There was plenty of ballyhoo for 2002-03 when the fall arts season opened. Big anniversaries for Theatre Charlotte and the Blumenthal Performing Arts Center. Notable premieres from Opera Carolina and the North Carolina Dance Theatre. New regimes at Charlotte Rep and Children’s Theatre. The new Charlotte Shout pseudo festival showered us with hype, cunningly packaging the opening month of Charlotte’s arts season and bringing us the mighty International Origami Festival.
Above all else, looming in the lordly distance, there was the month-long engagement of The Lion King capping off the PAC’s 10th anniversary. It was a season to herald with a trumpet fanfare.
Well, instead of one loud trumpet, grab a handful of piccolos… 2003-04 is about to begin! Local performing arts companies are tossing away the big ceremonies, dealing with lower budgets and slightly reduced production counts. But pssst! the number of companies is growing, expanding the scene.
After last season’s double dose of Disney, amusement park lovers will find it hard to go cold turkey for an entire Broadway Lights Series. No animals or cartoons at all! But there are a couple of truly fine musicals in the lineup, including Thoroughly Modern Millie (opening September 23), and one of the best touring machines of recent years returns, Miss Saigon (November 18). Subscribers may not be excited by Starlight Express (October 21) or next year’s Oliver! (January 13), but I’ll take them over last year’s Lord of the Dance and Seussical. Gladly.
Tired of rollerblades and disco? Truly hip readers will be thinking outside the boxed subscription and opting for Russell Simmons’ Def Poetry Jam (October 14) instead.
We had hoped that Charlotte Shout would mature beyond its booster club beginnings into a genuine arts festival. But an artistic director for the month-long event is still on back order. Aspirations to rival Spoleto Festival USA have vanished along with worthy performing arts events that are strictly Shout. With prestigious Johnson & Wales University a year closer to opening its Charlotte campus, the Shout theme for its Culinary Arts Experience has devolved into Blues, Brews & BBQ. Last year’s CityVerve Jazz Heritage Festival has been scrapped in favor of a logo with a pig blowing a trumpet.
So the feisty Shout of 2002 has become little more than a hog call or a yawn in its own right. Sigh. Even the lovably obnoxious shower of press releases gushing from Charlotte Center City Partners has diminished to a trickle.
Still, we hoped last year that the birth of Charlotte Shout, though little more than a container for events already scheduled by local arts organizations, would become a catalyst that would encourage our companies to open their seasons with a bang. It makes wonderful sense to put your best foot forward at the start of the season, so that locals and out-of-towners will feel the impulse to climb aboard for the whole ride.
Gathering under Charlotte Shout’s omnivorous umbrella, arts organizations around town do seem more determined to make sensational first impressions in the fall. Besides Millie and OperaBabes at Belk Theater, there’s a bumper crop of boffo beginnings all around town. That’s the good news.
Big Dog
Curbs Its BarkAfter a splashy season that dominated the local arts headlines, Charlotte Rep has cut back on the glitter — and its payroll. Marquee names with Tinsel Town clout and Tony Award talent began parading onto the Booth Playhouse stage a year ago. Nobody with quite the stature of Hilary Swank, Andre De Shields, Marla Schaffel or Penny Fuller is slated to emerge from the Green Room this fall. Nor are meaty modern classics the likes of Glass Menagerie and M. Butterfly on the menu.Affable managing director Matt Olin greets you on the welcome page of Rep’s 2003-04 brochure alongside producing artistic director Michael Bush. But Olin and dynamo director of development Anne Lambert were out the door two weeks ago and instantly replaced. There was some fanfare when Olin was lured to the Rep from Broadway’s renowned Dodger Theatricals production company. His replacement, Deborah Fitts, came to Rep in 1986 as a volunteer — from Acme Foods in Baltimore. That’s showbiz.
But no theater has captured the BBQ spirit of Charlotte Shout better than Charlotte Rep. They’re opening their new season with the official 20th anniversary production of Pump Boys and Dinettes (September 6), featuring the musical’s original Broadway star and co-creator Jim Wann. For those who fondly recall Suzzanne Douglas from The Parent “Hood series on TV, Rep’s production of Jar the Floor (October 18) will pump out an additional stargazing experience. Plus, there’s our annual ration of A Tuna Christmas (November 29).
Theatre Charlotte gave subscribers something to shout about when they launched their 2002-03 season, ferrying in CP Summer Theatre talent for their production of Show Boat. They’re sticking with that award-winning game plan this season, bringing in Billy Ensley to direct Evita (September 11). They’re laying off the Bard this year, perhaps loaning him to the Rep, and sticking with brand name fare, most of which has been market-tested at CP in recent years: Witness Blithe Spirit (October 30), which is cagily programmed to coincide with Halloween.
While TC is looking to refresh old CP discards, Children’s Theatre will be recycling its own repertoire for half of its upcoming mainstage lineup. The Morehead Street fantasy palace still hasn’t caught Shout fever, leading off again with a modest Tarradiddle production. But The Commedia Cinderella (September 12) is top-drawer T-diddle, and all the newbies in the lineup look intriguing, including this fall’s Bridge to Terabithia (October 10).
After visiting the vaunted Children’s Theatre Company of Minneapolis, winners of the coveted regional Tony Award, I’ll add one informed observation: Children’s Theatre of Charlotte is as good as anybody at what it does — perhaps better.
Actor’s Theatre of Charlotte is offering one of their most appealing lineups ever, but don’t expect their return to Duke Power Theatre anytime soon. Or anywhere else they’ve performed before. Like other companies on the scene, Actor’s is staking out a place of its own and nesting, refurbishing the old Reliable Music Building on Stonewall Street and opening just in time for a holiday run of The Santaland Diaries (December 4). Directed by Dennis Delamar and starring Billy Ensley, the David Sedaris memoir should be a Yuletide natural with an ATC attitude.
You don’t have to wait until next summer to enjoy solid fare at CPCC. The Theatre Department has had good success in recent years with musical revues, so expect good things from their fall opener, Rodgers & Hammerstein’s A Grand Night for Singing (September 26).
Home Cooking
In BohemiaShopping for performing arts experiences in Charlotte, don’t ignore the fringe. More of these groups are entrenched with full seasons than ever before — usually at their own spaces. Off-Tryon Theatre Company is the senior member of the guerrilla brotherhood, out on Cullman Avenue in NoDa, and the most prolific producer of counterculture comedy and drama, often with gay themes. BareBones has been achieving the most consistent quality over the past two seasons and has established its own fringe epicenter, SPAC, on Rampart Street in SouthEnd.Meanwhile, Victory Pictures and innerVoices have formed a prolific coalition at their upfitted facility, Central Avenue Playhouse (the CAP), on Clement Avenue. With Michael Simmons building sets and designing lights, tech at the CAP is arguably the best among the fringe groups. Newest of the fringe theaters, Pat’s Playhouse is located where Central Avenue winds around 10th Street. No telling what they’ll be serving up next at Pat’s. Could be lunch if you drive by their roadhouse tomorrow noon.
Chickspeare, Actor’s Gym, and the exciting new Epic Arts Repertory all tend to drift into Off-Tryon or SPAC when their artists have a project. The Farm, after summering at Children’s Theatre, figures to wind up at the new Hart-Witzen Gallery on 36th Street.
But you never know. Chickspeare is cooking up a Reduced Romeo & Juliet (September 13) for Charlotte Shout and running it at three locations, including SPAC. Then the Chix banditas invade Boudreaux’s restaurant close to Halloween for The Witches Tale (October 30), an interactive Macbeth murder mystery.
Meanwhile, we can give you some menu picks at the other venues. From Column A at Off-Tryon, we’ll choose Quills (October 23) and Twilight of the Golds (November 13). From Column B at Central Avenue, my taste runs to The Rocky Horror Show (October 9) and The Colored Museum (November 13), as well as plenty of promising shows in 2004.
At SPAC, you’ll probably get hooked — or not — after you’ve seen the BareBones take on Steve Martin’s The Underpants (September 4) and Neil Labute’s Bash (October 2). But you also want to check out Stan Peal, the actor/playwright whose new works will be fueling the first Epic Arts season. Dip a toe into Peal with A Mad, Mad Madrigal (December 4).
Keep it dialed here to find out what’s happening — and how good it is. It’s a great scene when you find the sweet spot.
Highbrows And BabesThe opening shots fired by Charlotte’s pre-eminent orchestras during Shout month aptly illustrate their differences. Charlotte Symphony Orchestra takes instantly to the high road with elegant flutist James Galway (September 12) playing a Mozart concerto in his CSO debut. On the other hand, Charlotte Philharmonic goes directly for the jugular, bringing in the chart-topping OperaBabes (September 5) for an evening of “Ave Maria,” “Stranger in Paradise” and whatever else might goose sales of their Beyond Imagination CD in the lobby.
Less than 24 hours after the last OperaBabes CD is autographed, the Phil will be back at the Belk, greeting renowned NYPD tenor Daniel Rodriguez (September 6) in an encore performance. He was out in the lobby signing CDs till nearly 11 o’clock after last year’s Shout concert. You just can’t bad-mouth a guy who refuses to autograph an American flag.
Virtuoso percussionist Evelyn Glennie (October 10) makes a guest appearance for the Symphony while her star is on the rise, playing the Charlotte premiere of a concerto by Joseph Schwantner.
Among the mighty symphonic and vocal pieces on the CSO’s Classics Series, I’m most anticipating Maestro Christof Perick’s interpretation of Bruckner’s Seventh (October 3) near the beginning of the season.
There’s plenty more to choose from among the 32 programs Charlotte’s hardest working performing group has to offer over the entire season. CSO does a complete Pops Series before the notorious outdoor summer bashes. Particularly notable on the pops chart are the guest shots by Olivia Newton-John (October 31) and, beyond 2003, jazz diva Dianne Reeves (January 16). While David Tang is no longer presiding, the Saturday morning Lollipops Series (starting November 1) ranks right up there with a Children’s Theatre subscription as the best performing arts investment you can make for your kids.
Carolinas Concert Association is coping with the graying of its audience base by widening its horizons to attract a new generation. They’re opening their season with the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra (October 7). The Smiths are led by David Baker, one of the foremost educators in the music — and a mean valve trombonist in his own right.
Opera Carolina hit on a fine idea when they heralded the February premiere of Cold Sassy Tree by handing out complete librettos to their audiences last October. This year, OC is stretching their audience less strenuously, introducing Verdi’s first success, the biblical drama of Nabucco (October 23). To prime their audience for this mighty piece, OC gave out librettos back in April during the production of Carmen, a move calculated to ease the unfamiliar Verdi down subscribers’ digestive tracts and get them jazzed up about the new season. The front-end marketing is reinforced at the back end by casting Mark Delavan as the Babylonian king. Anyone who saw Delavan at Spoleto last year as Wagner’s Dutchman won’t need any further convincing.
Leap For JoyWith North Carolina Dance Theatre firmly established in Charlotte, we’re seeing some of the best new choreography anywhere executed by a world-class troupe. Like Children’s Theatre, they’re terribly undervalued by local residents. Worse, while CT seems to be gaining strength at the box office, NCDT houses seem to be dwindling.They’d be hard-pressed to improve their product, so NCDT appears to be working at designing more people-friendly programs. Tossed on the trash heap are the moribund Fall Trilogy, Winter Trilogy and Spring Trilogy of yesteryear. For the new season, we have Red Hot “n’ Bluegrass (September 18) for the rowdy Charlotte Shout crowds with Speedweek inclinations. And, of course, The Nutcracker (December 11), as well as newfangled stuff in Innovative Works (November 13).
Providing a funky alternative to NCDT — and scandalizing purists of all stripes — the multimedia works of Moving Poets Theatre deeply enrich Charlotte’s dance scene while establishing a Ground Zero for a cross-pollination of all the arts. Last season proved that Moving Poets can still improve on what they do.
They’ll be opening in October as the first performing arts group at Theatre 36 in the new Hart-Witzen Gallery in NoDa, presumably a bit further from the train tracks at the old H-W. Poets founder Till Schmidt-Rimpler continues with his walpurgisnacht fixation that has brought us Macbeth and Dracula in past years. This year — or rather this Halloween — he’s premiering A Devil’s Dance (October 23), based on nothing less than Goethe’s Faust.
Poets then follows upon last year’s successful 6/15, named CL‘s X-treme Performing Arts Show of the Year, with Satirical 6/15 (November 19).
This article appears in Aug 27 – Sep 2, 2003.
