Daily Loaf

Zombies are always hungry — good thing they aren’t real.  Metropolitan Ministries have hungry families and their need is real, so the cast of Jobsite Theater’s Night of the Living Dead is teaming up to help!

All jokes aside (and I can’t take credit for that headline, that’s the work of our resident designer Brian Smallheer), hunger is serious business. For over 35 years, Metropolitan Ministries has helped over 150 families a day get GEDs, find employment and overcome homelessness. Their Backpacks of Hope program helps put the tools kids need in their hands to be successful students. At the holidays they provide food and toys for thousands and thousands of area families.

If you’ve spent much time in Tampa during the holidays, you’ve no doubt seen the large tent on Florida Avenue not that far north of downtown. My wife and I have personally contributed in some fashion every year, and it’s impossible not to be moved by the holiday spirit when you stop in to drop things off.

This year, I have read over and over again how many organizations like MetMin across the country are hurting far worse going into the holiday season than ever before.  The economy is still down, unemployment is still up. All non-profits are taking a hit in this economy. Even Jobsite has had some stressful moments. But not with this show, so let’s face it, when it comes to a hungry actor or a hungry family — the hungry family wins every time.  Metropolitan Ministries is facing a perfect storm: Growing need and diminishing contributions.  Over 8,000 families will need assistance this holiday season, from food to warm clothing, shelter to toys from Santa. Read the rest of this entry »

Christopher Rutherford and Glenn Gover deserving a great audience

Why does one come to the theater if one does not want to watch the play? Case in point: The Woman in Black sold out performance last night. I directed the show and have been to just about every performance, so I tend to watch the audience as well as the play.  It is a thriller with many technical aspects that all need to be spot-on every night, so I watch how it is all played out and how it is all received by the audience.  So, Sunday night being a sold out show, I lingered on the sidelines so that those who paid for a ticket got a seat. I had the perfect view and it was the perfect audience. Almost.

Perhaps I should explain “perfect audience.”  Have you ever been an observer of art with a whole room full of strangers with whom you collectively took the journey with the artist — as one?  Ever been at a performance where you needed to see that exact thing at that exact time in your life?  Ever been inspired collectively with the person sitting next to you, without talking to each other?  It is not a type of audience, per se, but rather the right combination for the particular experience at hand.

Conversely, as a performer or fellow audience member sitting in your vicinity, if you’ve had a bad day at work and can’t shake it off, we feel it.  If you had too much to drink at happy hour before you got to the theater, we feel it.  If you are waiting for that voice mail or text message and want intermission to get here so you can check it, we feel it.  Or, in the case of last night’s performance, if you did not come to the theater to watch a play, we feel it.

Sunday’s play was 98 percent the perfect audience.  Read the rest of this entry »

Jobsite Theater’s Night of the Living Dead isn’t even very funny. Insofar as it has a plot, it’s tiresomely repetitive, and the script, by Lori Allen Ohm, isn’t within miles of being the sort of inspired Charles Ludlam-like parody one might have expected. There are a few good moments — a couple of graphically gory shockers, some silly combats, and all the much-too-short scenes involving Jason Vaughan Evans — but in general this is a sloppy, flaccidly directed yawner that’s short on invention and memorable acting. In its 75 minutes, it offers about 30 seconds of real hilarity.

The play begins with Barbara (Kari Goetz) and Johnny (Matthew Lunsford, pictured left), siblings who’ve come to a cemetery in order to place a wreath on their father’s grave. They’re rudely interrupted by a zombie (Evans, pictured right) who struggles with Johnny, leaving Barbara to escape to a house in the vicinity. There she tries to call for help, but her cellphone’s not working, and the blood she sees on her hand seemingly sends her into shock. A rescuer arrives: Ben (Dayton Sinkia), a forward-thinking good guy who helps her fight off more ghouls and then proceeds to board up the visible doors and windows with a few unconvincing planks. Read the rest of this entry »

At Thrill the World, St. Pete joins MJ fans across the world in an attempt to break the Guinness World Record for Largest Simultaneous Dance — in this case, the famous, phantasmic Thriller dance. The Pier hosts music, food, activities and a pre-dance lesson for anyone who needs to learn the monster moves. Then, Michael Jackson achieves what no world leader ever has: a world united – united by zombies. No word on whether Obama’s participating, but we hope to see everyone from the local Blockbuster guy to the Prez paying tribute to the one-gloved man. Come in your most dashing undead duds, and an on-site make-up artist adds scabs and scars to make sure that you thrill and terrify like the real thing. Sat., Oct. 24, 6:30 p.m. sign-in, 8:30 p.m. dance, The Pier, 800 Second Ave. N.E., St. Petersburg, free admission; $5 zombie make-up, thrillstpete.com. – Franki Weddington

Hello voracious readers, welcome to heaven. Seriously, the St. Petersburg Times Festival of Reading is a nice reminder that in 2009, people still read theses little things called books. Held on the USF St. Petersburg campus, this lovely celebration of the written word features book signings, panel discussions, entertainment, family activities, refreshments, and various booksellers and exhibitors. There are also book signings by Read the rest of this entry »

Paula Vogel’s And Baby Makes Seven has all the ingredients for a successful play, and none of the results.

This ultimately tedious exercise has one wonderfully interesting idea – that a lesbian couple has invented a small group of imaginary sons – and then restates it relentlessly without any real development or variation. The three actors in the play – Alison Burns (pictured center), Jessica Rothert (right) and David Jenkins – are talented enough, and Karla Hartley as usual offers vibrant and intelligent staging. But this is a text without real insight, without larger meaning or even suspense, and no collection of artists can make it stageworthy for more than a half hour.

I’m a big fan of Vogel’s Pulitzer Prize-winning How I Learned to Drive, but you’d never know from watching Baby that its author is the same one who gave us precocious Li’l Bit and her deviously abusive Uncle Peck. Read the rest of this entry »

The city closes down two blocks of Central Avenue for the third edition of Creative Clay’s now-annual fundraiser, FolkFest St. Pete. The free two-day street party celebrates all things folk with food and drink, art booths spotlighting the works of a range of local artisans, and a solid lineup of music throughout. Florida’s finest singer-songwriters,  folk and blues artists join national talents on the outdoor stage. South Carolina kicks off the music on Saturday, with sets by Dave Hardin, Green Grass Boys and TC Carr, Sarasota Slim and Nitro, Rebekah Pulley and the Reluctant Prophets, Ben Prestage, and The New Familiars of Charlotte, S.C. to follow (and in that order). The Sunday bill features Veronica Jackson, Ella Jet, a “Tribute to Woodstock,” Have Gun Will Travel and the main headliners and a big score for the fest – NY’s Donna the Buffalo (pictured), their folky, rootsy jams marked by elements of zydeco, old time fiddle music and three-part harmonies. Sept. 26-27, beginning at 10 a.m. both days, Central Avenue, between 11th and 13 streets N., St. Petersburg, free admission. –Leilani Polk

Time to start mapping a route that hits every major museum and attraction this side of the Bay: ArtsAlive 2009: Free Museum Day includes the Salvador Dali Museum, the Dr. Carter G. Woodson Museum, the Florida Holocaust Museum, Florida International Museum, Great Explorations, the Fine Arts Museum, the St. Pete Museum of History, the Morean Arts Center, the Pier Aquarium, the Leepa-Rattner Museum of Art, the Florida Craftsmen Gallery and more. Visit stpete.org/artsalive for museum hours and more info. Sat., Sept. 26.

Read the rest of this entry »

David M. Jenkins, Alison Burns and Jessica Rothert in "And Baby Makes Seven"

Actor, director and lighting designer, Karla Hartley has got to be one of the most versatile theater people in the Tampa Bay Area.  She has directed such widely divergent plays as The Crucible and Psycho Beach Party, and she has designed and stage managed shows from such far-reaching locations as the Kennedy Center in Washington D.C. to the Edinburgh Fringe Festival in Edinburgh, Scotland. She is currently the Producing and Educational Programming Manager at the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, and I last saw her when she played Dr. Scott and Eddie in TBPAC’s wonderful production of The Rocky Horror Show.  (As if that isn’t enough, she also co-directed the show.) We are indeed fortunate to have her.

Her latest venture is directing Jobsite Theater’s production of And Baby Makes Seven. Here’s the unlikely plot: Anna, Ruth and Peter await the arrival of their newborn child, but first they must rid the crowded apartment of their three imaginary children. Playwright Paula Vogel redefines the meaning of family and completely blurs the lines between illusion and reality, power and subjection, friendship and love, female and male. I had the pleasure of interviewing Karla the week before the show’s opening. Read the rest of this entry »

Tampa Bay’s got all that jazz, man. Here are two of the most promising events of the season:

At Last Call for Jazz, Best of the Bay-winning singer-actress Emilia Sargent (pictured) performs standards like “‘Deed I Do,” “Get Happy” and “Bewitched,” backed up by the Tampa Jazz Greats on piano, trumpet and bass for a great, late-night foray into the world of jazz. Fri., Oct. 9, 10:30 p.m., Shimberg Playhouse, Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, 1010 N. MacInnes Place,Tampa, $15, $5 student rush tickets 30 minutes prior to curtain, free for Jobsite season ticket holders, jobsitetheater.org. Read the rest of this entry »

Last December, just a few months into Jobsite’s 10th anniversary season, I wrote this blog for Creative Loafing about lessons learned trying to run a theater for an entire decade.

We’re now just a few days away from the end of this 10th season, and I’ve had time for further reflection.

Left to right: Amy Gray, Chris Perez, Ami Sallee Corley, Spencer Meyers, Katie Castonguay, Stephen Ray and Jason Vaughan Evans in "Pericles." Photo by Brian Smallheer.

We finish the final show of our season, a rousing and hilarious punk rock mob reimagining of the Pericles story, with a video tribute to 10 awesome years in Tampa Bay.  From the genesis of the company, represented by a photo of five awkward and rebellious 20-somethings on the loading dock of USF’s Theater I, cycling through all of our productions and major milestones, to a staged promotional shot of our dead-sexy board in one of the Carol Morsani Hall dressing rooms, photographed by Steve Widoff.

It moves me every night.  Oh, yeah, I’ve watched every single performance of Pericles — from lights up to lights down — something I’ve never done before. Read the rest of this entry »

As a freelance artist I find myself in a lull of productivity sometimes.  In the springtime I tend to do a lot of administrative work for the Access Arts Scholarship program for the Patel Conservatory, so my artistic side isn’t being shopped out to other companies as much (i.e. I don’t audition for shows during that time.)

In these times I always think I am going to dust off that script of the one-woman show I’ve always wanted to work on.  Problem is, when you do a one-person project it seems like you have to do all the work for yourself; be your own motivator, be responsible to only yourself.  It’s hard to pull through on the deliverables when it is only you that you have to answer to.

Well, local actor Curtis Belz found the gumption, self-motivation, and two friends (eventually more), to pull off Danny Hoch’s (pictured) Jails, Hospitals and Hip-hop, a one-man show demanding that he play several personas, including Flip, a good ol’ boy from the Midwest who has come to identify with urban hip-hoppers; Bronx, a sidewalk vendor who gets pinched for selling without a license; and Sam, a prison guard with an anger management problem — evidenced by his beating a prisoner nearly to death. The show is playing tonight as Jobsite’s latest Job-side project. This is the second of two preview performances before its full incarnation in September at HCC Ybor. Read the rest of this entry »

Talia

Editor’s Note: Actor/director/teacher/playwright Ami Sallee Corley (right) continues her series of posts about the challenges of being a freelance artist in Tampa Bay. Today’s topic: Self-esteem (or lack thereof)

So I have had the incredible honor of being one of the cast of Pericles, Jobsite’s newest Joe Popp rock musical.  I get to play the love interest, a post-graduate hippie chick rebelling against her Cape Cod “old money” roots.  I’m in jeans and braids and half the time I am barefoot and tote around a nice chip on my shoulder for Daddy’s attempts to assimilate me into “society.” Daddy: “I thought you were going to see that Kennedy boy?”  Talia: “No.  That was your idea, and I told you I don’t want to end up at the bottom of a lake.”

So, in a very favorable review, CL’s Mark Leib refers to me as Read the rest of this entry »

Ami Sallee Corley and Stephen Ray in "Pericles." Rehearsal photo courtesy of David Jenkins.

Pericles is a fitting cap to Jobsite Theater’s tenth season, a noisy, funny, unpredictable rock musical featuring the impressive guitar work of Joe Popp and the splendid performances of seven inspired actors.

Neil Gobioff and Shawn Paonessa’s adaptation of Shakespeare’s play makes more sense than Shakespeare does; by turning the Bard’s characters into Mafia thugs, and his locations (Tyre, Tarsus, Pentapolis) into recognizable American locales (Coney Island, the Bronx, Cape Cod), Gobioff and Paonessa have succeeded in domesticating one of the wildest, hardest-to-follow plays in the canon, while still showing remarkable fidelity to the original. Read the rest of this entry »

I interviewed Joe Popp the weekend before opening night of Pericles in a dark, smoky bar in downtown Tampa. He was affable and talkative — I guess I expected more of a pissed-off punk guy. I mentioned that I had seen his punk rock Macbeth at American Stage’s Shakespeare in the Park series in 1997. It was a kick-ass production that still stands as one of the theater’s best-attended events ever. For that reason, I can’t wait to see Pericles at Jobsite Theater.  Joe wrote the music and lyrics for Pericles and also plays guitar and functions as the narrator.

See what Popp had to say about how he turned Shakespeare’s least-produced work into a modern, pop-punk-riddled tale of incest, intrigue and murder in the streets of New Jersey, where Pericles becomes Perry the mobster.

Read the rest of this entry »

In celebration of their 10th anniversary season and the beginning of a new decade of quality theater, Jobsite Theater presents a mobster musical based on Shakespeare’s Pericles, Prince of Tyre. Although the adaptation stays true to the play’s original plot and structure, the geniuses at Jobsite constructed their version for a modern audience: theocratic royalty is replaced with the underworld mafia; exotic locations like Tarsus and Mytilene are replaced with more familiar locales like New Jersey, New York and Massachusetts; and the Grecian Pericles becomes New Jersey Perry. Another modern twist: Perry’s treacherous adventures are accompanied by composer Joe Popp’s power-punk music. But never fear! After dodging mob hits and losing his wife and daughter, Perry learns the value of love, loyalty and honor — how sweet. This play has it all, folks: raucous tunes, love, laughs, mobsters, incest, intrigue and more. (Pictured, left to right: Amy Gray, Chris Perez, Ami Sallee Corley, Spencer Meyers, Katie Castonguay, Stephen Ray and Jason Vaughan Evans in Jobsite’s Pericles. Photo by Brian Smallheer) Aug. 6-23, 8 p.m. Thurs.-Sat., 4 p.m. Sun., Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, Shimberg Playhouse, $24.50 general admission; $10 Students, seniors and military, 30 minutes prior to curtain; a $10 preview is on Wed., Aug 5, 8 p.m., www.jobsitetheater.org. —Lily Reisman

Six directors direct six short plays for an evening of theatrical tastiness in Short Comings: Over the Edge. Material includes original scripts by up-and-comers along with new works from old friends. (Pictured: Summer Bohnenkamp-Jenkins and Amy E. Gray in Short Comings: Over the Edge) 7 p.m. Mon., June 15. Shimberg Playhouse, Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, 1010 N. MacInnes Place, Tampa, $5; free for Jobsite season ticket holders, 813-229-7827, jobsitetheater.org.

At the Water Way Challenge, Crystal Light’s colorful convertibles cruise Tampa to give away water and free Crystal Light samples — and dares local ladies to get water-wise and start drinking two extra glasses of water every day. 9 a.m.-5 p.m. Mon., June 15, Franklin Street Mall, 400-800 blocks of Franklin Street, downtown Tampa, 813-274-8518, deliciouschange.glam.com.

Prelude to Pride presents Our Leading Lady, a comedic backstage romp set in 1865, when British-born stage actress Laura Keene seeks fame and fortune. Of course, there’s a hiccup in the plan when her traveling theater company performs at Ford Theater. To Laura’s dismay, Washington, D.C.’s citizens are more concerned with a certain presidential assassination than her brilliant performance. Proceeds from the performance benefit ASAP (AIDS Association of Pinellas), which provides services to locals living with HIV and AIDS. Visit americanstage.org for more info. (Pictured: Matt McGee as leading lady Laura Keene) 7:30 p.m. Mon., June 15 , American Stage, 163 3rd Street N., St. Petersburg, admission is “pay what you can”, 727-823-7529, americanstage.org.

It was maybe the first impacting death to reach me first via Twitter: Augusto Boal died at the age of 78 Friday from respiratory failure after a long battle with leukemia.

I was immediately transported back in time to the first time I’d studied the theater legend in undergrad at USF — I’m pretty sure it was during a course taught by Nancy Cole called something to the effect of The Theater of Post-Cultural Pluralism. I’d go a lot more in-depth the next year in Dr. Pat Finelli’s Senior Colloqium class (perhaps the best class I had as an undergrad theater student). By the time I’d moved on to UF for grad school, Boal would be shoulder to shoulder in my theatrical Mount Rushmore, joining Dario Fo, Jerzy Grotowski and Peter Brook.

Two of Boal’s books — Theater of the Oppressed and Games for Actors and Non-Actors — still hold special spots on my bookshelf. What was fresh and exciting about Augusto Boal to me as a student in the mid-’90s (he developed his methods in the ’50s and ’60s) was that he worked lifelong to completely demysitify the form, worked tirelessly to put art and power into the hands of the common citizen and worked to use the form as a tool for change.

He worked with professionals, he worked with farmers — give him bodies and he’d create. Some of his work laid the foundation for what we’d today call drama therapy (which he called Forum Theater), where “spect-actors” would work through scenarios of oppression toward change. Boal’s methods encourage an actual dialogue with the audience as opposed to simple one-sided conversation. Theater was to be an active relationship.  He created and taught others how to create theater ripped from local news or based on current or proposed legislation. He created what was called “Invisible Theater” that could spring up anywhere and where those witnessing wouldn’t be clued in that it was performance.

His work was regarded as dangerous — the military dictatorship that ruled Brazil from the ’60s to the ’80s detained, arrested, jailed and tortured Boal before finally exiling him to Argentina.  He returned home in the late ’80s after that regime’s collapse. Read the rest of this entry »

LAST CHANCES:
Final performances of The Lieutenant of Inishmore at Jobsite (4 p.m., TBPAC) and Legally Blonde The Musical (3 p.m., Ruth Eckerd Hall).
Closing day for It’s a Dog’s Life: Photographs by William Wegman from the Polaroid Collection at Leepa-Ratner and Albrecht Dürer: Art in Transition at the Museum of Fine Arts.

Spring Plant Festival This year’s theme is “Change Is a Beautiful Thing,” and focuses on replanting local yards. Vendors include local plant clubs and societies and commercial growers. The variety of plants for sale include: crotons, African violets, orchids, bromeliads, cactus and succulents, bamboo, bonsai, bougainvillea, camellias, tropical fruit trees, palms, carnivorous plants, gesneriads and more. There is also a bee workshop with beekeeper Gary Van Cleef, a kid’s activity center, and an Easter egg hunt on Sunday. 11 a.m.-3 p.m. Sun., April 12, USF Botanical Gardens, Tampa, $5 general, free for garden members and children under 12, 813-974-2329.

Lovers and Friends Party. Meet and party with the cast of this web-based show about six lesbians in a modern urban environment. Visit loversnfriendsshow.com for more info. 9 p.m. Sun., April 12, The Social Club, Ybor City, $5 or free before 10 p.m., 813-317-3061.

The sexier technical parts of this show – a cute girl covered in gore wielding two handguns, a blood-soaked guy clutching a dead cat prop, the gunfights, the special effects rigs that shoot blood at a rate of 80psi – have been chronicled here, on the Jobsite blog and in a feature story in the St. Pete Times.

Still, there are loads of hours spent every night on making all the behind-the-scenes preparations and even more hours spent cleaning and resetting everything after the show. This work is not so much magic as it is just plain ol’ elbow grease.

I may be in the directors chair, but with so much to do and such a solid tech crew taking care of things, I recognize how little I know about how some things work or the time that goes into making it happen nightly.  I’m around, but usually just feel in the way during setup and breakdown.  So, I decided to ask everyone just exactly how their night goes whenever they come to the theater. They’re surely not getting paid enough for all of this, the least they can get is proper credit.

If you see the show, the first thing you’ll notice afterwards is the stage manager (Jaime Giangrande-Holcom) and the two ASMs (David Valdez and Katie Grey) scurry out with buckets of warm water, mops, giant squeegees and lots and lots of rags as the audience is still exiting the theater. Time is of the essence – every minute that blood sits out, the harder it gets to clean.  Large plastic bags are brought out and maimed bodies are loaded up into them like a really weird crime scene. The set starts getting scrubbed from top to bottom and all the blood is eventually worked down into a trough, and then from trough into a bucket, where it’s then disposed.  Bits of ‘entrails’ and spent shell casings are picked out as they go for recycling or reusing. As the water activates the baby detergent in the blood (primarily Karo syrup with chocolate syrup, food coloring and Chris Holcom’s “secret ingredient”) the whole theater starts to get an odd sorta-sweet, sorta-nursery smell to it. “Smells like chocolate baby,” so says Katie. Read the rest of this entry »

We at Jobsite Theater have been collecting quotes sent to us via email or Twitter or what-have-you since Wednesdays preview production.  We’ve also culled a few soundbites from bloggers who’ve attended over this opening weekend.

The best quote though came from a bartender friend who saw the show Sunday afternoon who sent a text message late last night, as my wife and I sat on the couch watching a DVRed episode of The Dog Whisperer.

i loved your show more than pussy

Wow.  Immediately I asked the girl to text him back and ask if I could use it.  He didn’t have a problem with it (It was Jeff Diamond, New World Brewery). Thinking later on it, I REALLY wanted to use the quote but wondered if I could really get away with it officially in our online materials.  That quote actually screams to go into a print ad, which I know no paper would run (well, CL might …). Read the rest of this entry »

The New Blue. Lots of colleges have a cappella singing groups, but few have the longevity of Yale’s Whiffenpoofs, the men’s group founded in 1909. So it’s kind of a surprise to learn that the women’s a cappella group at Yale has only been around since 1969 — but that’s because  Yale only started admitting women in 1969. The aptly named, award-winning New Blue is now the university’s oldest women’s organization of any kind, and its 13 current members (including Plant HS alum Juliet Buesing) will  be making a rare area appearance in Tampa tonight, singing a wide repertoire from pop to folk to gospel to choral music. Wed., March 18, 7 p.m., Palma Ceia Presbyterian Church Sanctuary, 3501 W San Jose, on Himes across from Plant High School, Tampa. Admission free.

The St. Patrick’s Day Hangover Show with Mike McCarthy. Wed., March 18, 8 p.m., The Tampa Improv, Ybor City, $8, 813-864-4000. tampaimprov.com.

FIRST LOOK:
The Lieutenant of Inishmore As the director himself has told you, Jobsite’s production of this Martin McDonagh black comedy is full of bloody, noisy special FX. Get an early glimpse of the mayhem tonight and save money, too, at the $10 preview. (Opening night is tomorrow.) Critics have called previous productions of Inishmore “appallingly entertaining” (New York Times) and “blisteringly funny” (CurtainUp), and it won the Tony for Best Play in 2006, so $10 sounds like a bloody bargain. Preview, March 18, 8 p.m., $10. Run continues March 19-April 12, 8 p.m. Thurs.-Sat., 4 p.m. Sun., Shimberg Playhouse-Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, downtown Tampa. $24.50, 813-229- 7827, tbpac.org.

LAST CHANCE:
Convergence … A Journey Continues A group show featuring works by Larissa Makeeva, Fauzie As’Ad, Basil Watson, Guillermo Portieles, Carlos Camargo Vilardy, Graham Davis and Julie Steiner. Extended through March 18, Orange Park Gallery International, downtown Tampa, free admission.

Jason Vaughan Evans and Chris Holcom in Jobsite's production.

Jobsite Theater’s hit production of the Steve Martin comedy Picasso at the Lapin Agile raised nary a disapproving eyebrow in Tampa Bay. So it was something of a shock to hear that the play has caused enough of a scandal at an Oregon high school that Steve Martin himself had to step in.  I guess we should be glad Ronda Storms never got ahold of the script.

Here’s the text of Martin’s letter to the La Grande Observer:

To the citizens of La Grande:It has come to my attention that there is a controversy regarding my play, “Picasso at the Lapin Agile,” which was to be produced at your local high school.

First let me compliment Mr. Kevin Cahill, the teacher who selected the play, on his excellent taste! The play has been performed, without incident, all over the world by professional and amateur companies, including many high schools.

Because I don’t know the standards of your community or the life experience of your students, it is impossible for me to address whether my play is appropriate to be performed on campus, although in the limited web exchanges I have read, the students, and the eloquent Mr. Cahill, seem to understand the play and can discern that the questionable behavior sometimes evident in the play is not endorsed.

I have heard that some in your community have characterized the play as “people drinking in bars, and treating women as sex objects.” With apologies to William Shakespeare, this is like calling Hamlet a play about a castle.

Read the rest of this entry »

As a director and producer, I’m not typically easily rattled.

Jobsite Theater tends to pick material that we’re confident we can do well and that will still push us, our artists and our audience just enough to make it all worthwhile.  As a director I really only go for work that speaks to me on some internal level.  It doesn’t have to be all deep and shit, or something that has to change the world, but I certainly have my sensibilities and predilections. As a producer I’m a bit more conservative.
Every so often, though, a play comes along that everyone can see from a mile away will be a sick challenge, but one that would pay such dividends if it was pulled off well.  As a working collective, sometimes the intense discussion will in the end push us away from such work, or at a minimum hold us off for a year or so until we’re perhaps better prepared to handle it.

Kari Goetz caught this on her iPhone in rehearsal

Right now we are very literally knee-deep in one of those shows that sparked a lot of debate within the company – The Lieutenant of Inishmore.  It thrills me endlessly and makes me wanna poop my pants a little all at the same time.

Read the rest of this entry »

Tampa Bay Symphony, the 90-plus volunteer orchestra, presents George Gershwin’s An American in Paris, Edvard Grieg’s Symphonic Dances, Ravel’s Alborada del Grazioso, and with guest soloist Corinne Puchalla, von Weber’s Andante & Hungarian Rondo for Solo Bassoon. 8 p.m., Progress Energy Center for the Arts – Mahaffey Theater, St. Petersburg, $20.

Eckerd College’s Visions Of Nature, Voices Of Nature Environmental Film Festival continues with a screening of John Sayles’ Sunshine State, a 2002 dramedy about the encroaching gentrification of a small coastal Florida town and the intersecting lives of the locals trying to deal with it; starring Angela Bassett (pictured), Edie Falco, Jane Alexander and Ralph Waite. 7 p.m., Miller Auditorium-Eckerd College, St. Petersburg, free admission.

The next play featured in the Jobside Project Staged Reading Series is P.J. Gibson’s Magenta Sunsets and Brown Silk. 7:30 p.m., Shimberg Playhouse, Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, downtown Tampa, $5 general (free for season ticket holders), 813-229-7827.

It’s not often you find a UK electro outfit that can combine elements of Can-style Krautrock (Britain-meets-Berlin accents, slinky minimal beats, hypnotic repetition) with sly, witty songwriting that references Hans Christian Anderson, ice cream flavors, Reebok, pickpockets and various other nonsensical subjects. Fujiya & Miyagi bring their U.S. tour to Orlando, with support by Brooklyn’s Project Jenny, Project Jan. 8 p.m., Back Booth, Orlando, $10.

Also worth the Monday night drive to O-town is Austin’s thunderously art rockin’ …And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead, which is currently on tour in support of their sixth and latest album, The Century of Self. Funeral Perty opens the Orlando gig. 9 p.m., The Social, Orlando, $15.

Marion Baldeon and Casey Hicks in The Agreeable Husband (Photo: Alex Catalano)

One of my goals when I took the leap last February and became a freelance artist was not only to have more time to commit to Jobsite, but also to collaborate with the artists I’ve met in the Tampa Bay area on original projects.  This not only ensures more work for artists in our community, but it raises a consciousness for Tampa-grown art.  The first to come to a fully realized production is The Agreeable Husband, a dance-theater piece based on Amy Vanderbilt’s “Complete Book of Etiquette”, a how-to book for husbands and wives published in 1952.  We need the community to help us with the next layer of the project, set to open this April.

I am conducting interviews with mothers, fathers and children who grew up with this book and its ideals.  If you or someone you know fits this description, we’d love to have your perspective in this project.  Please e-mail AgreeableHusband@gmail.com.

Read the rest of this entry »

Amanda Roa and Tina Tidwell of Mosaic Dance

This past weekend the Mosaic Dance concert hit the Tampa Bay Performing Arts Center, performing on stage in the TECO Theater.  I had a chance to talk with Co-Artistic Directors, Ashley Evans Hilton and Tina Tidwell, as well as two of their featured dancers, Claire Elbrink and Amanda Roa.  About halfway through composing my notes for writing this entry, I felt like I was experiencing deja vu.  Read the rest of this entry »

The highest-attended play in American Stage history.

There’s a lot being made about the state of professional theater in America these days.  You see theater closings almost daily, arts organization bailout packages are a hot topic, calls are being made for President Obama to create a Secretary of the Arts, layoffs are ubiquitous and now even the Kennedy Center is pitching in to provide support for arts organizations that may not make it another year.

Our industry is by no means recession-proof, and one that appears to be in as much trouble as the rest of the country. Yet, somehow, most of the professional theaters in the Tampa Bay area seem to be amidst their best seasons. Read the rest of this entry »

Super Bowl Weekend at Jackson’s Bistro: “Leather and Laces”
Carmen Electra, Jenny McCarthy and Kim Kardashian (left to right in the photo) co-host this Super Bowl kickoff bash at Jackson’s Bistro, Harbour Island’s high-end pickup joint. There’ll be live entertainment by Cirque USA performers and spins by celebrity DJ Tendaji Lathan, with proceeds to benefit Generation Rescue, an autism research and treatment advocacy organization headed by McCarthy. Admission is $275 general/$550 VIP (includes passed sushi and hors d’oeuvres). And since it’s for charity, you can write it off.
601 S. Harbour Island Blvd., Tampa, Fri., Jan. 30, 9 p.m.-3 a.m., 813-265-1234, leatherandlaces.com.

Pepsi Música Super Bowl Fiesta The second of two Pepsi-hosted concerts at Ford Amphitheatre (last night’s rain-soaked Rihanna bash was the first), the Friday Fiesta features Enrique Iglesias and Belanova. The concert will be taped to air on Telemundo Sat., Jan. 31. Jan. 30, 7:30 p.m. Ford Amphitheatre, 4802 U.S. 301 N., Tampa, $20- $45 per concert, nfl.com/pepsismash.

Lights On Tampa 2009: This weekend’s your last chance to check out the installations in Tampa’s  illuminating public art display.

King Hedley II and Picasso at the Lapin Agile: Two good reasons to get out and see a show tonight, the former at American Stage and the latter at Jobsite Theater. The acting in both productions won raves from CL theater critic Mark E. Leib. Check out our ArtsSpeak interview with Hedley star Postell Pringle, aka Playboy X.

Tim Dorsey: Safeguarding our region’s reputation as a mecca for wack jobs and illicit entertainments, Tim Dorsey’s Nuclear Jellyfish brings us another installment in the hilarious adventures of everyone’s favorite serial killer, Serge A. Storms, and his stoner pal Coleman. Dorsey reads from his new novel twice today, first at Haslam’s Book Store in St. Pete at 4 p.m., then at Skipper’s in Tampa at 7:30.

[Editor's Note: Ami Sallee Corley is an actor, a teacher and now a blogger for CL. (That's Ami in the photo with Drew DeCaro, Bechir Sylvain and Petrus
Antonius, fellow members of the cast of Gorilla Theatre's recent Six Degrees of Separation.) I'm pleased to have her join the conversation, which she begins with a particularly cogent question for area artists.]

In a city where an artist’s choice is to   survive on crumbs or leave, why would anyone want to stay and starve as an artist in Tampa?

I believe there are some pretty fantastic reasons out there.

If we are to build a thriving, sustainable arts and culture scene here in Tampa, we should at first focus on what makes it tempting to stay.  Here goes. Read the rest of this entry »

As discussed earlier on the Daily Loaf, St. Petersburg Times performing arts critic John Fleming recently questioned Creative Loafing theater critic Mark E. Leib about a possible conflict of interest in Leib’s relationship with two theaters. Now Fleming has published his criticisms in the Times.

Here’s the situation:  Gorilla Theatre recently hosted a staged reading of Leib’s new play, A River in the Desert, and this spring the Studio@620 will stage Leib’s Art People. Fleming, backed up by the ethics chair of the American Theatre Critics Association (Lawrence Bommer, a Chicago critic/playwright who has written reviews for CL sister paper the Chicago Reader), points out that because Leib reviews plays at both Gorilla and 620, having his own plays produced at these venues gives the appearance of a conflict of interest.

There are valid questions to be asked here, and Mark answered them on the Daily Loaf, generating a debate in the comments section between past and present CL staffers. But the Times article tries to pump up the controversy further with a question I find bogus: Read the rest of this entry »

Jobsite Theater officially turned 10 years old last month, which we celebrated with Jobsite’s Rockin’ 10^th Birthday Party at New World Brewery.

The anniversary got me thinking.

At the very beginning, this company was an experiment I was willing to go along with for a year. Considering my initial move back to Tampa was supposed to be to get my head straight after too many years of continuous schooling, it didn’t seem such a heavy commitment. The end of that year saw Jobsite having its greatest success to date in our original mounting of The History of the Devil, it saw the door fly wide open for us to work regularly at TBPAC, donors and sponsors started falling into place and on a personal front I’d begun a relationship with a pretty cool chick who actually put up with me and wasn’t batshit crazy.

It’s been year to year since. How are we doing? Still moving forward? Am I settling? The end of the year analysis has always pointed to things being in good, if not always magically fantastic, shape.

I still consider myself lucky to be here at all, a blue-collar kid from Jacksonville whose cultural upbringing consisted of funny car races, fish fries and turkey shoots. Honored that this thing has become something durable, dependable and necessary. Blessed to have so many people on both sides of the curtain who care enough to give, collaborate and make time to spend with us.

So – what have I learned in 10 years? Let me see if I can make a list. 10 for 10.

Read the rest of this entry »

For its 16th Anniversary Bash, Skatepark of Tampa welcomes the latest band from Brooklyn to generate a buzz, Les Savy Fav (pictured below); also on the bill are No Age and How Dare You. For more info, see Upcoming Concerts. Sat., Dec. 6, 9 p.m., Czar, Ybor City, $10.

Another area institution, Jobsite Theater, also celebrates an anniversary this weekend with its annual fundraiser-cum-wrap party. Jobsite’s Rockin’ 10th Birthday Party features the Jobby Awards, sets of music by Bay area bands Nessie, Poetry n’ Lotion, and The Vodkanauts, and raffle drawings throughout the night. Sat., Dec. 6, 8 p.m., New World Brewery, Ybor City, $10.

Event number three in Ybor City this Saturday night is Virgin 2.0, a Square One Creative multi-disciplinary fundraiser for the National Breast Cancer Foundation. Guests enjoy live music, dance performances, a fashion show, an exhibit of works featuring 85 or so artists and food. Sat., Dec. 6, 7 p.m.-midnight, The Ritz Ybor, free admission. Read the rest of this entry »

A subscription to a local theater is a great gift for the stagestruck, not to mention a superb way to ensure the stability of Tampa Bay’s often cash-strapped companies. But why give a subscription when the season’s half over? Good question, but many local  troupes have an answer: the flexible pass, which allows subscribers to apply ticket money to specific shows rather than requiring a full-season purchase. That means if you like what’s on tap in coming months, a subscription will still get you your money’s worth. American Stage, Gorilla Theatre and Stageworks are among the companies that offer such an arrangement, and Jobsite Theater is currently selling remainder-of-season subscriptions at a substantial discount.

Gift this: At American Stage, the six-ticket Flex Pass could be applied any number of ways. You could go seasonal and buy six tickets to A Tuna Christmas. Or you could wait till spring and buy two tickets apiece to August Wilson’s King Hedley II, Aristophanes’ Lysistrata and the musical Altar Boyz performed outdoors at Demens Landing. Or buy three tickets to Tuna, two tickets to II and one ticket for either Lysistrata or the Boyz. The permutations are endless and entirely up to you  (or the lucky person you give the pass to). One caveat: You can’t apply the Flex Pass to AmStage After Hours shows like the current Santaland Diaries (above left); those are “pay as you can” shows, so the pass wouldn’t give you much of a bargain. But consider this: Since Santaland is just about the funniest thing ever written by man (or at least by David Sedaris, and that’s saying something), you should consider throwing in some advance tickets to the show along with the pass. Flex Pass, $129 for six tickets; NextWave Pass, six tickets for those 30 years old or younger, $92. americanstage.org/seasonpass.php, 727-823-PLAY.

Photo of Brian Shea in The Santaland Diaries courtesy American Stage.

For more ideas from our Indie Holiday Shopping Spree, click here.

Tampa’s Jobsite Theater has just announced a new Monday night play-reading series that may lead to at least one mainstage production each year. According to Jobsite artistic director David Jenkins, ensemble member Lori Shannon expressed an interest in running such a series – and he handed her about 40 scripts that he’d received from all over the U.S. (he gets about 400 scripts a year). Shannon read through the collection and chose four promising plays: The Ballad of Johnny 5 Star by David Hauptschein and David Vlcek (reading Nov. 10), Two Gentlemen of Corona by Jim Geoghan (reading Jan. 19, 2009), Magenta Sunsets and Brown Silk by P.J. Gibson (reading Feb. 23), and Hugging the Shoulder by Jerrod Bogard (reading April 6). Jenkins says that the authors may not necessarily attend the readings – there’s no money available to pay their way – but Hauptschen and Vlcek have said they’ll come to Tampa from Chicago anyway. In any case, the majority of the Jobsite board of directors will be present at each reading in order to determine whether the play should move on to the mainstage. Admission for the public will be $5 (free to season ticket holders). Readings are at 7:30 p.m.

Congratulations to Jobsite as it takes one further step toward becoming an important regional theater power.

Meanwhile…Gorilla Theatre has announced which shows it’ll have to cancel or postpone because of the Fire Marshall’s insistence that an additional exit and a firewall be built. Bill Leavengood’s staged reading of Charley and Emma – about Charles Darwin and his wife - won’t take place till November, and the full production of Caryl Churchill’s Mad Forest – about the overthrown of communism in Romania – is being cancelled. So Gorilla’s next full show will be John Guare’s fine play Six Degrees of Separation, opening Dec. 4. It’s not too early to buy tickets, though: call 813-879-2914.