This August, five groups of Teen Reviewers and Critics (TRaC) ventured out into New York City to take in some culture. After attending a Thursday performance, everyone wrote reviews, then reconvened the following Tuesday for a discussion and workshop. Our work is published here in the second of a five part series featuring writing from the Summer TRaC!
Summer TRaC Session 2 attended Judith Shakespeare Company’s reverse-gender production of The Two Gentlemen of Verona. Check out the excerpts and full reviews below….
“One could be happy to say that the comfortable and exaggerated acting enabled those who quiver at the name of Shakespeare, to still understand what was going on.” – Nylejah Lawson
Read NYLEJAH’s full review.
“In [the] black box theater, [...] a woman comes out to put her costume skirt on, but then decides to put on pants and a tie. Little by little the whole cast comes on stage, and the men put on skirts and corsets, and the women dress in male attire.” – Katherine Brannan-Williams
Read KAT’s full review.
“Adding to the satire is the cast’s dramatic, intense line delivery and comedic use of pop culture allusions (most notably, the Fresh Prince of Bel-Air handshake). The unique versatility of the performance is both its merit and its downfall.” - Sharon Mizrahi
Read SHARON’s full review.
“What I inexplicably enjoyed most was the men’s interpretation of women, in love. Alvin Chan’s portrayal of a lovelorn Julia inspired some of the most memorable performances in the show. Equally as comical a performance was that of Hunter Gilmore as a gentle and seemingly fragile Sylvia.” - Carol Szwei
Read CAROL’s full review.
“Though Shakespeare’s jokes may now be archaic, when a man wearing a corset delivers them, it’s hard not to laugh. But the actors don’t need their outlandish costumes to be entertaining […] Yet, at times, these attempts to honor the themes of the play are undermined when routine comedic outbursts overshadow graver events such as rape and betrayal.” – Kirsten Rischert
Read KIRSTEN’s full review.
“Overall this play was a good play. I would definitely recommend seeing this play.” – Eddie Lawson
Read EDDIE’s full review.
Tagged as:
Judith Shakespeare Company,
The Barrow Group Theatre,
Two Gentlemen of Verona,
William Shakespeare
This August, five groups of Teen Reviewers and Critics (TRaC) ventured out into New York City to take in some culture. After attending a Thursday performance, everyone wrote reviews, then reconvened the following Tuesday for a discussion and workshop. Our work is published here in the first of a five part series featuring writing from the Summer TRaC!
Summer TRaC Session 1 visited an exhibition at the Whitney Museum of Art featuring turntable pioneer Christian Marclay. Check out the excerpts and full reviews below….
“Christian Marclay’s “Festival” at the Whitney Museum of Art is an experiment of the ‘fusion of image and sound through collage, performance, installation, photography, sculpture, and video.’ In other terms, it is a smorgasbord of all things musical.” – Elizabeth Sherwood
Read ELIZABETHS’s full review.
“Along the walls, you see a single line of words, seemingly describing what you had just heard in the show, or were about to hear. […] those sentences tied everything in the room together.” – Kayla Somar
Read KAYLA’s full review.
“Viewers are encouraged to write something on the massive chalkboard that is covered in staff lines […] I learned that ‘Teresa ♥’s Julian,’ ‘Emma wuz here,’ […], and what was perhaps my favorite: a regretful sentiment somebody wrote about how they wish that they had taken piano lessons.” – Jane Handorff
Read JANE’s full review.
“Interactive art is what this is, most museums won’t let any one touch a thing but yet now we can draw on the wall.” – Kayla Vialva
Read KAYLA’s full review.
“[…] intriguing in theory, the piece is just an unsettling battle of wills […] On guitar, Mary Halverson strums random, disconnected chords after another, contending with Ikue Mori’s drum machine-style clips of shattering glass.” – Sharon Mizrahi
Read SHARON’s full review.
“At some points the speakers oozed out the sound of soothing rain, another reminder of the weather the sheet music was exposed to. Accompanying the speakers was a guitar occasionally playing familiar tunes or chords and at other times seemingly haphazard notes.” – Kirsten Rischert
Read KIRSTEN’s full review.
“The dissonant tunes and complexed rhythms of this performance bring the most skilled listeners back to some other performances, such as Georges Asperghis’s latest production: Les Boulingrins.” – Victoire Bourhis
Read VICTOIRE’s full review.
“[…] certain combinations of sound and rhythm have the power to evoke such extreme responses in people. Music is at once less and more than physical. It is nourishing, like food, and yet invisible, like gas. Is music a fart?” – Phoebe Nir
Read PHOEBE’s full review.
“[…] sounds may include high shrills, popcorn sizzling, cork popping, water dripping, sawing, glass breaking, and everyday sounds of annoyance.” – Chui Yu Lau
Read CHUI YU’s full review.
Tagged as:
Christian Marclay,
Summer TRaC,
Teen Reviewers and Critics,
Whitney Museum of American Art
As I stepped up to the Lincoln Center Fountain for the International Body Music Festival, the first signs of performance art I witnessed were similar to what you may see in the streets of China town in New York or San Francisco. A group of five danced around with a big lion, clanging cymbals, and waving bright orange pieces of fabric. This “Lion Dance” wasn’t anything new or original; nothing I hadn’t seen before. The group moved from near the fountain over to the outdoor stage where we were to set our attention for the main attraction.
For the first approximately 17 minutes of the concert itself, two women, seemingly very close (turns out they were cousins), stood in the middle of the stage, holding each other, and sharing one microphone. They were “throat singing”, which they described to us (the audience) as “competing with their voices.” They completed six sets of their throat singing, which was a little too much. More interesting than the performance itself was observing the reactions of the people watching it. [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Barbatuques,
Celina Kalluk,
Derique McGee,
International Body Music Festival,
Keith Terry,
Lincoln Center Out of Doors,
Lucie Idlout,
SLAMMIN All-Body Band
A universal language that we all speak is music, and we can use our bodies in many different ways to create it. After nearly three hours at the International Body Music Festival Concert, presented as a part of Lincoln Center Out of Doors, all of the performers deliver a mind-blowing, collaborative encore which feels like it will last through the night. Although by this point most of the audience members have already dispersed, the performers aren’t frazzled. In fact, they make a rather admirable choice and raise their energy even more.
I knew that I was in for something special when the festival started off on a high note in Josie Robertson Plaza with the Lion Dance. I was immediately overcome with a flow of color and sound when these performers claimed their twenty minutes of fame. [click to continue…]
Tagged as:
Barbatuques,
Celina Kalluk,
Derique McGee,
International Body Music Festival,
Keith Terry,
Lincoln Center Out of Doors,
Lucie Idlout,
SLAMMIN All-Body Band
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