in college and our oldest has recently become engaged, so I am between children and grandchildren. It’s never the wrong time to begin a serious study and self-investigation about what most matters.

I want to become Jewish now because when I first came to study at Temple Emanu-El as a guest of Ann Costello, it was August of a presidential election year.

I can’t tell you when I began to see the world as the image of a butterfly – the butterfly’s body as the flattened-out globe – the butterfly’s abdomen as the tiny sliver of the nation of Israel on the world map, surrounded by one wing as half-the-world of Christianity, and the other wing as half-the-world of Islam. But that is how I see the world now, and the election made these images very intense in my mind.

I want to be Jewish now because, in my own family history, a German-American history, I have conflicts and seek to learn more. My great-grandfather Josef Otter was born in 1871 inHausen,Germany. He was blinded by a sniper in World War I, went home to raise a family on his farm with a seeing-eye dog, but on April 4, 1941, died mysteriously because he was blind. He was “undesirable” in a Nazi terror, and was killed for it. Others in his family were drafted into it. Like the children and grandchildren of six million Jews who were killed during the Holocaust, and like all of us, I am left with a guilt, rage, confusion and fear of this unimaginable but real human history. Somehow in my becoming a German-American-Jew, perhaps I can make a stand in this history.

Also, I want to become a Jew because I love to hear Hebrew, and again thank Rabbi Klein, our musical directors Judi Lewis and Steve Klaper, my mentors Anne Costello, Pat Chomet and Ande Teeple, and to virtually all of you here at Temple Emanu-El who have welcomed me with wide-open arms, taught me Hebrew songs and prayers and patiently spoke and repeated the pronunciation as I stumbled and learn.

I also want to thank my very supportive husband Doug and our children Michael, Bryce and Danielle for their love, and my extended family, here tonight!

Finally, Since I was a child growing up inDetroit, I have known that God is One, and that we are messengers of light and love in the world. Jews say Adoni is One, and that we are One, and that Tikkun Olam is our job – to heal the world. And that we are the people Israel, because Israel means to wrestle with God, or perhaps to wrestle with ourselves for God’s work here.

Today, “I am a Jew because, for Israel, the world is not completed, we are completing it. I am a Jew because for Israel, humanity is not created, we are creating it.”

A  blessing of peace, Shabbat Shalom.

–Vivian continues to cherish her life as a Jewish woman and works, volunteers and contributes to Temple Emanu-El daily.

Five girls, 30 songs and two hours of nonstop pop

By Vivian DeGain

The Oakland Press Friday, April 29, 2011

Pop rock from the British Invasion wasn’t always an all-man show.

In the early 1960s, the gorgeous and gutsy voices of Lulu, Dusty Springfield and Petula Clark created as many waves here in the States as they did across the pond.

That female intonation, arising from the deep convergence of soul, rock and blues has resurfaced again in the contemporary voices of Adele, Amy Winehouse and Leona Lewis.

Similarly, the five-woman cast of “Shout! The Mod Musical” which has just opened at Meadow Brook Theatre, resonates with and revisits that England sound during the 1960s. Simply put “Shout! The Mod Musical” is five girls, 30 songs and two hours of nonstop pop — nicely done!

MBT Artistic Director Travis Walter directs the musical review. It opens with a stunning ensemble performance of “Downtown” and the hits never quit.

The all-girl cast, each identified by the color of her miniskirt and Gogo Boots, includes Liz Griffith (Orange Girl), Katie Hardy (Green Girl), Allison Hunt (Blue Girl), Renee Turner (Yellow Girl), and Charis Vaughn (Red Girl).

Individually, in duet and in ensemble – these women perform in superb voice, singing out with heart and soul. Each is a chanteuse in her own right.

Show stopping soloists? Vaughn’s “To Sir With Love” is breath-taking. Turner’s “Son of a Preacher Man” takes a little ditty “with a good beat that you can dance to” and makes it whole. Wow! Hardy’s “Goldfinger” is absolutely chilling – just as it should be.

Song after song, threaded together in a light comedic series of look-backs and one-liners, “Shout!” recalls a time that seems simpler. Yet the 60s were hardly simple, as the music challenged and churned social issues of class, race, feminism and sexuality.

Walter and Choreographer Jennifer George-Consiglio put all the right moves into the show — every shake of the head and hip to some of the best shimmy seen since the day.

Created by Phillip George and David Lowenstein, with “Mod Musings” and “Groovy Gab” by Peter Charles Morris and Phillip George, this musical time capsule also features “Georgy Girl,” “Don’t Give Up (don’t let it get you down),” and “You Don’t Have to Say You Love Me.”

“Shout! The Mod Musical” features a live trio with Musical Director Daniel Feyer on keyboards, Jennifer Gale also on keyboards and Nick Matthews on drums/ percussion. Terry W. Carpenter is the stage manager with set design by Vince Mountain, costume design by Liz Moore, lighting design by Reid G. Johnson, and sound design by Mike Duncan.

If you go Meadow Brook Theatre presents ‘Shout! The Mod Musical’ through May 15 at Meadow Brook Theatre on the campus of Oakland University in Rochester. Tickets are $24-$39 and performances run at 8 p.m. Wednesdays, Thursdays and Fridays; at 8 p.m. on Saturdays April 20 and May 14, and 6 p.m. May 7; and at 6:30 p.m. Sundays. Matinees at 2 p.m. on selected Wednesdays, Fridays, Saturdays and Sundays. Call MBT box office at 248-377-3300 or visit www.mbtheatre.com.

***** FIVE Stars out of FIVE

By Vivian DeGain

Arts reviewer

The new production at Jewish Ensemble Theatre is both a Midwest premiere and the most exciting play on stage this season in Metro Detroit. The historical drama with a long name that frames it, “New Jerusalem: The Interrogation of Baruch Spinoza at Talmud Torah Congregation, Amsterdam, July 27, 1656” is described by the JET as a “intellectual comedic drama that addresses freedom of expression and religion and what our religious and cultural affiliations mean to us in the grand scheme of the universe.”

Easy for them to say.

Yet, as JET Artistic Director David J. Magidson directs the play and a first-rate cast, Magidson is delivering on his promise to bring the fresh, the invigorated and the inspired to his stage.

Interestingly, the new is created from a story nearly 500 years old about a young philosopher judged as either a heretic, a brilliant innovator, or both.

Baruch Spinoza (Hebrew) was born Bento de Espinosa (in Portuguese) November 24, 1632 – February 21, 1677. Deemed one of the most significant philosophers – “and certainly the most radical of the early modern period, his extremely naturalistic views on God, the world, the human being and knowledge serve to ground a moral philosophy. Of all the philosophers of the seventeenth-century, perhaps none have more relevance today than Spinoza,” http://plato.stanford.edu/entries/spinoza/.

In the JET’s “New Jerusalem” Mitchell Koory is Spinoza and is every bit as charming and as provocative as we imagine Spinoza was. While the other characters in the play gather in scenes and dialogue, Koory’s lines seem to last the entire two hours nonstop but never with a feeling that we a observing a manuscript – just the original.

The cast also highlights the excellent work of Loren Bass as the defending Rabbi Saul Levi Mortera, Hugh Maguire as the prosecuting Abraham van Valkenburgh, Phil Powers as ben Israel, Rob Pantano as de Vries, Christina Flynn as Clara van den Enden, and Caroline Price as Rebekah de Spinoza.

‘New Jerusalem…’ by David Ives premiered in New York in January 2008. Ives, born in 1950 in Chicago attended Northwestern University and the Yale School of Drama, where he received an MFA in playwriting. He also studied at a Catholic seminary, served as editor at Foreign Affairs magazine and was a contributing editor for Spy Magazine, the New York Times Magazine and The New Yorker.

In his eclectic assignments, his success on the New York stage beginning in 1972 and continuing (see sidebar below), one could imagine him as not so unfamiliar a thinker as the free thinker Baruch Spinoza in his time.　

The superb writing, the excellent cast and very fine directing come to fruition at the JET.

The play’s opening coincides with the grand opening this week of the $6.7-million Berman Center for the Performing Arts on the Jewish Community Center in West Bloomfield, which is also celebrating the annual JCC Stephen Gottlieb Music Festival. Marvin Hamlisch was the opening show on stage! The Berman Center seats a variable 350-600, boasts a beautiful stage and the gifts of cutting edge technology.

About Playwright David Ives: Ives’ first play in New York was “Canvas” at the Circle Repertory Company in 1972. He has also written Saint Freud in 1975 and a series of one-act plays in the 1980s including “Variations on the Death of Trotsky,” “Philip Glass Buys a Loaf of Bread,” and “The Universal Language.” His “All in the Timing,” originated as an evening of one-act comedies, premiered at Primary Stages in 1993, moved to the larger John Houseman Theatre and ran for 606 performances, which won him the Outer Critics Circle John Gassner Award for Playwriting.

The Jewish Ensemble Theatre presents ‘New Jerusalem: The Interrogation of Baruch Spinoza at Talmud Torah Congregation: Amsterdam, July 27, 1656’ through April 10 at the Aaron DeRoy Theatre on the campus of the Jewish Community Center, 6600 West Maple Road in West Bloomfield. Tickets are $32-$41 and performances run 7:30 p.m. Thursdays; 5 and 8:30 p.m. Saturdays; 2 and 6 p.m. on Sundays; with a Wednesday matinee April 6. Call 248-788-2900 or visit www.jettheatre.com.

By VIVIAN DeGAIN

Published in The Oakland Press Feb. 20, 2011

When it comes to the body beautiful, what better way is there to see, admire and feel the intimacy and energy of gorgeous human movement other than a live dance performance?And “Burn The Floor,” one of the most distinctive shows touring the globe in some 30 countries, is coming to Detroit Feb. 22 at the Fisher Theatre.

Described as “electrifying Latin and Ballroom dance with fire, passion, drama and the sizzling excitement of 20 champion dancers in a true theatrical experience,” “Burn The Floor” was applauded by The New York Times as “Dazzling!”

Jason Gilkison, “Burn The Floor’s” director and choreographer, described it this way, “This is not your preconceived grandparent’s Ballroom dancing. This is something in a completely different light, grace and athleticism. We are not content to leave it as couples’ dancing – but add a twist here, amazing kicks, lifts and intense high-impact moves. It is nonstop action for two hours.”

“To demonstrate the principle of lead and follow,” Gilkison said, “we have one dance that was so erotic we had to tone it down a bit. Whereas in our other dances, our men might be bare chested, in this one we had to put shirts on. Here there is one woman and all of our men, leading her around because she is blindfolded. It is very sensual, Latin almost controversial,”

The company never stops, he says, and yes it is more than an accomplishment for a small company of 22 — with 20 dancers in the show every night. “It’s very demanding. During intermission, dancers back stage are laying on the floor resting, catching their breath. They have to. But as we dancers say, you keep going no matter what… A dancers’ body must work every muscle every day. If you are not hurting somewhere, you are not alive!”

Australian National Champion Gilkison no longer performs, but television audiences will recognize many of the stars in “Burn The Floor.” The tour features “So You Think You Can Dance” alums Anya Garnis, Pasha Kovalev, Robbie Kmetoni, Janette Manrara and Karen Hauer. Featured vocalist Vonzell Solomon, is “American Idol’s” second runner-up in its fourth season.

Gilkison said the popular media of television brings bigger and more informed audiences to live performance.

“It’s fantastic. Dancing is now up at the front, whereas before it was not always recognized as a top form of entertainment on its own, just a part of the show. Now the audience knows the dances, the moves, the music and rhythms.”

The show includes a panoramic collection of performances “from Harlem’s hot nights at The Savoy, where dances such as the Lindy, Foxtrot and Charleston were born, to the Latin Quarter where the Cha-Cha, Rumba and Salsa steamed up the stage,” he said. From “the elegance of the Viennese Waltz, to the exuberance of the Jive, the show features the Paso Doble, the Tango, Samba, Mambo, Quickstep and Swing.”

“The two sides of the show that I love best are polar opposites,” Gilkison said. “There is the sensual, intimate and intense quiet of a single couple dancing to a slow perfection – and there is the full company doing the 1940s Jitterbug. In both extremes, the dancers are expressing the language of dance, which is lead and follow. They are reacting to each other, stretching their wings and reacting to the audience.”

Gilkison returns to Detroit where he last performed six years ago and looks forward to our audience response.

“Burn The Floor” audiences have screamed and demonstrated their enthusiasm from South Africa to Japan – a surprise reaction for the performers who were told beforehand that Asian people are modest and more subdued. “Not so for us! We couldn’t have been more surprised and thrilled. Korean and Japanese people were screaming and just as wildly appreciative. We loved it.”

‘Burn The Floor’ runs Feb. 22–March 6 at the Fisher Theatre, 3011 W. Grand Blvd. in Detroit. Performances are at 8 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays; 7:30 p.m. Sundays; and 2 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. Tickets begin at $29 at the Fisher Theatre box office, online at www.broadwayindetroit.com or www.ticketmaster.com or 1-800-982-2787.

By Vivian DeGain

Oakland Press Friday, Jan. 28, 2011

A contemporary comedy with a pinch of fracas has opened at the Jewish Ensemble Theatre which takes a new look at diversity – or you might say divergency.

The comedy, ‘Modern Orthodox’ written by Daniel Goldfarb, opened on Broadway in 2004 bringing the vivid Molly Ringwald (Pretty in Pink) and the zany Jason Biggs (American Pie) together on stage where anything might happen.

At the JET, ‘Modern Orthodox’ features Christina L. Flynn as the beauty and Aral Gribble as Herschel Klein, a hyper, obnoxious, annoying and devout Modern Orthodox Jew who wears the uniform black suit and tie – with his touch of individuality – high-top tennis shoes and a yarmulke featuring his baseball team logo, the New York Yankees.

Set in Manhattan, we first meet Herschel, a diamond dealer from Brooklyn, when he is 45 minutes late for his business lunch.

Gribble pulls out all the stops as his Herschel is loud, messy, intense, melodramatic and like all little boys (of which he is anything but) — quite loveable.

But back to the story of ‘Modern Orthodox.’

The story centers on a young professional couple Ben and Hannah, who are enjoying all the comforts of their Upper West Side apartment. Both Jewish but not religious, Ben and Hannah are about have their tidy world turned upside down.

It all begins when Ben has decided it’s time to pop the question – and that is how he meets Herschel.

As Ben impatiently awaits the diamond salesman Herschel for over 45 minutes, he is getting up to leave when said salesman finally shows up.

In the pulls and tugs of the diamond negotiation, Ben and Herschel strike a deal. They also nearly come to blows.

Who is more arrogant – the affluent and well heeled Ben – or the self-righteous Herschel who ends each line with “Baruch Ha-Shem” (God willing)?

Ben (Scott Crownover) returns home to his honey Hannah and the sweetness of their life together. But on the eve of Ben’s proposal, their quiet amity becomes all disarray when Herschel shows up from nowhere, banging on the front door and demanding sanctuary on Shabbat.

As an Orthodox Jew who observes Shabbat without the use of electricity, fire or many other modern conveniences, Herschel arrived ready to  hunker down from sundown Friday through the next 24 hours. Sanctuary on Shabbat is no laughing matter – but in this case, it is, it really is.

‘Modern Orthodox’ is as full of contradictions as the title implies. For every moment of predictable, there is surprise. For every question, there are many more answers. If life is best lived in moments of quiet introspection, then just wait and see what happens in the topsy-turvy.

As Hannah and Ben are provoked to question the depths of their religious feelings and identities – they are also provoked to reconsider love and life with the erratic and frenetic Herschel.

Needless to say – Gribble is amazing all the way down to his last scene, taking his bows in his underwear.

And the JET cast also features Kat Grilli as a very believable Rachel.

The Jewish Ensemble Theatre presents ‘Modern Orthodox’ by Daniel Goldfarb through Feb. 13, at the Aaron DeRoy Theatre on the campus of the Jewish Community Center, 6600 West Maple Road in West Bloomfield. Tickets are $32-$41, and discounts for seniors and students. Performances at 7:30 p.m. Thursdays; 5 p.m. and 8:30 p.m. Saturdays; 2 p.m. and 6:30 p.m. Sundays; and 2 p.m. Wednesday, Feb. 9. Call 248-788-2900 or visit www.jettheatre.com.

By Vivian DeGain

The Oakland Press Friday, Jan. 28, 2011

Broadway musical directors Alex Lacamoire and Bill Sherman are a part of a triumphant team that stormed New York theater audiences and the Tony Awards for a wonderful new musical that could only have been written in and about New York, “In The Heights.”

Winner of four 2008 Tony Awards for Best Musical, Best Music and Lyrics, Best Choreography, and Best Orchestrations, “In The Heights” opened on Broadway March 9, 2008.

The brilliant Lin-Manuel Miranda, the show’s creator, holds the Tony for Best Music and Lyrics, and Lacamoire and Sherman won for Best Orchestrations.

“In The Heights” also won the 2008 Grammy Award for Best Musical Show Album.

It opens at the Fisher Tuesday, Feb. 1.

Lacamoire planned to arrived in Detroit from Atlanta the Saturday before opening for final rehearsals.

Q: In addition to your work with the original Broadway production, how do you work with the traveling cast now?

A: “Musical supervisors on the road wear many different hats from overseeing the final rehearsals of the orchestra and the detailed use of instruments such as trumpet, trombone, piano — to teaching the cast to sing specific to the performance, deciding what key, vocal arrangements and the best ending to a song – to listening with the sound designers and technicians about the final mixing,” Lacamoire said. “I have a clear vision of what the show sounds like, feels like and I want the music and story to blend and be seamless.”

Q: What has made ‘In The Heights’ such a success?

A: “Lin-Manuel. His genius and the way he crafts the story and music, using Broadway’s traditional, modern and contemporary expressions. Because his musical vocabulary is also steeped in Rap, Hip Hop and Latin flavors, it’s a part of his creative process. Not since ‘West Side Story’ has there been a Broadway musical about Latino people and music, and that was an interpretation not an expression. After all, the Sharks were the bad guys. Their images were about darkness and knives. We are drawn to ‘In The Heights’ because it is a real story about Latino people, a love story about families and generations.”

Q: Where is the Heights?

A: “Washington Heights is in the tip of North Manhattan. Lin-Manuel grew up near there in neighborhoods that were at the time Latino-based, middle class families from all over including Dominicans, Puerto Ricans, Mexicans and Cubanos. When you walked down the street you heard everything from Hip Hop to Bolero. But then, Lin-Manuel went to Connecticut to study at Wesleyan College and there, homesick for the cultures and flavors he grew up with, he started to write ‘In The Heights.’”

Q: What else can you tell us?

A: “As our creative team came together to work on this show in the beginning, we were like six pieces of a giant Voltron – a beast of a machine that questioned, tore apart and refined every day we worked to make it better. It was a wonderful process. I knew from the very beginning that ‘In The Heights’ was very special, that we were a part of something extraordinary. Only once in so many years, a generation, does a show like this come along. I like it to the success of ‘Chorus Line’ or ‘Rent.’ I am very thankful. We are counting our lucky stars.”

Q: What do you want to do in Detroit?

A: Go to the Hitsville Museum.

Lacamoire was born in Los Angeles, California in 1975 and moved with his family to Miami, Florida when he was 9. He began to play piano at age 3, studied music throughout his entire education and graduated from Berklee College of Music in 1995.

In addition to his 2008 Tony for “In the Heights,” he won a Drama Desk Award nomination for the Off Broadway production in 2007. His Broadway credits also include Wicked in 2005, High Fidelity in 2006, Bat Boy: The Musical, Godspell, Stephen Schwartz’s Captain Louie and Legally Blonde.

The additional “In The Heights” stellar creative team includes Andy Blankenbuehler (Tony for Best Choreography) and writer Quiara Alegría Hudes, whose book is a Pulitzer Prize finalist and Tony Award nominee. 

‘In The Heights’ From www.intheheightsthemusical.com

“Tells the universal story of a vibrant community in a Washington Heights neighborhood – a place where the coffee from the corner bodega is light and sweet, the windows are always open and the breeze carries the rhythm of three generations of music. It’s a community on the brink of change, full of hopes, dreams and pressures, where the biggest struggles can be deciding which traditions you take with you, and which ones you leave behind.”

‘In The Heights’ runs Feb. 1-13 at the Fisher Theatre, 3011 W. Grand Blvd. in Detroit. Performances are at 8 p.m. Tuesdays-Saturdays; 7:30 p.m. Sundays; and 2 p.m. on Saturdays and Sundays. Tickets are $30-$84 at the Fisher Theatre box office, online at www.broadwayindetroit.com or www.ticketmaster.com or 1-800-982-2787.