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Performing Arts

IMGP1428 After a five-year hiatus, the Telluride Repertory Theatre at last was able to bring back Shakespeare in the Park. "Merchant of Venice" opened Saturday night. 7:30 p.m. on the Main Stage in Telluride Town Park. Performances continue Wednesday, August 25 – Sunday, August 29. (The performance on Saturday, August 28, however, is a 1 p.m. matinee.)

Local actor-turned-director Jeb Berrier's choice of "The Merchant of Venice" to relaunch one the REP's most popular series was a bit like deciding to run a marathon after an extended illness. The material in this dark comedy is challenging to say the least, dealing as it does with racial profiling in the person of Shylock, whom the Bard portrays in a somewhat grotesque, anti-Semitic caricature. Shakespeare, however, specializes in shades of gray, begging the question: Is Shylock meant to be victim or villain?
23 August, 2010 /
[to hear Erin Neff's conversation with Susan, click "Play"]

And now for something completely different.

Cabaret ad costume party The 37th annual Telluride Chamber Music Festival meets "Cabaret." The event takes place Friday, August 20, 7:30 p.m. at the historic Sheridan Opera House. In keeping with the decadence of the period in Germany before the rise of Hitler, the evening begins with a champagne reception and ends with sweets. Guests are asked to come in costume, although Telluride chic works just fine for the aristos in the crowd.

The culture of Germany's Weimar Republic, 1918-1933, encompassed the political caricature of Otto Dix and George Grosz, the beginnings of the far-reaching Bauhaus movement in architecture and interior design and the decadent cabaret culture of Berlin, documented by Christopher Isherwood in "Goodbye to Berlin," the book that became the musical "Cabaret." Cabarets, concert halls and conservatories performed the atonal and modern music of Alban Berg, Arnold Schoenberg, and Kurt Weill, like the other arts, declared decadent under the Reich.
18 August, 2010 /
[click "Play", Jeb Berrier speaks to Susan about "The Merchant of Venice"]

Merchant_poster The Telluride Repertory Theatre brings back the very popular Shakespeare in the Park series with one of the most controversial play's in the Bard's literature, the tragi-comedy "The Merchant of Venice." The pared-down-to-the-bones production, directed by Jeb Berrier, takes place Saturday August 21 and Sunday, August 22, then again Wednesday, August 25 – Sunday, August, 29, 7:30 p.m. on the Main Stage in Telluride Town Park. (The performance on Saturday, August 28, however, is a 1 p.m. matinee.)

Individuals (like Hitler, and that's a fact) and regimes (like the Nazis) seeking justification for hateful, sometimes murderous policies towards Jews turned to "The Merchant of Venice" and their good buddy Shakespeare. Is the play anti-Semitic? Did Shakespeare knowingly and intentionally write a play that disparaged Jews? Or, was he a writer and visionary whose brilliant mind transcended the prejudices of his age? It is important to remember that just as we are everyone and everything in our dreams, the Bard is famous for speaking through all his characters. Those who choose to believe in Shakespeare's transcendence turn to Shylock's great speech about humanity and revenge, Act 3, Scene1:
15 August, 2010 /

 

by D. Dion

It wasn’t anything like seeing Phish or a jam band back in the 90s. For one thing, I was 9 months pregnant and sitting in the back, stone cold sober, and too exhausted to join my one-year-old daughter in her feverish spinning dance on the tarp in front of me. For another thing, I can’t remember ever sitting down at a concert like Phish, or even bringing a chair to such a show. My friend, also 9 months pregnant, was sitting in the back with me. She leaned over and confessed, “I really wish I could have a hit of nitrous. I don’t really miss drinking, and I’ve never been much of a pothead or anything, but I have always loved nitrous.”

The whole night was like that, one long reminiscence. Seeing people twitching with that front-row frenzy, their internal speakers set to “11,” was like looking at myself ten years ago. And the songs evoked long forgotten memories. How long has it been since I sang “Would you please, please drive me to Firenze?” or “When you’re here, I sleep lengthwise, and when you’re gone, I sleep diagonal in my bed,” or since I stayed up all night literally bouncing around the room? There was something familiar and comfortable about the music, the lyrics and the way the mountains cradled the sound, which was, by the way, about twice as loud as any band I’ve ever seen play Telluride Town Park.

13 August, 2010 /

by David Byars

(editor's note: Telluride Inside... and Out has published a lot of content about the Phish concert in Telluride. At the risk of seeming redundant we felt that two younger voices after the fact would be appropriate. Given the amount of hype surrounding the Phish event, and considering the level of apprehension in some parts of our community, TIO has decided to publish this account by David Byers and one by TIO regular, Deb Dion to follow.)

IMG_7572 Phish has come and gone.  I’m feeling what a lot of residents are feeling right now.  A little hungover, slightly confused, and struck by the unreality of the whole thing. 

In the months and weeks before Phish arrived, feelings of excitement mingled with moments of apprehension.  Would Phish turn our picturesque mountain burg into a steaming cauldron of psychedelically enhanced burn outs with the associated flotsam and jetsam of empty PBR cans and wayward cigarette butts?  Or would the fans behave themselves and bring with them a much needed injection of income into a town in desperate need of out-of-towners’ vacation funds?

13 August, 2010 /
[click "Play", Meehan Fee describes the event]

PIG & WHISKEY POSTER FINAL Telluride's sister city, the Mountain Village, is hopping this weekend with two big events: the Telluride Festival of the Arts and the Telluride Conference Center's Pig & Whiskey.

Pig & Whiskey is no pig in a poke: everything about the event is out there on the table. And there is something for everyone.

For film buffs, there's a screening of a documentary by Drive-By Truckers co-founder Patterson Hood. "The Secret to a Happy Ending" chronicles the life and impact of the Drive-By Truckers, a rock-and-roll band that may not enjoy mass fame, but claims an unusually potent connection with its fans just like the jam band who packed Telluride Town Park earlier this week, Phish. It's a connection the film's director, Barr Weissman felt first-hand when he saw them in 2003. One song in particular, "The Living Bubba," frontman Patterson Hood's high and mournful ode to a friend who had died, purportedly reduced Weissman to an emotional pulp.
13 August, 2010 /

Emma Ryan The Telluride Academy's Mudd Butts opens August 13 at The Palm. The 24th annual production is "1001 Arabian Nights." The event takes place Friday, August 13 and Saturday, August 14 @ 7 p.m. The Sunday program, a matinee @ 2 p.m., is followed by an auction of Mike Stasiuk's incredible props. 

While the heart and soul of the Mudd Butts is a trio of outspoken creative geniuses, Sally Davis, Kim Epifano and Mike Stasiuk, its takes a village to mount their ambitious happenings.

A list of this year's cast and crew follows:

13 August, 2010 /