The Curtain and Pen

Nebraska Copywriting Services for Small Business

omaha performing arts

By

Arlo Guthrie and More Musings from Me

Here I am with another post sponsored by Omaha Performing Arts! If you’re sick of these, take heart in the fact that the season’s almost over, and if you’re not, then I will give you a high-five the next time I see you.

(Who am I kidding? I would probably high-five you no matter what.) Anyway…

Arlo Guthrie is playing in Omaha at the Holland Performing Arts Center in Kiewit Hall at 7:30 pm on Tuesday, April 28th, and I am really excited to see him play.

While, no, he hasn’t been someone I thought I’d see in concert, he’s definitely been a presence in my life for a very long time. My dad has always been a fan, and even named our dog, Arlo, after him. I can remember Thanksgiving car rides when NPR would play Guthrie’s famous “Alice’s Restaurant Massacree” more than once. All day, maybe? I don’t remember for sure. Although, at the time, I was listening to Ace of Base and TLC on my discman and thinking “Ugh why Dad why,” I now appreciate how much my dad tried to acquaint me with the classics.

That’s what’s so special about this performance in particular; it’s Arlo Guthrie’s “Alice’s Restaurant 50th Anniversary Tour.” He’ll be commemorating the anniversary by playing the song/monologue in its entirety, along with other songs from his library. The song itself is a monologue with a guitar backing that depicts a true story from Guthrie’s life, and was written as a protest of the Vietnam War.

I hope you guys will take advantage of this awesome chance to see a legend. I’ve gotten to see Bob Dylan, Eric Clapton, and B.B. King in concert, and I have to say that seeing the people who used to stare back at me from the album covers in my dad’s collection is an incredibly feeling.

(You can purchase tickets online at Ticket Omaha.)

(Seriously, you should go.)

By

Cherish the Ladies at the Holland Center

When somebody asks me where I want to travel, my first thought is Ireland. Hands down. My mind fills with green and mist and legends, and I imagine myself frolicking among grassy hills and tiny cottages. I want to go to pubs and see literary landmarks… and I want to just sit with a mug of tea and stare out the window, absorbing as much of the landscape as I can with my eyes and heart.

And when I’m imagining this, there’s always a soundtrack. Fiddles, flutes, heart-shaking drums. Guhhhhh. I love it. I find that a traditional Irish tune with a rolling beat gets my adrenaline pumping faster than any of my favorite workout playlists, and one that is slow and heartfelt almost pushes me to tears.

Luckily for me, Omaha Performing Arts is bringing Cherish the Ladies, an all-female Irish-American ensemble, to Omaha, along with intricately beautiful music and traditional step dancers. What I find to be incredibly cool about this group is that it has been around for thirty years, collecting some of the most talented Celtic musicians in the country. They’re bringing their 30th anniversary concert on tour, and we get to enjoy it about a week before St. Patrick’s Day.

I can’t wait. Although I’ve found lately that I’m not a huge fan of sitting through instrumental concerts (I blame Netflix and my ever-waning attention span), I know this is going to be a special case. Just sitting and watching this video on Youtube has gotten me all worked up.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JCcJXYrNqz8

If this kind of music makes your heart flutter too, I hope you’ll join me in seeing them at the Kiewit Hall in the Holland Performing Arts Center on May 11th at 7:00 pm. Tickets start at $25 and can be purchased online at Ticket Omaha, over the phone at 402-345-0606, or inside the Ticket Omaha office in the Holland Center at 1200 Douglas Street.

For Transparency’s Sake: I’m being compensated by Omaha Performing Arts for this post with two complimentary tickets to Cherish the Ladies. All rambling and sigh-punctuated words are my own.

By

Pippin!

When I was younger, there were certain items in my life that became fixtures. They were always there, and I remember registering them in my brain for most of my childhood… and then finally interacting with them.

My dad was a high school Theatre teacher when I was littler, and I remember seeing two video tapes on the bookshelf in his classroom: Live recordings of the Broadway musicals Sweeney Todd and Pippin. Sweeney Todd was in a heavy plastic black and red case, and Pippin was in an 80’s-tastic blue cardboard case, with a picture of a beautiful blonde man with long curly hair lying down on some kind of stone altar. (Watch, I’m going to go look it up now and it will have been something completely different than I remember.)

 

pippinvhs

Yeah, okay. So I was mostly right.

When dad stopped teaching, the videos came home. (That sounded really dramatic… he just got a new job and brought his stuff home, nothing cryptic or anything.) I remember finally asking to see the shows, and watching Sweeney Todd about 5 million times. Pippin, however, I didn’t watch as much. I think that, despite its fantastical appearance, it was a much heavier show than Junior High Lauren was prepared for. I was pretty in to That 70’s Show at that time, so the philosophically heavy stuff was especially not on my radar.

I’m excited to see Pippin as an adult. I’ve done a little research on the plot, just to familiarize myself, and it sounds like the perfect thing to see right now. In Pippin, the title character is on a quest to find meaning in his life, and ends up discovering true happiness in an unexpectedly domestic setting. Now, that’s greatly simplifying things, but I don’t really want to give too much away.  In the meantime, I’ll leave you with the particulars, and fun video to watch.

Performances of Pippin at the Orpheum:

March 3, 4, 5 (Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday) at 7:30 pm

Friday, March 6th at 8:00 pm

Saturday, March 7th at 2:00 pm and 8:00 pm

Sunday, March 8th at 1:30 pm and 7:00 pm

Tickets are available at Ticket Omaha, by phone at 402-345-0606, or at the Ticket Omaha box office inside the Holland Performing Arts Center

Kids Night on Broadway

As part of a program designed to introduce kids from ages 9 to 18 to live Theatre, the Orpheum is offering a limited number of tickets at 50% off on the night of Tuesday, March 3rd. The limit is two tickets per adult, and can be obtained by using the code KIDS NIGHT at Ticket Omaha.

What is Pippin all about, anyway? (VIDEO)

Just so you know, I’ve been compensated by Omaha Performing Arts with two tickets to the performance of Pippin. All words and thoughts and nostalgic musings are mine!

By

A New Tradition

Charlie and I have accidentally started a Christmas tradition, and it turns me into a ridiculous, gushy bag of emotions just thinking about it.

Last year, we went to see Elf the Musical together at the Orpheum, thanks to Omaha Performing Arts, and this year, we got invited to join my friend and her son in seeing A Christmas Story at the Rose Theater.

(Just to clear it up, this post isn’t sponsored… I just love these organizations forever long time.)

Walking up to the theater holding an excited Charlie’s hand will never get old… even when I’m forcing him to do it as a 17-year-old.

Last year, Charlie got a little upset at the tension before intermission during Elf, and fell asleep in Act II, but he still talks about it to this day. This year, at A Christmas Story, he stayed awake the whole time and only got a little distressed at a few of the conflicts that came up in the show.

I don’t know if it was the fact that I was with Charlie, the show itself, or the amount of time it’s been since I’ve last seen a play… but I was emotional almost the entire time I watched that show. I’m sure it was a combination of all three factors.

The show truly was wonderful. I have some lack-luster onstage memories of the Christmas Story production I was in in college, and this has done a great job of re-instating the love I have for the show. The original movie was a HUGE DEAL in our house during my childhood, and I’m happy to add more layers of love to it. The actors were pleasant and endearing, and the boy who played Ralphie hit some notes that made me almost burst into tears every time.

I think what I loved most about the show itself was that there seemed to be a lot more love at the heart of it than there is in the movie… or at least obvious love, anyway. The father was a much more likeable character, and the relationship between him and the mother seemed more fulfilling.

For the most part, Charlie was old enough for the show… there were only a few moments that he had a hard time with. The bullies and the breaking of the leg lamp got him pretty worked up, and he had difficulty understanding Ralphie’s bouts of imagination that were mixed in with “reality.” He thought the imaginary sequences were fun, but just couldn’t quite get the fact that it wasn’t really happening.

The Rose Theater is GORGEOUS, and the people there were so kid-friendly, I could barely believe it. A replica of the department store Santa slide was out front, and Charlie and his buddy got to take a trip down it before heading to their seats.

At one point during the show, I looked over to see Charlie imitating the arm gestures of Ralphie’s old man, and almost lost it again. I’m telling you, it was an emotional night. We left the theater, boys holding hands with moms, all singing “Ralphie to the rescue, ohowhooooaaahhhh!”

He says he would like to be in plays, too, and that’s so cool. Whether that’s true or he was just caught in the moment, it was incredibly heartwarming to share with him something that was once such a huge part of my life. He couldn’t believe that I had played the part of Esther Jane (one of the school girls), and was so excited to see which one she was.

Another cool thing about all of this? If Charlie wants to take some little kid acting classes, he totally can. The Rose offers classes for kids 3-18 years old. THAT IS AMAZING. Can you imagine teaching a bunch of three year olds acting classes? I sure can’t, but the fact that there are people in town who can is just crazy, crazy awesome.

So, big thanks to my friend for inviting us, thanks to the Rose for putting on such a wonderful show, and thanks again to Omaha Performing Arts for getting this tradition started.

If you have a chance to go to the Rose or see a kids show put on by Omaha Performing Arts, please do. If you’re not in Omaha, but have a local theater, see if they’ve got children-friendly show. I think it’ll end up being a pretty special experience for you.

Okay, I’m going to go somewhere and cry it out now. Thanks for reading.

By

Check out my expanded horizons: An Evening with David Sedaris

I think that, at almost 30 years old, I can examine my character flaws without it reflecting a lack of self-esteem on my part. There are a few aspects of my personality that I recognize as “not ideal,” at least when we’re thinking about the ideal characteristics of a human being contributing to society.

One of my most socially offensive flaws (in my opinion, anyway) is the intense desire to live in a carefully controlled bubble… a bubble containing my family, friends, nostalgic pop-culture, and music-related news.

I’ve spent my life carefully avoiding current events and nonfiction writing, because I prefer the fiction. If the fiction stresses me out, I can console myself with the fact that it’s not real. I recognize that, as a parent raising two other (hopefully) contributing members of society, this is an example I need to work on.

So, I’m trying, with baby steps, to expand my bubble. Perhaps someday, when my kids are older and more able to hold their own in the world, it will get easier to keep listening when NPR switches from Car Talk to the news. For right now, though, I’m slowly broadening my horizons with non-fiction storytelling. I’ve found that listening to things like This American Life and The Moth Story Hour makes it more possible for me to learn about the struggles of real people, without getting them carelessly dropped into my lap like a bowl of eyeballs. That might seem a little extreme… but sometimes that’s what the news feels like to me: like someone very nonchalantly handed me something horrible, in hopes of scaring me out of my wits.

So, slowly but surely, I’ve been learning about things outside of my bubble, and I do feel better for it. This is why, when I learned that David Sedaris was being brought by Omaha Performing Arts to speak, I quietly jumped up and down. Sedaris has been a fairly regular fixture on This American Life, and is one of the most spellbinding people I’ve heard (on the radio, anyway) speak. His words have a way of sounding so beautiful, even when he’s talking about things that are not inherently so. I think that seeing him speak in person will humanize him even more for me, and make his stories distinctly more real in my mind.

If you’re as interested as I am, An Evening with David Sedaris will be held on Thursday, October 30th at 7:30 pm at the Holland Performing Arts Center in Kiewit Hall. You can get tickets by visiting http://www.ticketomaha.com/productions/David-Sedaris.

I hope to see you there, whether you’re trying to expand your horizons or are simply interested in an incredible evening of storytelling! If you’re interested in reading some of his work, this website is a great place to start.

 

Real Talk: In return for this blog post, Omaha Performing Arts is compensating me with two tickets to An Evening with David Sedaris. Although I’m being compensated, all these words are my own, you guys. I ain’t no sellout.  

By

A Quick War Horse Review

Let me start out by saying that I haven’t written a “theatrical review” piece since … well, since I was getting a grade for it.  I have almost NO experience with Broadway shows, and I don’t remember anything about specific acting styles or anything like that.  I do like to think, however, that I can tell when a play has been done well, and when it’s been filled with life.  War Horse is exactly that: brimming over with life.  The show was practically breathing.

I was so concerned that I was going bawl my eyes out throughout the entire show.  I’m (most of the time) pretty good at giving myself in to the spirit of the production and fully suspending my disbelief when it comes to seeing a play, so if there’s going to be some emotional stuff happening . . . yeah, that crying lady is probably me.

Really, though, I spent most of the time feeling breathless.  Sure, I cried a few times because of the plot, but watching the puppeteers bring those horses (and birds) to life was an emotional experience in itself.  I loved that the puppeteers were very simply there.  No extra attention was called to them, and there was no attempt made to hide them, either.  When Joey was a young horse, one of the puppeteers was moving the entire time, gently heaving the horse’s chest as he breathed.  Honestly, they were all moving the entire time.  Joey’s ears would flick every once in a while, his tail would swish randomly . . . I don’t know if I can say much more without getting annoyingly gushy about it.  The puppets were absolutely mesmerizing.

The show as a whole was . . . formidable.  An emotional force.  The only static part of the set was a giant scrap of torn sketchbook paper, which was used as a projection screen throughout the show.  I’ve seen plenty of shows that use projections terribly, and this was not the case for War Horse.  For the most part, the projections were subtle and did a good job of providing a little bit of constant setting to such a sparse stage.

I appreciated the cast, as I don’t imagine that it could be easy to share the stage with such amazing puppetry.  The accents were pleasant, the leads were strong, and the rest of the cast made for a very satisfying ensemble.  For the most part, I found there to be a quiet symbiosis between the actors and the horses, and I think that they definitely rose to the challenge of interacting with these massive creatures.  I became emotionally attached to many, and fell in love with a few of the characters, which is, for me, a sign of a job very well done.

The show is marketed as a family show, and is recommended for kids aged 9 and up.  For the most part, I agree.  Courage, faith, and love are all prevalent themes, and the ending leaves you with hope.  I will say, however, that, oh my goodness you guys, this show is physically powerful.  There are moments of music and lighting and rumbling and war that are overwhelming even for me, an almost 30-year old woman.  There are deaths, there is darkness, there are ghostly soldiers, and a little mild profanity.  You know your kids’ ability to handle mature content; use your expert judgment!

I’m so grateful to Omaha Performing Arts and the people behind War Horse for allowing me to see this show.  I don’t think I would have gone to see it without a little nudge, and I’m incredibly glad I did.

Time for a little chat…

In return for this and a previous post, I received two complimentary tickets to War Horse from Omaha Performing Arts and the touring show.  All of the thoughts in this post, however, are my own.  I also paid for my own sippee cup of wine.  I also missed 4 or 5 minutes of the show due to a false-alarm involving suspicions of a Norovirus Attack . . . as long as we’re being honest.