605 stories by "Joel Benjamin"
What raised "The Ringdove" above mere creative story-time theater was the exquisite artwork and detailed performances. The perfect, colorful costumes (by Casey Compton) that evoked every…
Presented at Lincoln Center's David H. Koch Theater by the China Arts and Entertainment Group Ltd., the company used its impressive resource of dancers in two large-scale ballets:Â "Godde…
Lincoln Center's Mostly Mozart Festival 2019 presented the lavish, yet somehow intimate, "Under Siege," a stunning production of the Yang Liping Contemporary Dance Company of China.Its chief…
The Joyce Theater is presenting a two-week Ballet Festival, four programs under the artistic direction of Kevin O'Hare, director of The Royal Ballet. Each program is curated by a differe…
Joseph Sissens in Sir Frederick Ashton's "Dance of the Blessed Spirits," in The Joyce Theater's Ballet Festival (Program A) (Photo credit: Maria Baranova)The Joyce Theater is presenting a tw…
Co-conceived by Asante and Kenrik "H2O" Sandy who choreographed and directed the production, "Blak Whyte Gray" was constructed in two parts and three sections. Part I began with "Whyte,"…
The title of playwright Dianne Nora's fascinating new work, "Monica: This Play is Not About Monica Lewinsky," is disingenuous. Is it about you-know-who? Well, yes and no. There w…
How Freddie resolves his amorous adventures is cleverly handled by Blackstone using an imaginative combination of ballet, modern dance, mime and popular dance forms. The score is made up…
Russian-born Maria Kochetkova, the petite ballerina who spent the major portion of her career with the San Francisco Ballet, has turned herself into a small-scale Diaghilev. Her Maria Ko…
"Six Years Old" is a gem of a play, its facets polished by the director Helen Handelman. Every emotional revelation, no matter how subtle is illuminated by the acting of its four-member …
The world premiere "Sport," choreographed to more than twenty bits and pieces by Erik Satie, appropriately named "Sports et divertissements" (played by the brilliant pianist Colin Fowler), w…
The second part of the program was a bonanza of Bournonville excerpts, danced to not particularly memorable scores, that worked well even without colorful scenery. The beautiful, colorfu…
Ukrainian director Rimas Tuminas has led the Vakhtangov State Academic Theatre of Russia in a massacre of Mikhail Lermontov's 1845 play "Masquerade."Â Presented by the Cherry Orchard Fest…
Megan Monaghan Rivas' gender-bending take on the popular, much-adapted Alexandre Dumas 1844 novel, "The Three Musketeers," moves the action from the 17th century to Paris during World War II…
By placing his ballet in the realm of the high-strung ballroom world, Eifman supplied himself plenty of excuses to make dances that bounced about the stage to his score of a parade of waltze…
Cohen is clearly an intelligent, well-read man, familiar with the twists and turns of different periods and styles. "Midnight Street" is chock full of ideas, poetic meanderings and some …
Michael Mao Dance is celebrating 26 years of presenting Mao's work and if his recent program at the Ailey Citigroup Theater is any evidence, there is reason to believe he will continue for a…
Malloy, who wrote the book, music and lyrics, has taken a novel approach, staging Octet as if it were a 12-step program in which all the members of the group express their inner thoughts thr…
Several songs were from flop shows and given new life by Streisand:Â "He Touched Me" from "Drat! The Cat!" sung with infectious flirtatiousness by Lianne Marie Dobbs; "Why Did I Choose Yo…
The original production of "Curse of the Starving Class" in 1977 was a shocker even for a time when permissiveness prevailed. Kinney seems to have decided that the play Shepard wrote isn…
But, fear not! The Encores! creative team"director John Rando, music director, Rob Berman and choreographer Sarah O'Gleby"found a terrific cast led by Michael Urie in the Phil Silvers' r…
"Pepperland," however, will not do anything for Morris' reputation as a choreographer. His dearth of choreographic invention"including constant repetition of a few steps, gestures and pa…
Ted Chapin, the writer and host of the 92Y Lyrics & Lyricists Series' "A Beautiful Dawning: Oklahoma! at 75," did an impeccable job creating one of the best editions of this important se…
Michael Dorsey/Dorothy Michaels still has most of his/her friends and professional acquaintances from the movie version with some new twists:Â Jeff Slater, his playwright roommate (a wond…
It is a well crafted story of a feisty seventy-something Sheila O'Connor (Nora Chester who does feisty beautifully) whose grandson, physician Brian O'Connor (an earnest Jordan Ahnquist), who…
