Uma Thurman debuts on Broadway in Beau Willimon’s play
The Parisian Woman, Limited Engagement Now on Broadway at the Hudson Theater / By Beau Willimon, Directed by Pam McKinnon, Pictured: Uma Thurman, Josh Lucas, Marton Csokas; Photo by Matthew Murphy, 2017 / Image courtesy of BONEAU/BRYAN-BROWN
Captivating performance, high pace acting, foxy intrigue – these are the characteristics that any theater production would want to hear in its regard. And “The Parisian Woman” written by Beau Willimon and directed by Pam McKinnon is scoring high on each one of them. The cast with Uma Thurman in the title role, Josh Lucas, Marton Csokas, Phillipa Soo and Blair Brown are doing an incredible job in keeping the audience in their grip. The performances at Hudson Theater will continue until March 11, 2018. Click here to book your tickets. Read More
Returning to The Town Hall on February 16, 2018 with new program
Carla Bruni / Image courtesy of Metropolitan Entertainment
Carla Bruni, a French singer-songwriter and a former first lady and ex-supermodel is bringing her latest collection of songs to concert halls in the US in February 2018. Her dreamy yet sultry singing style of the love chansons accompanied on guitar playing by Bruni herself is guaranteed to give a terrific music night for the concertgoers. You can book tickets here.
Carla Bruni Sarkozy (née Carla Gilberta Bruni Tedeschi) was born in 1967 in Turin, Italy and moved to France at the age of 7. Starting with the piano in school, she discovered a guitar when she was about 11 years old. Right there at the first group lesson, she realized that this is her instrument. Singing and playing guitar became her purpose in life.
She started her music career in 1997 before successfully modeling for the top couture houses in France. Her success in songwriting began when in 1999 she sent her lyrics to Julien Clerc. The songs were later included in his album Si j’étais elle . Bruni’sfirst personal disc Quelqu’un m’a ditwas released in 2002. That followed by No Promises in 2007. She continued to record after her marriage to Nicolas Sarkozy, President of France in 2007-2012.
Bruni’s third album Comme si de rien n’état was published in 2008 and Little French Songs in 2012. A 4-year interval between the releases did not mean that she stopped her career in light of becoming the first lady of France. But even though she finished the work on the songs and the recordings by 2011, “it wasn’t considered appropriate to release it while she was First Lady” according to 2013 expose in Vanity Fair.
The latest album French Touch, released by Verve in October 2017, is her fifth. She regained the pace of her performing and recording music career when her husband had lost the reelection in 2012 and the family had fully relocated from the Élysées Palace to a private residence on Right Bank. The songs included in this album are all her favorites from when “I was a teenager” as she confided in the interview to NPR’s Scott Simon.
An idea for Bruni to record English language pop and country classics was David Foster’s, an acclaimed music producer and a former chairman of Verve. The collection includes the covers that she knew by heart, so the whole project felt like a smooth sailing full of distant memories and charming reveries. In the interview with The New York Times, she reveals that its “her secret passion: singing classic rock, country and jazz standards in English”.
Carla Bruni / Image courtesy of Metropolitan Entertainment
She has been including classic rock in her latest concert programs in Paris and on tours in Europe. However, her program at the NYC appearance in 2013 has featured primarily the songs from the newly released at that time Quelqu’un m’a dit album. All were in French or Italian delivered with the mastery, elegance, and simplicity.
The upcoming concert in February in NYC will give her fans a chance to enjoy an unbelievable mix of familiar classics performed in subtly sexy voice making it even more chic with a hint of French accent.
Vibrant production by Sir David McVicar of the beloved Verdi’s opera on January 22 – February 15, 2018
Anita Rachvelishvili as Azucena in Il Trovatore/ Image courtesy of the Met Opera NYC
This year repertoire at the Met Operais clearly dominated by Sir David McVicar’s productions. Il Trovatore, which first had opened here in 2009, is returning to the Met stage with a formidable cast under the baton of Marco Armiliato. The title role in this production is forcefully performed by Yonghoon Lee, the role of his lover Leonora is sung by Jennifer Rowley and the role of Count Di Luna is performed by the baritones Quinn Kelsey and Luca Salsi. After the opening on Monday, January 22, the praising reviews were given to the magnificent Georgian mezzo-soprano Anita Rachvelishvili performing the most complicated part of the opera, a gypsy Azucena. Book your tickets here.
Jennifer Rowley as Leonora in Il Trovatore / Image courtesy of the Met Opera NYC
Il Trovatore’s catchy, disturbing and at the same time melodic music score is overplayed on a macabre plot of medieval rivalries, superstitions and love stories. It is based on a successful play El Trovador (1836) by Antonio García Gutierrez. Verdi had started the work on this opera sometime in 1850 first with the librettist Salvadore Cammarano and later after Cammarano’s death in 1852 with young poet Leone Emanuele Barware. In his correspondence with Cammarano Verdi kept asking him for packing more actions in the libretto to make the most effect on the public. The librettists seem to succeed in that regard. Notwithstanding opera’s great acclaim by the audiences around Europe, the plot was mocked in numerous satires in Italy and elsewhere, which in itself was a sign that its a hit. The twists and turns of the original tale are transformed in this production from the very distant beginning of 15th century Aragon, Spain to the time of the Spanish War of Independence (1807-1814) fought against Napoleonic France. The bitterness and horrors of that period are memorialized in Goya’s “Desastres de la Guerre.”
The creators of this production felt that the time of Peninsular War “fits with Verdi’s tinta, the dark palette he creates for Spain” as McVicar pointed out in an interview with the New York Times. However, some critical elements of the plot in Il Trovatore particularly those surrounding Azucena and her fate seem to be mooted for early 1800. While in the gypsy folk tradition the fire is believed to be the means of communication with the dead, it makes sense for gypsy Azucena’s story and its horrific prominence in the original play set in the 15th century as burnings of sorceresses at the stake were widely practiced. At the time of Napoleon, the use of that practice is highly questionable.
Quinn Kelsey as Count Di Luna, Yonghoon Lee as Manrico, Jennifer Rowley as Leonora in Il Trovatore / Image courtesy of the Met Opera NYC
Despite the pitfalls of historic transposition, Anita Rachvelishvili as Azucena is taking a center stage with her dramatic performance. It’s one thing for Azucena to sing “It makes my blood run cold”, and its very different when the delivery of the lines makes the listeners’ blood cold. “Well, it fairly freezes in your veins while watching and listening to Anita Rachvelishvili” observes Z. Wolf in his New York Times review. Rachvelishvili powerful stage presence masterfully switching from the chilling scenes of tormenting madness to the touching desperation is particularly important here. Verdi himself was thinking about Azucena as a main female character in this opera and even wanted her name to be in the title. The Met orchestra under Armiliato conducting provides superb and inspiring music. With the rest of the main cast being well-placed, the production delivers a deep and spirited theatrical impression.
Starting from 1853 when it was first performed at the Teatro Apollo in Rome, Il Trovatore entered the repertoire of every major opera house in the world. There is a rich and diverse discography with multiple variations of the best singers and conductors. Its catchy melodies had even entered the popular culture and were used in the movie and TV productions.
Early works by Amedeo Modigliani on view from September 15, 2017 – February 4, 2018
Jeanne Hébuterne with Yellow Sweater, 1918-19 / Image provided by Solomon R. Guggenheim Foundation / Art Resource NY
The drawings, paintings, and sculptures by Amedeo Modigliani are easily recognized for their characteristic elongated features and warm color palette. The Jewish Museum presents the works from Dr. Paul Alexandre collection who was the artist’s close friend and first patron. The show covers Modigliani’s first years in Paris from 1906 when he arrived on the scene till primarily 1912. While many of the works look very familiar, others are exhibited in New York for the first time refreshing the visitors understanding of the artist oeuvre and getting deeper into the roots of his creative style.
Kneeling Caryatid, 1911-12, Paul Alexandre Family, courtesy of Richard Nathanson, London / Image provided by Richard Nathanson, photo: Prudence Cuming Ass.
Amedeo Modigliani was born in a Sephardic Jewish family in Livorno, Italy in 1884. His father’s side came from Italian businessmen clan, while his mother’s side origins were from Marseille, France bringing a cultivated, intellectual ancestry which traced its lineage to Spinoza. The family’s fortunes collapsed at the time of Modigliani’s birth, but the family was able to maintain a flare of decent means because of his mother’s enthusiasm and resourcefulness. Modigliani had experienced multiple health crises in his childhood and youth leading eventually to tuberculosis that claimed his life at an early age of 35.
When Modigliani arrived in Paris at the turn of the twentieth century, it was an artistic hub and the center of creative expression counting in its ranks founders of every modernist artistic movement. The unprecedented vibrancy of creative scene was calling for finding new styles away from the classical determinism towards the freedom of abstract art. Modigliani, however, embraced figurative style likely because he had already experimented with Macchiaioli, en plain air painting technique which pre-dates impressionism, back in Florence, Italy when he was attending art school there. He didn’t fall in love with it and continued to work in his studio.
Seated Female Nude, possibly Anna Akhmatova, 1911; Paul Alexandre Family, courtesy of Richard Nathanson, London / photo: Prudence Cuming Ass.
In Paris he was getting his inspiration from African, Egyptian and Southeast Asian art that he intensively studied at the museums rich in exotic artifacts. The current show traces the influence of these ancient cultures on Modigliani’s works and emphasizes the successful mix of forms and poses found in his portraits.
A fascination with the nonwestern representation of the faces and figures taken by the artist at the time when he met Russian poet Anna Akhmatova had resulted in numerous sketches of her as a goddess. The drawings on view have accentuated angular forms reminding of the paintings from the Ancient Egypt. Another gallery in the show is dedicated to the exploration of the caryatids and other devotional figures from the ancient world. Yet in another gallery, there is a collection of limestone sculpture heads reminiscent of the African masks. The build-up of influences and elements leads to the familiar oil paintings of nudes and portraits.
Modigliani’s short life was almost too full of all sorts of excesses. Too many lovers, too much alcohol and drugs, too many rushed ideas, too noisy parties. The latest biography by Meryle Secrest “Modigliani: A Life” tells a sympathetic story of this talented artist “putting his art at the center” in the words of the New Yorker review of the book.
One peculiar aspect of Modigliani’s oeuvre is that it attracts the imitators making Modigliani “the most faked artist in the world” according to Secrest. The seemingly easy to replicate compositions commanding sky-high prices combined with a poorly documented portfolio of works have led to the notorious number of forgeries. The fakes even found its way into acclaimed museum collections. An exhibition in Genoa, Italy in the summer of 2017 had to close early according to Artnet because of the high number of fakes on view.
Modigliani Unmasked will surely get one think about many of the artist’s intentions and make his art even more enjoyable for the viewers!
Amedeo Modigliani, Head of a Woman, 1910/1911, limestone, Chester Dale Collection
succeed in that regard. Notwithstanding opera’s great acclaim by the audiences around Europe, the plot was mocked in numerous satires in Italy and elsewhere, which in itself was a sign that its a hit. The twists and turns of the original tale are transformed in this production from the very distant beginning of 15th century Aragon, Spain to the time of the Spanish War of Independence (1807-1814) fought against Napoleonic France. The bitterness and horrors of that period are memorialized in Goya’s “Desastres de la Guerre.”
