Tuesday, September 29, 2009

Clown Kong's Coulrophobic Telethon



HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: PERFORMANCE ART
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Wednesday, Sept 30 9:00pm - 10:30pm
Clown Kong's Coulrophobic Telethon


For the final night blow-out of the Howl Festival's month-long run at the Bleecker St Theater, Clown Kong hosts a variety show telethon to help raise awareness of the scourge known as Coulrophobia, the fear of clowns. Special guests include actual real-live freaks, twisted performance artists, unusual musical acts, and a foul-mouthed puppet who will attempt to enter the Guiness Book of World Records!

Special Guests include: Fem Appeal,Lil Miss Lixx,The Lady Aye,sideshow sensation Eak The Geek and more. Musical Guests: South Side Slim & That Handsome Devil

Admission $10 to Benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance Tickets at http://www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79364
Cash only tickets will be available at the door one hour before showtime.

Photo credit: Culture Shock Marketing. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Culture Shock Marketing.

Monday, September 28, 2009

TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O'Hara and CLUTTER by Kristin Prevallet






HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Monday Sept 28, 8:00pm* Talk back with Lytle Shaw
Tuesday Sept 29, 8:00pm* Talk back with Anne Waldman


TRY ! TRY ! and CLUTTER:
Poets Theater – A Double Bill

Featuring: Dan Illian, Andy Kirtland, Elizabeth Ruelas
Verse Theater Manhattan
Directed and produced by Richard Ryan
Sound by Christopher North
Production design by Craig Napoliello
Associate producer Max Woertendyke

TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O’Hara
Frank O’ Hara’s lyrical vignette of love, lust and social disruption.
A man. A woman. An interloper. Frank O'Hara's lyrical vignette of love, lust, and social disruption.

CLUTTER by Kristin Prevallet
A boy. A girl. A radio. Trying to make sense out of chaos.
Kristin Prevallet's contemporary snapshot of spacial claustrophobia and mental rewiring.

Clutter by poet Kristin Prevallet is a black comedy about the Internet's malevolent influence on the minds of Ben and Lacy -- two writers with opposing creative minds. Imagining a time in the not too distant future when we can log in and communicate directly with Google muses who will provide insight into our every thought, Clutter entertains the question: can the Internet to remap our neural circuitry and reprogram our reality? As Nicholas Carr writes in his article Is Google Making Us Stupid, "When the Net absorbs a medium, that medium is re-created in the Net's image." For Ben and Lacy, resisting getting absorbed is as difficult as trying to maintain order in the apartment when Google -- or someone else -- keeps rearranging the furniture.

*Monday Sept. 28th: talk-back with O’Hara scholar and poet Lytle Shaw.
*Tuesday Sept. 29th: talk back with poet Anne Waldman

Admission $10 to Benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79140
Cash only tickets available at the door at 6:00pm until showtime.
www.versetheater.org

The poet Frank O’Hara (awarded the National Book Award for Poetry posthumously in 1972) was a key figure in the postwar New York School of poets and painters which includes poets John Ashbery and James Schuyler, and painters Larry Rivers and Jasper Johns. Enormously influential on subsequent generations of American poets, O’Hara’s poetry was at once colloquial and dreamy, embracing high modernism, camp, pop, and surrealism in their uncanny range of styles and influences. His remarkable works for the stage were often originally produced in collaboration with the legendary Living Theater, a seminal force in the downtown arts scene of the 50s and 60s, and are important early examples of performance art as a genre.

Kristin Prevallet’s most recent book is a lyric essay called I, Afterlife: Essay in Mourning Time (Essay Press, 2007). Her previous collections are Scratch Sides: Poetry, Documentation and Image-text Projects (Skanky Possum, 2006), Perturbation, My Sister (1998) and Shadow Evidence Intelligence (Factory School, 2006). She edited and introduced A Helen Adam Reader (National Poetry Foundation, 2007). Her collaboration with the musician Esfand Poumand is featured on Bowery Poetry Club Records Live! She received a 2007 New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship in poetry and she currently lives in Brooklyn. Clutter is her work for the stage. (Playwright: Clutter)

Verse Theater Manhattan (VTM) is the preeminent theater company in the English speaking world devoted exclusively to verse drama. VTM is devoted to discovering and staging the best of old and new verse drama and bringing it to the widest possible audience. VTM's mission is both practical and high-minded: as producers we coordinate and support the theatrical effort of poets, directors, and performers working to bring verse drama to the stage; as supporters of the New York cultural environment, we unite the city's diverse theatrical and literary community.
VTM is open to all styles, genres, and periods of verse drama. VTM seeks out contemporary and ancient texts, classics and translations. VTM is especially interested in encouraging and promoting the work of living poets working to bring verse to the stage.
www.versetheater.org

Anne Waldman
“She is the fastest, wittiest woman to run with the wolves in some time”- Ken Tucker,
The New York Times

Poet Anne Waldman has been an active member of the “Outrider” experimental poetry community for over 40 years as writer, sprechstimme performer, professor, editor, magpie scholar, infra-structure and cultural/political activist. She grew up on Macdougal Street in Greenwich Village where she still lives, and bi-furcated to Boulder, Colorado in 1974 when she co-founded The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics with Allen Ginsberg at Naropa University, the first Buddhist inspired school in the West, where she currently serves as Artistic Director of its celebrated Summer Writing program. Allen Ginsberg has called her his “spiritual wife”. She is the author of over 40 books of poetry including Kill or Cure, Marriage: A Sentence, Structure of the World Compared to a Bubble, and the poetic text: Outrider which includes an interview with Ernesto Cardenal, and essays on Lorine Niedecker and Charles Olson. Manatee/Humanity (Penguin Poets 2009) is Waldman’s most recent book. She has also the author of the legendary Fast Speaking Woman (City Lights, San Francisco), now translated into Italian, Czech and French, as well as the 800 page epic Iovis trilogy (Coffee House Press), forthcoming in 2011. She is editor of The Beat Book (Shambhala Publications) and co-editor of The Angel Hair Anthology (Granary Books), Civil Disobediences: Poetics and Politics in Action (Coffee House) and a comprehensive Beats at Naropa (Coffee House, 2009), with previously unpublished work by Allen Ginsberg, Gary Snyder, and William Burroughs, among others. A book translated into Chinese is forthcoming in 2010.

Waldman has worked actively for social change, and has been involved with the Rocky Flats Truth Force and was arrested in the 1970s with Daniel Ellsberg & Allen Ginsberg protesting the site of Rocky Flats which was bringing plutonium onto property 10 miles from Boulder for the manufacture of “triggers” for nuclear warheads. She has been involved with clean-up issues and also with Poets Against the War, organizing protests in New York and Washington, D.C. , and with the Poetry Is News events, co-curated with Ammiel Alcalay.She was active in the recent election cycle, along with countless young people and elders and artists. She took a vow at the Berkeley Poetry Conference in 1965 to devote her life to poetry and artistic “community”. She helped found and direct The Poetry Project at St Mark’s Church In-the-Bowery where she worked as first assistant director and then director a decade. She currently serves on the Board of the Bowery Poetry Club in New York City. She has been an editor of several small press venues over the years, including Angel Hair Magazine and Books, Full Court Press, Rocky Ledge, Erudite Fangs and Thuggery & Grace.

She has been a student of Buddhism since 1962, a culturally active feminist, and an ambassador for the oral revival of poetry, appearing on stages from Berlin to Caracas , from Mumbai to Beijing. She has been instrumental in encouraging poetry projects world-wide and has helped organize programs in Vienna and Indonesia. She has also collaborated with artists Elizabeth Murray, Richard Tuttle, Donna Dennis and Pat Steir as well as dancer Douglas Dunn, filmmaker Ed Bowes, and her son, musician/composer Ambrose Bye. Her extensive historical literary, art and tape archive resides at the Hatcher Graduate Library in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Some of her performances may be viewed on YouTube.

Some Responses to Anne Waldman’s Poetry:

“It's as if people have ceded both their destinies and their imaginations to "a hopeless gray area of defeat an despair, Anne Waldman comments in Civil Disobediences: Poetic and Politics in Action. Few other American writers have responded to that malaise with as much joy, ferocity and irrepressible charge as Anne Waldman."- Forrest Gander. The Harriet Blog, National Poetry Foundation, Chicago

“Here is a voice from the frontlines of poetry’s improvisational traditions”- Peter Gizzi

“She’s the fastest, wisest woman to run with the wolves in some time.” Ken Tucker, New York Times Book Review

“From St Marks in the early sixties, to her stewardship of Naropa, to her worldwide travels, Anne Waldman has shown herself to be one of the key players on the U.S.A. poetry scene. Her energy, her total commitment to her art, and her cultural work are a wonder to behold. Wherever it happened, Anne was there.” - Marjorie Perloff

All 3 below from an essay by Ravi Shankar, in the Quarterly Conversation 2008:

“The apocryphal rumor that she started – started- the phenomenon of Poetry Slams when she and Ted Berrigan donned shiny trunks and boxing gloves to verbally pummel each other with uppercuts of verbs and roundhouses of metaphor.. Her prodigious proliferation: publishing a book of poems a year, not to mention translations, edited anthologies, sound recordings, cameo appearances in Bob Dylan’s film Renaldo and Clara, performances with Allen Ginsberg, Meredith Monk in the documentary Cooked Diamonds, fried Shoes, collaborations with artists Richard Tuttle and Elizabeth Murray, with musicians Steven Taylor and Steve Lacy, the co-founding with Allen Ginsberg of the Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University, the first Buddhist-inspired educational institution in America, two-time winner of the International championship Poetry Bout in Taos, New Mexico, recipient of many of the country’s major grants and literary awards, onwards…
***
“Waldman is a transpersonalist and Maximalist. [Her] choice of deity is Kali, Hindu goddess of time and ferocity, meat and skulls, remover of the advidya (the ignorance that makes us fear death), a creative and destructive force that wears a girdle of severed arms, a bracelet of cobras, corpse-earrings, and a mouth darkened with blood…Waldman is a Flame.”

“Anne Waldman’s work is the antithesis of stasis. Orality is crucial to her. She is a force of nature. Needed to be in order to hold her own in the male-dominated world of the Beats. And her work is an specially potent example of Helen Cixious’s idea of ecriture feminine, female writing that overcomes the limits of Western logocentrism and male patriarchy, or in Waldman’s own words, “body poetics and politics, right now.” Her erudito, which she wears like a mantle, is deeply eclectic and one feels that all of the turbulent waves of the late 2oth century have washed over her From Olson to Oulipo, from Sappho to Diane di Prima, from apperceptions of genocide to sexual empowerment that enclose menstruation. Waldman’s a sponge who has soaked up art and drips what she’s absorbed into splotches of color. She also leans Eastward, using Buddhist concepts and Sanskrit words in a way that doesn’t feel like dilettantism or mere shrubbery in her poems, but something meditated upon over a course of years, studied and given breath to breathe.”- Ravi Shankar, the Quarterly Conversation
Of IOVIS:

Iovis is a monumental improvisation, epic length, major work by a major poet, Anne Waldman" - Allen Ginsberg

“A marvelous mytho-poetic collage of self-and-other, male an female, in demonstration of a female universe ("open system") packed with seed. The Goddess considers the role and power of Jove in detail, in cosmic gossip and multiple language. Anne Waldman’s vast poem is a net of language and spirit that opens out the possibilities of writing and our enactment of
Archetypes in one long breath” – Gary Snyder

“Waldman’s chapters are fuid and ever-changing-like life. Hers is a pedagogic poetic that teaches as much as it complicates, enlightens as much as it mystifies, is filled with stories and myths, personal reflections and homages. Because the poem moves through time, contained among clusters of practical information are also elegies for the deaths of loved ones, ritual practices, erotic wishes… Waldman is carrying on the 20th century epic tradition…” Poetry Project Newsletter

Of Vow to Poetry
“Waldman’s utopianism a good antidote to current militarism. Vow to Poetry is an enticement to vocalize, to make ideological interventions with language. Deluged as we are by agenda-hiding, mendacious rhetoric of profiteering, I is good time to read Waldman. She has spent a lifetime artfully hexing and arguing against violent territoriality. The utopian imagination is embodied in this stellar poet whose heart has an interstellar wingspan.” The Sunday (Boulder Daily) Camera, Boulder, Co.

Of Structure of the World Compared to a Bubble:

“Waldman accomplishes an open alliance between the bodhisattva path and her radical poetic and artistic determination. In this marvelous volume, Waldman makes a vow to poetry. [The poem] upholds the complexity of being human in the entire bubble-shaped world that it confronts..Waldman leaves her readers with a sense of provisional hope, conditioned by our participation in making the possible world possible.”-The Poetry Project Newsletter
Ambrose Bye, musician (keyboard, guitar, voice) and composer, son of poets Anne Waldman and Reed Bye, grew up in the environment of The Jack Kerouac School of Disembodied Poetics at Naropa University, counting Allen Ginsberg and William Burroughs as “poetic” godfathers. He graduated from The University of California, Santa Cruz and is has studied at the music /production program at the Pyramind Institute in San Francisco. He has studied and played Gamelan in Bali and in Santa Cruz. He has performed on stage with Anne Waldman, and Bob Holman in New York’s Issue Project Room in a program that included Steve Buscemi reading from the work of William Burroughs. He accompanied Anne Waldman at The Boulder Theatre’s “Music and Poetry for Progressives” headlined by Thurston Moors of Sonic Youth, and Jello Biafra. His previous composing/ production credits include “In The Room of Never Grieve”, and “The Eye of the Falcon” with poetry by Anne Waldman. Recent shows with poets at the Meridian Gallery, San Francisco, the Manatee/Humanity Show, and at The Poetry Project in NYC. He is working on new project which includes the poet Amiri Baraka.
His Matching Half CD, produced by Farfalla, McMillan & Parrish with Akilah Oliver & Anne Waldman was released in 2009.

Photo credit: Kristin Prevallet courtesy the artist. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Kristin Prevallet.

Photo credit: Anne Waldman by Greg Fuchs. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Greg Fuchs.

Photo credit: Elizabeth Ruelas as Violet in a scene from TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O’ Hara.
Photo by Nathaniel Siegel. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Nathaniel Siegel.

Photo credit: Elizabeth Ruelas and Dan Illian in a scene from TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O’ Hara. Photo by Nathaniel Siegel. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Nathaniel Siegel.

Photo credit: Clutter by Kristin Prevallet poster design.
Used with permission. All rights reserved.
Copyright Kristin Prevallet.

Friday, September 25, 2009

The Common Swallow by David Caudle




HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Friday Sept 25, 8:00pm
Saturday Sept 26, 8:00pm
Sunday Sept 27, 3:00pm and 8:00pm


The Common Swallow by David Caudle
Directed by Kirsten Kelly
Starring: Annie Golden, Julie Jesneck, Doug Rees, Elizabeth Rich and MacLeod Andrews
At a summer food festival, modern Midwesterners grapple with unraveling ties
To home, family and their envirornment. Developed in the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group at Primary Stages.
Admission: $15 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/78930
Cash only tickets available at the door starting at 6:00pm and 1:00pm (2 hours before showtime) respectively until showtime.

A midwestern town's annual food fair is in full swing. Locals converge along the banks of the muddy river to sample pulled pork, baked beans, and corn. Nineteen-year-old runaway Jim comes for the meth. New Yorker Karen, on a rare return to her roots, picks at her barbecued chicken, potato salad, and a very old wound. Her townie brother Tripp sharpens his teeth on some juicy ribs and a simmering sibling rivalry. All any of them really craves is a good helping of love and acceptance, and even just a taste of "welcome home."

“The Common Swallow,” was developed in the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group at Primary Stages. David Caudle is also author of the acclaimed, award winning play, “The Sunken Living Room.”
Directed by Kirsten Kelly. Starring Annie Golden, Elizabeth Rich, Julie Jesneck, and MacLeod Andrews

“Caudle’s writing is full of humor, compassion, keen observation”
Christine Dolen, Miami Herald

“Caudle’s plays...often suprise with their mystifying aura, their dramatic punch.” Tom Kertes, Village Voice

Elizabeth Rich (Karen) is an award-winning actress and recent transplant from Chicago, where she performed at Steppenwolf in The Pillowman (Mother; dir. Amy Morton); Cherry Orchard (Varya; dir. Tina Landau) and A Tale of Two Cities (Mme. De Farge; dir. Jessica Thebus). She also performed at the Goodman as Kristine Linde in Doll's House (dir. Robert Falls), and Theatre J as Hannah in Hannah and Martin (dir. Jeremy Cohen), to name a few. Ms. Rich is the recipient of a 2006 Helen Hayes Nomination, 2005 Jeff Award and 2004 After Dark Award. Regional: The Alley Theatre, The Scene (dir. Jeremy Cohen); Florida Stage, Cradle of Man (dir. Michael John Garces). In New York, she has received a Talkin Broadway citation for Best Actress and a MITF Best Featured Actress nomination for her work in Non Play; shadows of a dream at the Horace Mann Theatre (dir. Mikhael Tara Garver), and Couldn't Say at the Abingdon (dir. Lisa Rothe.)

MacLeod Andrews (Jim) recently performed as Jake in Slipping at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater. Off-Broadway: Too Much Memory (NYTW Jonathan Larson Lab/Rising Phoenix Rep/Piece by Piece); The NY premiere of Somewhere in the Pacific by Neal Bell, No End of Blame, and Hang Up (Atlantic Stage 2/Potomac Theater Project). New York: Nobody by Crystal Skillman (RPR). MacLeod is a company member of Rising Phoenix Rep. He has recorded a number of audio books and is a 2008 graduate of Middlebury College. Come visit him at www.MacLeodAndrews.blogspot.com

David Caudle (Playwright) wrote THE SUNKEN LIVING ROOM (Samuel French), VISITING HOURS, THE SECOND HOUSE, DAMSEL and others. IN DEVELOPMENT opens in October at Miami’s New Theatre, directed by Ricky J.Martinez. David is a member of the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group at Primary Stages and has been developed in the New Harmony Project, Downstage Miami and the Sewanee Writers Conference.

Matt D'Amico (Tripp) Regional credits include: The House of Gold, Italian Sojourn and The Ballad of Emmett Till (O'Neill Playwright's Conference); Othello, Cymbeline, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Three Musketeers, and Romeo and Juliet (Alabama Shakespeare Festival); Saint Joan (Repertory Theatre of St. Louis); Hamlet, Life is a Dream and Caucasian Chalk Circle (South Coast Repertory); Inherit the Wind and Death of a Salesman (Geva Theatre); Camille (Bard Summerscape); Richard II (Shakespeare Theatre of NJ); As You Like It (Indiana Rep); Sweet Mercy (NY Stage and Film); Dive, Thief of Man, and Zealot (Guthrie Theater); Othello, Dracula, and Acorn (Actors Theatre of Louisville); Twelfth Night and The Tempest (Colorado Shakespeare). Other credits: Fizz (The Ohio Theatre); The Duchess of Malfi and Hamlet (Kings County Shakespeare). TV: Law and Order. He is a graduate of The Juilliard School. For Sarah and Addy.

Annie Golden (Corinthia/Melinda) was discovered by Academy Award- winning film director Milos Forman while fronting her rock band THE SHIRTS at CBGB's and was cast as Jeannie in his movie of the tribal love rock musical HAIR in 1978 and she hasn't stopped working as an actress on Broadway and off originating roles for Stephen Sondheim, Terrence McNally, Jerry Zaks, Richard Foreman and others while continuing to record and tour Europe as a singer songwriter. Annie can be seen on the silver screen (TWELVE MONKEYS, BABY BOOM, PEBBLE AND THE PENGUIN, ) and opposite Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor in I LOVE YOU, PHILIP MORRIS due out February, 2010...performing Annie Golden's VELVET PRISON at Joe's Pub and Ars Nova...born and bred in Brooklyn growing up on the Bowery making a living on Broadway Annie never forgets her downtown roots!

Julie Jesneck (Abra/Red) Broadway: Rock 'N Roll. Off-Broadway: Walls, Cherry Lane; Green Girl and The Nightshade Family, SPF; Romania. Kiss Me!, The Play Co.; Mr. Marmalade (u/s), Roundabout; Abu Ghraib Triptych, EST; Mistral, Drama League. Regional: A Thousand Clowns, Intiman Theatre; The Trip to Bountiful, The Denver Center (Henry Award); Thinking Of You, Alabama Shakespeare Festival; Othello and A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Old Globe; The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Alliance/The Acting Co. Tour; The Ruby Sunrise, Trinity Rep and Actor's Theatre of Louisville (Humana); Mary's Wedding, San Jose Rep. Television: "Law & Order" and "Empire Falls" (HBO). Juilliard graduate.

Kirsten Kelly (Director) is a film and theatre director from New York. Recent directing credits include: Slipping by Daniel Talbott (Piece by Piece Productions, Rising Phoenix Rep, Rattlestick) Crash! (an ensemble created piece based on the Great Depression and the current economic crisis with Roots&Branches Theatre Company) ART (Two River Theatre Co); The Government Inspector (Calvin College Guest Director); 365-Week 47 (Rising Phoenix Rep/Public Theatre); Co-creator of the “CPS! Shakespeare” program at Chicago Shakespeare Theater where she directed productions of Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet and Hamlet; the Washington D.C. premiere of “Boy Gets Girl” by Rebecca Gillman for Theatre Alliance (Helen Hayes Nomination, Best Direction); the Midwest/Chicago premiere of Mamet’s “Boston Marriage” (After Dark Award, Best Director), and Sam Shepherd’s “Savage Love/Tongues” with the Juilliard Percussion Ensemble at Lincoln Center. Film credits include: “Front of House” (Web Pilot Series for Strike TV); Tokyo/Vermont Counterpoint” short film (Beyond The Machine concert, Lincoln Center); “Asparagus! (Stalking the American Life)” (award-winning documentary on the 2006-7 film festival circuit; DVD released 2008; PBS broadcast Spring 2009); Prior to NY, Kirsten directed many Chicago productions and was the Co-Artistic Director of Strawdog Theatre there. Kirsten is a graduate of the Master’s Directing program at Juilliard where she received the Andrew W. Mellon Directing Fellowship, and is a proud member of Rising Phoenix Repertory.

Douglas Rees (Policeman/Porter): Doug is delighted and honored to e making his HOWL debut, and always delighted to be working with David Caudle. Doug has appeared at many theatres regionally, and most recently appeared in New York in the acclaimed NYC premiere of Michael Hollinger's OPUS, at Primary Stages. Some favorite past roles include Lennie in OF MICE AND MEN, Henry Carr in Tom Stoppard's TRAVESTIES, Pato in Martin McDonough's BEAUTY QUEEN OF LEENANE, and Atticus Finch in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD.

Production Photo Credit:
(Top to bottom: MacLeod Andrews and Annie Golden, Matt D'Amico and Julie Jesneck, Matt D' Amico and Elizabeth Rich; in The Common Swallow by David Caudle. All Photos by donje photography. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright donje photography and David Caudle.)

Thursday, September 24, 2009

Nanette Natal and Company


HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: MUSIC
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry Street)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Saturday Sept 26, 11pm

JAZZ: JUST BEFORE MIDNIGHT
Nanette Natal and Company

Nanette Natal performs in the grand tradition of Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan. Her latest CD ‘I Must Be Dreaming’ is a 2008 Village Voice Jazz Consumer Guide listing.
Admission $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79374
Cash only tickets available at the door at 9pm to showtime.

Nanette Natal’ s music has always defied categories. One of the most interesting and exciting singers working in jazz today, she is a consummate artist in the grand tradition of Ella Fitzgerald and Sarah Vaughan and has delivered her socially conscious rhythmic blues/ rock message alongside Mahalia Jackson and Odetta. Rooted in jazz, blues, gospel, and New Orleans style, her latest CD "I Must Be Dreaming" is a 2008 Village Voice Jazz Consumer Guide listing. She has garnered consistent raves throughout the U.S. and Europe including: "Ms. Natal bends and twists her notes in unexpected fashions, makes startling leaps around the scales, and has the daring to expand and extend what might be a satisfactory note to open up a fresh and revealing color”(NY Times) and "...she's a hell of a singer...the extended improv marvels are the most fascinating, like an intense 'You Go to My Head' that ends up somewhere close to Coltrane's 'Equinox.' This is jazz singing at its highest level." (Cadence).
www.benyomusic.com
www.myspace.com/nanettenatal

(Photo credit: Nanette Natal courtesy the artist. Used with permission.
All rights reserved. Copyright Nanette Natal.)

Wednesday, September 23, 2009

Hayes Greenfield and Company



HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: MUSIC
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry Street)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Friday Sept 25, 11pm

JAZZ: JUST BEFORE MIDNIGHT
Hayes Greenfield and Company

Hayes Greenfield has headlined the Blue Note, Birdland, Knitting Factory and CBGB and performed with Jaki Byard, Rashied Ali, Paul Bley, Barry Altschul and Richie Havens.
Admission $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79371
Cash only tickets available at the door at 9pm to showtime.


Hayes Greenfield – producer, composer, saxophonist, filmmaker, bandleader, and educator – has been active on the New York City jazz scene since the late ‘70s. As sideman, he has built enduring associations with such notable artists as Jaki Byard, Rashied Ali, Paul Bley, Barry Altschul, and Richie Havens. As bandleader, Hayes has recorded and produced a number of critically acclaimed CDs and played throughout the U.S. and Canada, headlining in such popular New York City clubs as the Blue Note, Birdland, the Knitting Factory, and CBGB’s. European tours have taken him and his bands to Vienna, the Aalen Jazz Festival in Germany, Brighton Jazz Festival in the U.K., the Albi, Coutances, Bordeaux, Amiens, Hyeres, and Avignon Jazz Festivals in France, and the Aarhus Jazz Festival in Denmark.

(Photo credit: Hayes Greenfield and Cooper Moore courtesy the artist.
Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Hayes Greenfield.)
(Photo credit: Hayes Greenfield courtesy the artist. Used with permission.
All rights reserved. Copyright Hayes Greenfield.)

American Songbook Lisa Brailoff and Friends

HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: MUSIC
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry Street)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Thursday Sept 24, 11pm

JAZZ: JUST BEFORE MIDNIGHT
American Songbook/Lisa Brailoff and Friends

Comic, torch, storied and standard, the golden era of radio, big band, film and musical theater still delivers our greatest jazz classics.
The golden era of radio, big band, film and musical theater ushered in some of the greatest American songwriting treasures of the 20th century. Comic, torch, storied and standard, sit back and chill for a stop, shock and stroll through some of our greatest jazz classics --- big band and small ensemble.

Admission $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79370
Cash only tickets at the door starting at 9pm to showtime.

The Duke's Men ! Art Baron and Friends



HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: MUSIC
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry Street)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Wednesday Sept 23, 11pm

JAZZ: JUST BEFORE MIDNIGHT
Bone-a-fide Music
The Duke’s Men ! – Art Baron and Friends

Multi-instumentalist Art Baron has performed with every great legend from Duke Ellington, Elliot Sharpe, James Taylor, BB King, Alvin Ailey, Stevie Wonder and Cab Calloway to the Bruce Springsteen Seeger Sessions Band.
Admission $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79369
Cash only tickets available at the door starting at 9pm to showtime.

Arthur Baron is a trombonist, multi-instrumentalist and composer.
He has had a rich and varied performance career. From Duke
Ellington to Elliot Sharpe, James Taylor to BB King,and Alvin Ailey
to Annea Lockwood. Others include Stevie Wonder and Cab Calloway.
Art spent 2006 as a member of the Bruce Springsteen, Seeger Sessions Band, touring Europe and the US. With Bruce he performs on sousaphone, trombone, penny whistles & mandolin. He also guest performs with Levon Helm, of ‘The Band’ fame, at Levon’s Midnight Rambles in Woodstock, NY. Art is a composer and arranger, and has had several commissions,including Jazz at Lincoln Center, the MOBI New Music Ensemble and the New York Composers' Orchestra, and dance ensembles such as Martita Goshen’s Earthworks. Art has been deeply involved with education, doing workshop/clinics and guest appearances from pre-schoolers to universities and beyond..
Currently he leads The Duke's Men, an ensemble of Ellington alumni,
and is a mainstay with ‘Art Baron & Friends’ at The Bowery Poetry Club
in New York City.

(Photo credit: Art Baron courtesy the artist.Used with permission.
All rights reserved. Copyright Art Baron.)
(Photo credit: Art Baron courtesy the artist.Used with permission.
All rights reserved. Copyright Art Baron.)

TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O'Hara and CLUTTER by Kristin Prevallet




HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Monday Sept 28, 8:00pm* Talk back with Lytle Shaw
Tuesday Sept 29, 8:00pm* Talk back with Anne Waldman


TRY ! TRY ! and CLUTTER:
Poets Theater – A Double Bill

Featuring: Alex Bilu, Dan Illian, Elizabeth Ruelas
Verse Theater Manhattan
Directed and produced by Richard Ryan
Sound by Christopher North
Production design by Craig Napoliello
Associate producer Max Woertendyke

TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O’Hara
Frank O’ Hara’s lyrical vignette of love, lust and social disruption.
A man. A woman. An interloper. Frank O'Hara's lyrical vignette of love, lust, and social disruption.

CLUTTER by Kristin Prevallet
A boy. A girl. A radio. Trying to make sense out of chaos.
Kristin Prevallet's contemporary snapshot of spacial claustrophobia and mental rewiring.

Clutter by poet Kristin Prevallet is a black comedy about the Internet's malevolent influence on the minds of Ben and Lacy -- two writers with opposing creative minds. Imagining a time in the not too distant future when we can log in and communicate directly with Google muses who will provide insight into our every thought, Clutter entertains the question: can the Internet to remap our neural circuitry and reprogram our reality? As Nicholas Carr writes in his article Is Google Making Us Stupid, "When the Net absorbs a medium, that medium is re-created in the Net's image." For Ben and Lacy, resisting getting absorbed is as difficult as trying to maintain order in the apartment when Google -- or someone else -- keeps rearranging the furniture.

*Monday Sept. 28th: talk-back with O’Hara scholar and poet Lytle Shaw.
*Tuesday Sept. 29th: talk back with poet Anne Waldman

Admission $10 to Benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79140
Cash only tickets available at the door at 6:00pm until showtime.
www.versetheater.org

The poet Frank O’Hara (awarded the National Book Award for Poetry posthumously in 1972) was a key figure in the postwar New York School of poets and painters which includes poets John Ashbery and James Schuyler, and painters Larry Rivers and Jasper Johns. Enormously influential on subsequent generations of American poets, O’Hara’s poetry was at once colloquial and dreamy, embracing high modernism, camp, pop, and surrealism in their uncanny range of styles and influences. His remarkable works for the stage were often originally produced in collaboration with the legendary Living Theater, a seminal force in the downtown arts scene of the 50s and 60s, and are important early examples of performance art as a genre.

Kristin Prevallet’s most recent book is a lyric essay called I, Afterlife: Essay in Mourning Time (Essay Press, 2007). Her previous collections are Scratch Sides: Poetry, Documentation and Image-text Projects (Skanky Possum, 2006), Perturbation, My Sister (1998) and Shadow Evidence Intelligence (Factory School, 2006). She edited and introduced A Helen Adam Reader (National Poetry Foundation, 2007). Her collaboration with the musician Esfand Poumand is featured on Bowery Poetry Club Records Live! She received a 2007 New York Foundation for the Arts fellowship in poetry and she currently lives in Brooklyn. Clutter is her work for the stage. (Playwright: Clutter)

Verse Theater Manhattan (VTM) is the preeminent theater company in the English speaking world devoted exclusively to verse drama. VTM is devoted to discovering and staging the best of old and new verse drama and bringing it to the widest possible audience. VTM's mission is both practical and high-minded: as producers we coordinate and support the theatrical effort of poets, directors, and performers working to bring verse drama to the stage; as supporters of the New York cultural environment, we unite the city's diverse theatrical and literary community.
VTM is open to all styles, genres, and periods of verse drama. VTM seeks out contemporary and ancient texts, classics and translations. VTM is especially interested in encouraging and promoting the work of living poets working to bring verse to the stage.
www.versetheater.org

Photo credit: Elizabeth Ruelas as Violet in a scene from TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O’ Hara.
Photo by Nathaniel Siegel. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Nathaniel Siegel.

Photo credit: Elizabeth Ruelas and Dan Illian in a scene from TRY ! TRY ! by Frank O’ Hara. Photo by Nathaniel Siegel. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Nathaniel Siegel.

Photo credit: Clutter by Kristin Prevallet poster design.
Used with permission. All rights reserved.
Copyright Kristin Prevallet.

SOP DOLL ! A Jack Tale Noh by Lee Ann Brown & Tony Torn



HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Saturday Sept 26, 9:30pm
Sunday Sept 27, 8:00pm


SOP DOLL ! A Jack Tale Noh by Lee Ann Brown and Tony Torn

A spooky Appalachian tale of witches, ghosts, and shape shifting wildcats, told in the style of Japanese ritualistic Noh drama. Special guests will be on hand to perform a hair-raising spectacle! Starring Tony Torn, Lee Ann Brown, Miranda Torn, Julie Patton, and Daria Fain.

Admission: $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund.
Advance tickets at: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79139
Cash only tickets available at the door starting at 7:30pm and 6:00pm (2 hours before showtime) respectively until showtime.

Cast:
Felix Bernstein as Jack
Julie Patton as The Mill Woman
Tony Torn as The Stranger
Lee Ann Brown and Miranda Torn as The Chorus
Daria Fain as The Dancer


Tony Torn is an actor and director based in New York City and Marshall, North Carolina. He was a founding member of Reza Abdoh’s legendary theater company dar a luz, a regular presence at Richard Foreman's Ontological-Hysteric Theater and was a founding director of the celebrated political/satirical troupe Reverend Billy and The Church of Stop Shopping. He most recently appeared as Trinculo in CSC's production of The Tempest. His first feature as director Lucky Days, a directorial collaboration with Angelica Torn, was recently awarded best feature at the 2008 Coney Island Film Festival. He is founder, with his wife Lee Ann Brown, of The FBI (French Broad Institute of Time and the River).

Lee Ann Brown was born in Japan in 1963 and was raised in Charlotte, NC. She is the author of two collections of poetry, The Sleep that Changed Everything (Wesleyan University Press, 2003), and Polyverse (Sun and Moon, 1999) which received the New American Poetry Series Award ), and a song cycle, The 13th Sunday in Ordinary Time. She is editor of Tender Buttons Press, publishing experimental women’s poetry since 1989. Her poetry has been published in numerous journals including Boston Review, Jacket, The Chicago Review, Intervalles, the Interdisciplinary Transcription Issue and The Poetry Project Newsletter and in several anthologies, including Line: A Drawing Center Anthology, Best American Poetry 2001, Giant Step: African American Writing at the Crossroads of the Century, and The Garden Thrives: Twentieth Century African-American Poetry. She teaches in the English Department of St. John’s University in New York City. Poet Robin Blaser calls, her second book, The Sleep That Changed Everything “"an astonishing, wonderful book, top-of-the-line poetry…. Her ‘life long love of language’ breathes here"” and Charles Bernstein calls it "a “sprung formalist ode to the ‘open possibilities’ of song."


Artwork credit: SOP DOLL ! A Jack Tale Noh by Lee Ann Brown and Tony Torn.
Cover art courtesy the artists. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Lee Ann Brown and Tony Torn.

(Photo credit: Julie Patton in SOP DOLL! A Jack Tale Noh by
Tony Torn and Lee Ann Brown. Used with permission.
All rights reserved. Copyright Tony Torn and Lee Ann Brown.)

Tuesday, September 22, 2009

The Common Swallow by David Caudle




HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Friday Sept 25, 8:00pm
Saturday Sept 26, 8:00pm
Sunday Sept 27, 3:00pm and 8:00pm


The Common Swallow by David Caudle
Directed by Kirsten Kelly
Starring: Annie Golden, Julie Jesneck, Doug Rees, Elizabeth Rich and MacLeod Andrews
At a summer food festival, modern Midwesterners grapple with unraveling ties
To home, family and their envirornment. Developed in the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group at Primary Stages.
Admission: $15 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/78930
Cash only tickets available at the door starting at 6:00pm and 1:00pm (2 hours before showtime) respectively until showtime.

A midwestern town's annual food fair is in full swing. Locals converge along the banks of the muddy river to sample pulled pork, baked beans, and corn. Nineteen-year-old runaway Jim comes for the meth. New Yorker Karen, on a rare return to her roots, picks at her barbecued chicken, potato salad, and a very old wound. Her townie brother Tripp sharpens his teeth on some juicy ribs and a simmering sibling rivalry. All any of them really craves is a good helping of love and acceptance, and even just a taste of "welcome home."

“The Common Swallow,” was developed in the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group at Primary Stages. David Caudle is also author of the acclaimed, award winning play, “The Sunken Living Room.”
Directed by Kirsten Kelly. Starring Annie Golden, Elizabeth Rich, Julie Jesneck, and MacLeod Andrews

“Caudle’s writing is full of humor, compassion, keen observation”
Christine Dolen, Miami Herald

“Caudle’s plays...often suprise with their mystifying aura, their dramatic punch.” Tom Kertes, Village Voice

Elizabeth Rich (Karen) is an award-winning actress and recent transplant from Chicago, where she performed at Steppenwolf in The Pillowman (Mother; dir. Amy Morton); Cherry Orchard (Varya; dir. Tina Landau) and A Tale of Two Cities (Mme. De Farge; dir. Jessica Thebus). She also performed at the Goodman as Kristine Linde in Doll's House (dir. Robert Falls), and Theatre J as Hannah in Hannah and Martin (dir. Jeremy Cohen), to name a few. Ms. Rich is the recipient of a 2006 Helen Hayes Nomination, 2005 Jeff Award and 2004 After Dark Award. Regional: The Alley Theatre, The Scene (dir. Jeremy Cohen); Florida Stage, Cradle of Man (dir. Michael John Garces). In New York, she has received a Talkin Broadway citation for Best Actress and a MITF Best Featured Actress nomination for her work in Non Play; shadows of a dream at the Horace Mann Theatre (dir. Mikhael Tara Garver), and Couldn't Say at the Abingdon (dir. Lisa Rothe.)

MacLeod Andrews (Jim) recently performed as Jake in Slipping at Rattlestick Playwrights Theater. Off-Broadway: Too Much Memory (NYTW Jonathan Larson Lab/Rising Phoenix Rep/Piece by Piece); The NY premiere of Somewhere in the Pacific by Neal Bell, No End of Blame, and Hang Up (Atlantic Stage 2/Potomac Theater Project). New York: Nobody by Crystal Skillman (RPR). MacLeod is a company member of Rising Phoenix Rep. He has recorded a number of audio books and is a 2008 graduate of Middlebury College. Come visit him at www.MacLeodAndrews.blogspot.com

David Caudle (Playwright) wrote THE SUNKEN LIVING ROOM (Samuel French), VISITING HOURS, THE SECOND HOUSE, DAMSEL and others. IN DEVELOPMENT opens in October at Miami’s New Theatre, directed by Ricky J.Martinez. David is a member of the Dorothy Strelsin New American Writers Group at Primary Stages and has been developed in the New Harmony Project, Downstage Miami and the Sewanee Writers Conference.

Matt D'Amico (Tripp) Regional credits include: The House of Gold, Italian Sojourn and The Ballad of Emmett Till (O'Neill Playwright's Conference); Othello, Cymbeline, The Count of Monte Cristo, The Three Musketeers, and Romeo and Juliet (Alabama Shakespeare Festival); Saint Joan (Repertory Theatre of St. Louis); Hamlet, Life is a Dream and Caucasian Chalk Circle (South Coast Repertory); Inherit the Wind and Death of a Salesman (Geva Theatre); Camille (Bard Summerscape); Richard II (Shakespeare Theatre of NJ); As You Like It (Indiana Rep); Sweet Mercy (NY Stage and Film); Dive, Thief of Man, and Zealot (Guthrie Theater); Othello, Dracula, and Acorn (Actors Theatre of Louisville); Twelfth Night and The Tempest (Colorado Shakespeare). Other credits: Fizz (The Ohio Theatre); The Duchess of Malfi and Hamlet (Kings County Shakespeare). TV: Law and Order. He is a graduate of The Juilliard School. For Sarah and Addy.

Annie Golden (Corinthia/Melinda) was discovered by Academy Award- winning film director Milos Forman while fronting her rock band THE SHIRTS at CBGB's and was cast as Jeannie in his movie of the tribal love rock musical HAIR in 1978 and she hasn't stopped working as an actress on Broadway and off originating roles for Stephen Sondheim, Terrence McNally, Jerry Zaks, Richard Foreman and others while continuing to record and tour Europe as a singer songwriter. Annie can be seen on the silver screen (TWELVE MONKEYS, BABY BOOM, PEBBLE AND THE PENGUIN, ) and opposite Jim Carrey and Ewan McGregor in I LOVE YOU, PHILIP MORRIS due out February, 2010...performing Annie Golden's VELVET PRISON at Joe's Pub and Ars Nova...born and bred in Brooklyn growing up on the Bowery making a living on Broadway Annie never forgets her downtown roots!

Julie Jesneck (Abra/Red) Broadway: Rock 'N Roll. Off-Broadway: Walls, Cherry Lane; Green Girl and The Nightshade Family, SPF; Romania. Kiss Me!, The Play Co.; Mr. Marmalade (u/s), Roundabout; Abu Ghraib Triptych, EST; Mistral, Drama League. Regional: A Thousand Clowns, Intiman Theatre; The Trip to Bountiful, The Denver Center (Henry Award); Thinking Of You, Alabama Shakespeare Festival; Othello and A Midsummer Night's Dream, The Old Globe; The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter, Alliance/The Acting Co. Tour; The Ruby Sunrise, Trinity Rep and Actor's Theatre of Louisville (Humana); Mary's Wedding, San Jose Rep. Television: "Law & Order" and "Empire Falls" (HBO). Juilliard graduate.

Kirsten Kelly (Director) is a film and theatre director from New York. Recent directing credits include: Slipping by Daniel Talbott (Piece by Piece Productions, Rising Phoenix Rep, Rattlestick) Crash! (an ensemble created piece based on the Great Depression and the current economic crisis with Roots&Branches Theatre Company) ART (Two River Theatre Co); The Government Inspector (Calvin College Guest Director); 365-Week 47 (Rising Phoenix Rep/Public Theatre); Co-creator of the “CPS! Shakespeare” program at Chicago Shakespeare Theater where she directed productions of Macbeth, Romeo & Juliet and Hamlet; the Washington D.C. premiere of “Boy Gets Girl” by Rebecca Gillman for Theatre Alliance (Helen Hayes Nomination, Best Direction); the Midwest/Chicago premiere of Mamet’s “Boston Marriage” (After Dark Award, Best Director), and Sam Shepherd’s “Savage Love/Tongues” with the Juilliard Percussion Ensemble at Lincoln Center. Film credits include: “Front of House” (Web Pilot Series for Strike TV); Tokyo/Vermont Counterpoint” short film (Beyond The Machine concert, Lincoln Center); “Asparagus! (Stalking the American Life)” (award-winning documentary on the 2006-7 film festival circuit; DVD released 2008; PBS broadcast Spring 2009); Prior to NY, Kirsten directed many Chicago productions and was the Co-Artistic Director of Strawdog Theatre there. Kirsten is a graduate of the Master’s Directing program at Juilliard where she received the Andrew W. Mellon Directing Fellowship, and is a proud member of Rising Phoenix Repertory.

Douglas Rees (Policeman/Porter): Doug is delighted and honored to e making his HOWL debut, and always delighted to be working with David Caudle. Doug has appeared at many theatres regionally, and most recently appeared in New York in the acclaimed NYC premiere of Michael Hollinger's OPUS, at Primary Stages. Some favorite past roles include Lennie in OF MICE AND MEN, Henry Carr in Tom Stoppard's TRAVESTIES, Pato in Martin McDonough's BEAUTY QUEEN OF LEENANE, and Atticus Finch in TO KILL A MOCKINGBIRD.

Production Photo Credit:
(Top to bottom: MacLeod Andrews and Annie Golden, Matt D'Amico and Julie Jesneck, Matt D' Amico and Elizabeth Rich; in The Common Swallow by David Caudle. All Photos by donje photography. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright donje photography and David Caudle.)

Got You by Michael W. Small

HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Thursday Sept 24, 9:30pm
Friday Sept 25, 9:30pm

Got You by Michael Small

Directed by Penny Ayn Maas
Starring: Heather Laws, Fred Rose, Laura Daniel, Jeremy Ellison-Gladstone
Sound/lighting: David Premark
Stage Manager/Assistant Director: Brian Rardin
The daily routine of an East Village couple, interrupted by what seems to be another terrorist attack, reveals the fragility of their post-9/11 lives and leads them to deadly consequences.
Admission $10 to benefit HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79137
Cash only tickets available at the door starting at 7:30pm until showtime.


Every day, East Villager Adam and his wife Wendy play a private game in which they try to trick each other with outrageous lies. But when their daily routine is interrupted by what seems to be another terrorist attack, they become unwitting players in a different sort of deception -- one that reveals the fragility of their post-9/11 lives and leads them to deadly consequences.

Here’s what people are saying about Michael’s work:

THE IT GIRL:

"...a neat, very witty book." -- Clive Barnes, 2001

"A bright and breezy musical with a big future." -- Theatrical Index, 2001

"....fresh, remarkably intelligent entertainment." -- The Waterbury Republican American, 1999

"The dialog is punderful. Yes, punderful, that wonderful combination of puns and an unbelievable amount of double entendres... Just sit back and enjoy the entertainment."
-- SDtheatrescene.com, 2009

KABOOM!

"...mixes sex, greed and roguishness in a way that's highly reminiscent of the Marx Brothers...hip boisterous and puerile. It will probably be a big hit." -- Curtain Up, 2008

"...a far-fetched rollercoaster of crazy, unbridled Fringe Festival fun." -- Offoffonline.com, 2008

"So funny you might onomatopee your pants." -- Daily Candy, 2008

Saturday, September 19, 2009

The Cradle Will Rock by Marc Blitzstein


HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Monday Sept 21, 8:00pm
Tuesday Sept 22, 8:00pm
Wednesday Sept 23, 8:00pm
Thursday Sept 24, 8:00pm


The Cradle Will Rock by Marc Blitzstein
Produced by Downtown Music Productions,
East Village Concert Series.
Music Direction: Mimi Stern-Wolfe
Directed and Choreographed by Lisa Brailoff
Artistic Coordinator: Jeannine Otis


An operetta condemning corporate greed and corruption, this 1938 Broadway musical was locked out of its theater on opening night by the Federal Gov’t for being too liberal.
Admission $20 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79128
Cash only tickets available at the door starting at 6:00pm until showtime.

On a June evening in 1938 director Orson Welles, producer John Houseman and the cast and crew of a new Broadway musical were locked out of their theater on opening night by armed servicemen under orders from the Federal Govt. Without costumes, sets, lights or sound, Welles and Houseman found an unused theater, rented an upright piano and marched their audience up Broadway for what has become the most historic theatrical opening ever recorded. The entire libretto performed from the audience by actors forbidden to step onto the stage, received a 40 minute standing ovation, as legend has it. An operetta about greed, corruption and the plight of the worker could not be more timely.

The Cradle Will Rock

Cast:

Moll: Laura Newman
Dauber the Artist, Bugs: Michael Iannucci
Professor Trixie: Greg Senf
Larry: Mark Peters
A Gent, President Prexie, Stevie: Rob Ventre
Yasha the Violinist: Zak Risinger
Sister Mister, A Reporter: Rayna Hickman
The Druggist: Joel Abels
Professor Scoot: Tom Savage
Gus, A Dick, Cop #2: Joshua Lee Isaacs
Dr. Specialist, Junior Mister: Alex Michaels
Editor Daily, Attendant: Michael Schilke
Mr. Mister, Cop #1: Paul Malamphy
Reverend Salvation: Mark Singer
Mrs. Mister: Darcy Dunn
Ella: Jeannine Otis
The Clerk: Jason Robards III
Professor Maimi: Gavin Esham
Sadie, A Reporter: Kate Canary
On Piano: Mimi Stern-Wolfe

Photo credit:
The Cradle Will Rock, production photo (Left to right):Jason Robards III, Zak Risinger, Michael Iannucci, Michael Schilke, Gavin Esham, Mark Singer, Alex Michaels. Photo by Nathaniel Siegel. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Nathaniel Siegel.

Friday, September 18, 2009

The Mystery of Claywoman - Screening and Lecture


The HOWL! ARTS PROJECT 2009: PERFORMANCE ART
presents
The Mystery Of Claywoman - Screening and Lecture
45 Bleecker Street Theater
Saturday Sept 19, 11pm


Rob Roth (founder of Click + Drag) and Michael Cavadias (Blacklips Performance Cult, the Ontological Theatre Company), combine live performance with the technology of documentary. Footage features Amy Poehler, Alan Cumming, Justin Bond, and Ruth Maleczech. Also featuring a new character played by Nicholas Gorham.
Admission $15 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79363
Cash only tickets available at the door.

THE MYSTERY OF CLAYWOMAN - SCREENING AND LECTURE is written and performed by MICHAEL CAVADIAS and directed by ROB ROTH. Utilizing live performance and film, the piece combines the forms of a documentary screening and lecture to actualize the story of Claywoman, a 500-million year old enigma who, legend has it, can cure anyone of their deepest pain. Described by PAPER MAGAZINE as "Funny, uncomfortable and depressing - in that order" and by MICHAEL MUSTO as "wildly witty", this next incarnation of the mystery that is Claywoman should be eye opening for all.
New York City-born director and visual artist Rob Roth has been called the mad man incarnate. A persistent and influential presence in the citys downtown art and culture since the early 1990s, his work draws from photography, video, painting, dramaturgy and theater to create experiences that transcend the limits of media and performance. Roths work has been exhibited at a variety of venues including the New Museum for Contemporary Art, Performance Space122, Abrons Art Center, Galapagos Art Space, and Deitch Projects as well as the Whitney Museum of American Art. In the 1990's Roth co-founded Click + Drag, the infamous nightclub weekly, which incorporated fashion and atmosphere and blended computer-age references with a theatrical sensibility, sexual ambiguity and a strict dress code.
Actor/writer Michael Cavadias is an active film, theatre and TV performer as well as a singer. He starred in Paramount Motion Pictures WONDER BOYS opposite Michael Douglas and Robert Downey Jr.
Michael received his B.F.A. from NYUs experimental theatre wing. He has been a Resident Artist with Mabou Mines, starred in Ruth Maleczechs The Bribe and in Fassbinders Brmen Freedom, and worked with Blacklips Performance Cult and the Ontological Theatre Company.

http://www.rob-roth.com/works/clay.htm

A portion of tonight's proceeds will benefit HOWL! HELP, administered by the Actor's Fund, which provides emergency assistance to qualified performing artists in crisis.

(Photo credit: Claywoman by Rob Roth. Used with permission.
All rights reserved. Copyright Rob Roth.)

Wednesday, September 16, 2009

The Living Theater and the New American Cinema: NEWSREEL: JONAS IN THE BRIG, THE BRIG, STREET SONGS


The Living Theater and the New American Cinema:
THE BRIG, STREET SONGS, NEWSREEL JONAS IN THE BRIG


Friday, September 18, 10:00 PM
All screenings are at the Millennium Film Workshop,
66 East 4th Street, NY NY 10003.

Programs are subject to change.
Advance Tickets: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79742
Admission: $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Cash only tickets available at the door two hours before showtime.

HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: FILM SERIES presents
The Living Theater and the New American Cinema


Introduction by Jonas Mekas, filmmaker, author, director of Anthology Film Archives:
NEWSREEL: JONAS IN THE BRIG, 1964, directed by Storm de Hirsch.
With Jonas Mekas and members of the Living Theatre. B/W, silent, 5 min. 16m print courtesy of the New York Film-Makers’ Cooperative.
“A newsreel of Jonas Mekas shooting his filmed version of ‘The Brig” on the set of the Living Theatre production. ” (Storm de Hirsch)

THE BRIG, 1963, directed by Jonas Mekas.
With members of the Living Theatre. B/W, sound, 68 min. 16mm print courtesy of the New York Film-Makers’ Cooperative.
“Part drama, part polemic, with shock-wave sound and a nightmare air that suggests Kafka with a Kodak, the movie does exactly what it sets out to do – seizes the audience by the shirtfront and slams it around from wall to wall for one grueling day in a Marine Corps lockup.” (Time Magazine)

STREET SONGS, 1983, directed by Jonas Mekas.
With Julian Beck and members of the Living Theatre. B/W, sound, 10 min. 16mm print courtesy of The New York Film-Makers Cooperative.
“Made in 1966/1983 ‘STREET SONGS’ is a 1966 performance, in France, of a section of the Living Theater’s ‘Mysteries and Smaller Pieces.” Based on a chance-determined scenario written by Jackson Maclow in 1961, STREET SONGS weaves militant political chants into a mandala of mantras. Julian Beck sits cross legged on an empty stage; the slogan he repeats – ‘Free All Men! Ban the Bomb! Stop the War! Free the Blacks! Change the World!’ – are both meditation and calls to action, as a crowd of voices answers each slogan and actors join him on stage to pace in a circle, clasp one another’s shoulders and collectively breathe ‘Ohmm…’” (the Village Voice)

Photo credit: The Brig film still by Jonas Mekas. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright Jonas Mekas.

In and Around Tompkins Square Park: B/SIDE, WHAT ABOUT ME

In and Around Tompkins Square Park: B/SIDE, WHAT ABOUT ME
Friday, September 18, 7:00 PM
All screenings are at the Millennium Film Workshop,
66 East 4th Street, NY NY 10003.

Programs are subject to change.
Advance Tickets: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79727
Admission: $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Cash only tickets available at the door two hours before showtime.

HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: FILM SERIES presents
In and Around Tompkins Square Park


B/SIDE, 1996, directed by Abigail Child.
Color and b/w, sound, 40 min. 16mm print courtesy of the New York Film-Makers’ Cooperative.
“Framed by on New York's Lower East Side, where some of the homeless of Tompkins Square Park settled after the riots of June 1991, the movie begins with the encampment's first night and ends with the fire and subsequent destruction of the lot in October of the same year. Applying rhythmic construction, poetic license and a generous eye to bodies in poverty, B/SIDE documents a gritty vision of late 20th century urban life.” (New York Film-Makers’ Cooperative Catalogue)

Introduction by Rachel Amodeo, filmmaker:
WHAT ABOUT ME, 1993, directed by Rachel Amodeo. Cast: Rachel Amodeo, Judy Carne, Gregory Corso, Richard Edson, Richard Hell, John Peter Melendez, Jerry Nolan, Dee Dee Ramone, Rockets Redglare, Johnny Thunders, Nick Zedd. B/W, sound, 87 min. 16mm print courtesy of the New York Film-Makers’ Cooperative.
“WHAT ABOUT ME tells the story of a young woman, Lisa Napolitano (Rachel Amodeo), who through uncontrollable circumstances, finds herself homeless in New York City. The film portrays her gradual deterioration as she exists on the streets, intermingling with outcasts of society. Along the ways she encounters a shell-shocked Vietnam veteran, Nick (Richard Edson); a nihilistic east-villager, Tom (Nick Zedd); and a sympathetic good samaritan, Paul (Richard Hell). WHAT ABOUT ME was shot on location in the Lower East Side and Tompkins Square Park.” (New York Film-Makers’ Cooperative Catalogue)

TWEED Fractured Classicks Series Presents: Pic-up: A Summer Romance


HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:THEATER
45 Bleecker Street Theater

(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry St)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)

Friday Sept 18, 9:30pm
Saturday Sept 19, 9:30pm
Sunday Sept 20, 8:00pm
The TWEED Fractured Classicks Series presents:
Pic-up: A Summer Romance

Original interpretation of great american plays and movies. Deceptively reverent, yet hilarious spins on classic American dramatic literature. Starring Sweetie, Gayton Scott, Jay Rogers, Bradford Scobie, Steve Hayes, Greg Wallach, Bree Benton and Peter Frechette.
Admission $20 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79133
Cash only tickets available at the door starting at 7:30pm and 6:00pm (2 hours before showtime) respectively until showtime.

Tuesday, September 15, 2009

Jack Smith and the Lower East Side (as seen by Ken Jacobs): BLONDE COBRA, FLAMING CREATURES


Jack Smith and the Lower East Side (as seen by Ken Jacobs):
BLONDE COBRA, FLAMING CREATURES

Thursday, September 17, 10:00 PM
All screenings are at the Millennium Film Workshop,
66 East 4th Street, NY NY 10003.

Programs are subject to change.
Advance Tickets: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79753
Admission: $10
Cash only tickets available at the door two hours before showtime.
Recommended for adults only. Ages 18 +.

HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: FILM SERIES presents
Jack Smith and the Lower East Side (as Seen by Ken Jacobs)

Introduction by Ken Jacobs, filmmaker:
BLONDE COBRA, 1963, directed by Ken Jacobs, based on images gathered by Bob Fleischner. Cast: Jack Smith. B/W, sound, 16mm. 33 min. 16mm print courtesy of the New York Film-Makers’ Coop.
“BLONDE COBRA is an erratic narrative – no, not really a narrative, it’s only stretched out in time for convenience of delivery. It’s a look in on an exploding life, on a man of imagination suffering pre-fashionable lower East Side deprivation and consumed with American 1950s, ‘40s, ‘30s disgust. Silly, self-pitying, guilt-stricken and yet triumphing – on one level – over the situation with style, because he’s unapologetically gifted, has a genius for courage, knows that a state of indignity can serve to show his character in sharpest relief. He carries on, states his presence for what it is. Does all he can to draw out our condemnation, testing our love for limits, enticing us into an absurd moral posture the better to dismiss us with a regal ‘screw-off’.” (Ken Jacobs)

FLAMING CREATURES, 1963, directed by Jack Smith. Cast: Francis Francine, Sheila Bick, Joel Markman, Dolores Flores, Arnold, Judith Malina, Marian Zazeela. B/W, sound, 16mm. 42 min. 16mm print courtesy of the New York Film-Makers’ Coop.
“Jack Smith has graced the anarchic liberation of new American cinema with graphic and rhythmic power worthy of the best of formal cinema. He has attained for the first time in motion pictures a high level of art which is absolutely lacking in decorum; and a treatment of sex which makes us aware of the restraint of all previous filmmakers. He has shown more clearly than anyone before how the poet’s license includes all things, not only of spirit, but also of flesh; not only of dreams and of symbol, but also of solid reality. In no other art but the movies could this have so fully been done; and their capacity was realized by Smith” (Film Culture Magazine)

Plus sequences from other films made by Ken Jacobs starring Jack Smith, including TWO WRENCHING DEPARTURES and STAR SPANGLED TO DEATH. B/W and color, sound. DVD courtesy of Ken Jacobs.

Photo credits: Blonde Cobra Film Still courtesy Ken Jacobs, used with permission, all rights reserved, Copyright Ken Jacobs.

Allen Ginsberg on Film: SCREEN TEST, COUCH, WHOLLY COMMUNION, PULL MY DAISY



Allen Ginsberg on Film: SCREEN TEST, COUCH, WHOLLY COMMUNION, PULL MY DAISY

Thursday, September 17, 7:00 PM
All screenings are at the Millennium Film Workshop,
66 East 4th Street, NY NY 10003.

Programs are subject to change.
Advance Tickets: www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79647
Admission: $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund
Cash only tickets available at the door two hours before showtime.
Curated by Jon Gartenberg.

HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009: FILM SERIES presents
Allen Ginsberg on Film


Introduction by Callie Angell, Adjunct Curator, The Andy Warhol Film Project, Whitney Museum of American Art:
SCREEN TEST, 1966, directed by Andy Warhol. Cast: Allen Ginsberg. B/W, silent, 4 min. 16mm print courtesy of The Museum of Modern Art Circulating Film Library.
A portrait of Allen Ginsberg filmed by Andy Warhol on December 4, 1966. This was one of the very last of the hundreds of screen tests that Warhol shot of well-known personalities from the poetry, music, fashion, film, and other creative worlds that visited his famous Factory.

COUCH, 1964, directed by Andy Warhol.
Cast: Allen Ginsberg, Jack Kerouac, Gregory Corso, Peter Orlovsky, and others. B/W, silent, 52 min. 16mm print courtesy of The Museum of Modern Art Circulating Film Library.
“Warhol had filmed Ginsberg once before in 1964 when he shot several rolls of a historic gathering of Ginsberg and his fellow Beats Jack Kerouac, Gregory Corso, and Peter Orlovsky hanging out in and around the Factory couch.” (Callie Angell)

Introduction by Paul Cronin, author, filmmaker and historian:
WHOLLY COMMUNION, 1965, Peter Whitehead. Cast: Gregory Corso, Harry Fanlight, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Allen Ginsberg, Michael Horovitz, Ernst Jandl, Christopher Logue, Adrian Mitchell, Alexander Trocchi. B/W, sound, 35 min. 16mm print courtesy of the Reserve Film and Video Collection of The New York Public Library for the Performing Arts, with the permission of Contemporary Films, London.
“Peter Whitehead captures the unexpected, the intensity and the excitement of a Happening, as 7000 people jam into London’s Albert Hall on June 11, 1965 for four hours of poetry reading by many Beat poets.” (New York Public Library Catalogue)
Excerpts from IN THE BEGINNING WAS THE IMAGE: CONVERSATIONS WITH PETER WHITEHEAD, 2006, directed by Paul Cronin. Cast: Peter Whitehead. B/W and color, sound. DVD courtesy of Paul Cronin.
Historian/filmmaker Paul Cronin interviews Peter Whitehead, the filmmaker of WHOLLY COMMUNION, about the significance of this unique Beat poetry event.

PULL MY DAISY, 1959, directed by Robert Frank and Alfred Leslie. Cast: Allen Ginsberg, Gregory Corso, Larry Rivers, Peter Orlovsky, David Amram, Richard Bellamy, Alice Neel, Sally Gross, Pablo Frank, Denise Parker, Delphine Seyrig, Jack Kerouac (narrator), Music by David Amram. B/W, sound, 29 min. 16mm print courtesy Museum of Fine Arts, Houston.
“PULL MY DAISY is a classic look at the soul of the beat generation, made with writers Jack Kerouac and Allen Ginsberg, and painters Alfred Lesllie, Larry Rivers, and Alice Neel. It was written and narrated by Kerouac, based on his unproduced play ‘The Beat Generation.’ It tells the story of a bishop (Richard Bellamy) and his mother (Alice Neel) who pay a visit to Milo, a railroad worker. At the same time his poet friends, Ginsberg, Peter Orlovsky, and Gregory Corso, hang around quizzing the bishop about the meaning of life and its everyday relationship to art and poetry.” (Museum of Fine Arts catalogue)

Photo credits: top to bottom: Allen Ginsberg in Wholly Communion by Peter Whitehead,
used with permission, all rights reserved, copyright Peter Whitehead. Pull My Daisy film still by Robert Frank and Alfred Leslie, used with permission, all rights reserved, copyright Robert Frank and Alfred Leslie.

Legends of the Lower East Side: Joey Arias, Basil Twist, Psychotica (Featuring Patrick Briggs) and Lavinia Co-op




HOWL ! ARTS PROJECT 2009:
VARIETY
PERFORMANCE ART
BURLESQUE
45 Bleecker Street Theater
(NE Corner of Lafayette at Mulberry Street)
(By subway: #6 train to Bleecker Street Station)



Wednesday Sept 16, 10pm
Legends of the Lower East Side:
Joey Arias, Basil Twist, Psychotica (Featuring Patrick Briggs) and Lavinia Co-op.

Delirious, Devine and Divalicious. Pure seduction by downtown icons, who paved the way for the performance renaissance of the EV/LES.
Admission: $10 to benefit the HOWL ! HELP Fund.
Advance tickets at www.brownpapertickets.com/event/79362
Cash only tickets available at the door from 8pm to showtime.

From the 1970's on, each of the performers featured this evening paved the way for today's incredible performance renaissance on the Lower East Side, and each is still presenting valid, thought-provoking work today.
From his performances with Klaus Nomi, backing David Bowie on 'Saturday Night Live' and the seminal, grand-scale 'Mermaids On Heroin,' to his Billy Holiday-isms, 'Zoo-manity' in Las Vegas, and the triumphantly spectacular 'Arias With A Twist,' Joey Arias has written the book on how to retain one's integrity and crediblity while crossing over into the (somewhat) mainstream flow of Popular Culture.
With a score of interweaving influences, Basil Twist has taken the ancient art of puppetry into whole new realms as evidenced by his work on Shakespeare-In-the-Park's 'Hamlet', his collaboration with Joey Arias in 'Arias With A Twist,' as well as Broadway's upcoming 'The Addams Family" musical.
His soaring signature vocals have highlighted the oeuvre of the indy Pop/metal bands he has been in. Tonight, 'Psychotica' takes Patrick Briggs well-beyond the 21st century with his quirky, hook-laden, and stellar songwriting.
A charter member of the legendary performance troupe, Bloo-lips, and whose one-person monthly, 'Chez Lavinia' has been packin' them in at the East Village's Brit-Pub, Telephone, Lavinia Co-op hosts the evening' festivities with his own colorful brand of Music Hall, slapstick, and tongue-in-cheek Vaudeville.




Photo credits: Top to Bottom, Joey Arias, Basil Twist, Lavinia Co-op by Johnny Dynell, courtesy the artists. Used with permission. All rights reserved. Copyright the artists.