Latest news with #NYUSkirball
Time of India
4 days ago
- Entertainment
- Time of India
Who took home the most Drama Desk Trophies—and why?
The 2025 Drama Desk Awards dazzled New York City's theatre community with a night of celebration, surprises, and record-breaking victories at NYU Skirball , hosted by the dynamic duo Debra Messing and Tituss Burgess. The ceremony—now in its 69th year—remains unique for recognizing the best of Broadway, Off-Broadway, and Off-Off-Broadway in the same competitive categories, making it a true barometer of New York's theatrical pulse. Leading the winners' parade was Maybe Happy Ending , which swept six awards. The show's creative team is led by director Michael Arden and writers Will Aronson and Hue Park. The musical, also a current Tony nominee for Best Musical, was widely celebrated for its innovative storytelling and emotional resonance. Debra Messing, co-hosting the event, remarked, 'Tonight is a celebration of the resilience, creativity, and passion that define New York theatre.' The Drama Desk Awards once again proved why they are a highlight of the theatrical calendar, honoring both established stars and rising talents in a night of unforgettable performances and heartfelt speeches.' by Taboola by Taboola Sponsored Links Sponsored Links Promoted Links Promoted Links You May Like Offerte Imbattibili Su Auto Usate PopularSearches | Annunci di Ricerca Scopri di più Undo 69th Drama Desk Awards: major winners 1. Outstanding Musical Winner: Maybe Happy Ending 2. Outstanding Play Live Events Winner: Purpose (by Branden Jacobs-Jenkins) 3. Outstanding Revival of a Play Winner: Eureka Day 4. Outstanding Revival of a Musical Winner: Gypsy 5. Leading Performance in a Musical Winners: Jasmine Amy Rogers ( BOOP! The Musical ) Audra McDonald ( Gypsy ) (TIE) 6. Featured Performance in a Musical Winners: Brooks Ashmanskas ( Smash ) Jak Malone ( Operation Mincemeat ) Michael Urie ( Once Upon a Mattress ) (THREE-WAY TIE) 7. Outstanding Director of a Musical Winner: Michael Arden ( Maybe Happy Ending ) 8. Outstanding Music, Lyrics, and Book Winners: Will Aronson & Hue Park ( Maybe Happy Ending ) 9. Outstanding Choreography Winner: Jerry Mitchell ( BOOP! The Musical ) 10. Outstanding Costume Design Winner: Gregg Barnes ( BOOP! The Musical ) 11. Outstanding Scenic Design Winner: Maybe Happy Ending (team/designer not specified in summary) 12. Additional Notable Winners (Design/Staging) Stranger Things: The First Shadow (3 awards, categories not specified) The Picture of Dorian Gray (3 awards, categories not specified)
Time Out
20-05-2025
- Entertainment
- Time Out
New York Music Month announces lineup of 50+ free events throughout June
New York Music Month is turning the volume all the way up this June. The city's official celebration of its music industry returns for its eighth year with a whopping 50-plus free events, ranging from high-wattage concerts and indie showcases to expert panels, artist workshops and a flagship industry conference. Produced by the Mayor's Office of Media and Entertainment, the monthlong festival aims to both spotlight New York's creative pulse and give artists and fans access to the kind of resources, insight and inspiration that could spark a career—or at least a killer playlist. It all kicks off June 3 with the New York Music Month Conference at NYU Skirball. More than 40 speakers, including RIAA CEO Mitch Glazier, Variety's Jem Aswad, and Taylor Hanson (yes, that Taylor Hanson), will unpack the music industry's biggest shifts. Topics range from streaming fraud to merch monetization and the rise of music tech, with backing from sponsors including Sony Audio and Hudson House Distillery. But the programming doesn't stop at the industry's gate. NYMM Talks, a 36-event lineup, dives into the state of modern artistry with panels like 'Cutting Through the Noise' (Empire), 'Inside the Voice' (Abiah Institute of the Arts), and 'Gender Equity in Musical Theatre' (Maestra). There are masterclasses, mentoring sessions, and roundtables with heavyweights like Young Guru, Neil Giraldo and Anthony Cruz. 'NYMM is more than a celebration—it's a powerful reminder that music is the heartbeat of New York,' said Jeremiah Abiah, who will present a vocal masterclass at Carnegie Hall. 'And our voices, quite literally, matter.' Live music lovers can catch 18 free performances around the city, including the Radio City series—a new program highlighting New York's independent radio stations like WFMU, WFUV and The Lot. Other highlights include five-borough artist showcases, open mics, family concerts and even a celebration of hip-hop pioneer MC Sha-Rock. And for artists needing space to rehearse? NYMM has that covered too, with free studio time at locations from Smash Studios in Manhattan to Fenix Studios on Staten Island.
New York Times
06-04-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
Review: Reclaiming the Past in a Dance of Simmering Power
In this charged and challenging world, Reggie Wilson, a choreographer one can depend on for dance artistry no matter the political climate, can get to the essence of feeling — the good, the bad and everything in between. His new 'The Reclamation,' performed at NYU Skirball over the weekend, is a powerfully solemn dance that, in part, repurposes material from his early works. That gestural vocabulary, over the course of an hour, becomes a rich blueprint illuminating how the past can meet the present on unaffected terms. Much of the dancing in Wilson's 'Reclamation' has a gravity to it. While it does unspool into speedy passages in moments, the effect is more fleeting and frantic — not the kind that transports you to that happy dance place. The work, featuring seven authoritative performers from Wilson's Fist and Heel Performance Group, including the magnetic Paul Hamilton, is intricately formal and something of a slow, methodical burn because of that. At the start, the performers, one by one, take turns standing still at the front of the stage. Eventually, they all make their way to the back where they peel off layers of clothing and fold them with care before placing them in neat piles on the floor. It's ritualistic — as if by shedding a shawl, they are reclaiming their skin. Soon, they are dressed for the stage in Naoko Nagata and Enver Chakartash's body-skimming separates, some adorned with pops of color. There's an early postmodern vibe to both the dance-wear and to Wilson's movement palette, which arranges and rearranges angular arms, backs that hinge over legs and jumps that send dancers spinning and landing on two feet. Even when the dancers shoot off into different directions, letting go of their precise spacing to vault themselves more loosely into space, they find their way back to lines, crossing the stage as a pack or splintering off in pairs. Dancers often mirror one another, but rarely do they touch. Wilson's soundtrack operates like a mixtape of sonic poetry. The blues singer Son House's 'Motherless Children' is followed by the Gladys Knight and the Pips recording of 'I Can See Clearly Now,' which takes on a despondent tone as the dancers move forward with rocking feet that seem to be stuck in mud. At once listless and direct, they stare hard, especially as the lyrics paint a different picture: 'Gone are the dark clouds that had me blind.' For this group, for this world, the days ahead don't seem so sunshiny. Wilson takes advantage of the width of the Skirball stage and spreads his cast — Hamilton is joined by Oluwadamilare (Dare) Ayorinde, Bria Bacon, Rochelle Jamila, Annie Wang, Henry Winslow and Miles Yeung — across its landscape expanse with duets that appear like visions. The vocabulary is reshuffled throughout, building, at times, to a more heated state as dancers circle the stage with long, loping runs and arms that stroke through the air as if it were water. The song 'Helping,' performed by Tom Smothers, adds to the sense of turbulence with its lyrics, 'Some kind of help is the kind of help we all can do without.' Wilson, who finds ways to create grandness and scale with just seven bodies, ends his dance with the soulful 'Touch a Hand, Make a Friend' by the Staple Singers. Its hypnotic chant, a hope for unity, turns into an order, delivered with a tinge of desperation in this recording, which has two words on repeat: 'Touch somebody! Touch somebody! Touch somebody!' The dancers skim the stage faster and faster, their feet puncturing the floor with sharp stomps and flickering footwork as their hands clap and slap their thighs. Eventually they each fall to the floor arranged in a semicircle and roll in slow motion, forming a large circle that becomes smaller and tighter. It's stark and searing — again, a slow burn — and a testament to Wilson's unspoken message: You can't ignore the past, but you can reclaim it.
New York Times
28-02-2025
- Entertainment
- New York Times
‘Mary Said What She Said' Review: A Hypnotic Huppert
Isabelle Huppert stands upstage center, demurely holding her hands in front of her waist, and starts to speak. She is motionless and in silhouette so we don't see her mouth, creating a sense of dislocation as to where the words we hear are actually coming from. And as we quickly discover, the Robert Wilson production 'Mary Said What She Said' interpolates live and recorded lines. But wait: After a few minutes, Huppert is standing a little closer to the audience. Moments later she is almost downstage. The entire time I could have sworn she wasn't moving. How did she pull off that sleight of hand — or feet? Huppert is playing Mary Stuart and wearing a 16th-century-style dress, which means she can take tiny steps without the audience seeing them, as if she were on casters. This creates the illusion of stillness in motion, or perhaps freeze-framed movement — either way a neat encapsulation of Wilson's art as a theater maker — that contrasts with the simultaneous verbal stream flowing in an almost uninterrupted manner over the course of this 90-minute monologue. (The show is in French with subtitles.) Written by Darryl Pinckney, who drew from the Queen of Scots's letters, 'Mary Said What She Said,' which is at NYU Skirball through Sunday, is inconceivable without Huppert, and she is the reason to see it. She gives a performance of rarefied virtuosity and rigor as she seemingly effortlessly handles the precise blocking and light and audio cues, the swings between immobility and fastidiously choreographed movement, the abrupt changes in tempo and pitch — and of course the dense, nonlinear text full of echoing repetitions, which must be a beast to memorize. Even when she's not moving or speaking, she always needs to be committed to the moment. It is a marvel to behold. This is Huppert's third collaboration with Wilson, after 'Orlando' (1993) and 'Quartett' (seen at the Brooklyn Academy of Music in 2009), so at least she knows his exacting M.O. She was also familiar with the character, having played her in Schiller's 'Mary Stuart' at the National Theater in London in 1996. Pinckney's play, however, is a very different proposition from that classic, dramatic confrontation with Queen Elizabeth I, the rival who had Mary beheaded. Here, Mary is alone with her swirling thoughts as her execution nears; the brilliant costume by Jacques Reynaud features a high collar that creates the optical illusion of a severed head, floating above the torso. With auburn hair pulled back tightly to frame a face painted white and a mouth like a searing slash of red, Huppert's Mary stares down death (uncannily, the actress appears to never blink) as past and present mix in chaotic mental fragments that often reoccur obsessively. She keeps bringing up, for example, her four ladies in waiting ('even you, miserable Mary Fleming') who, in an additional, historically accurate repetition, were all named Mary. We can't say we weren't warned of this obsessiveness: Before the show begins, a short video of a small dog chasing its tail plays on repeat inside a small frame in the middle of the red curtain obscuring the stage. Pinckney has been collaborating with Wilson as a writer and as a dramaturg since the late 1980s (often on monologues and adaptations from literary texts), and he has tailor-made a cryptic script that is hypnotic and maddening. Several times I had no idea what Mary was jabbering on about, yet I was never bored. Partly it was because I was locked inside the show's hermetic world by the elevated production values, which include Wilson's set and lighting, and Nick Sagar's sound design. (I was a little less enthralled by the original score, by the popular Italian neoclassical artist Ludovico Einaudi, but it is not distractingly objectionable.) Mostly, of course, the show exerts a grip because of the charismatic Huppert, the rare actress who can straddle not just film and theater, but also — more important — the mainstream (Florian Zeller's 'The Mother' at the Atlantic Theater) and the extreme (a recent Romeo Castellucci production of 'Bérénice' that baffled even hardened French audiences). And she shows no signs of slowing down despite being about to turn 72: On Monday, she could be taking a day off after her string of 'Mary' performances at Skirball, but instead she is heading uptown to read short stories by Guy de Maupassant at L'Alliance New York. I'll have what she's having.
