Nov 1
The “teepees,” that have been in front of the Mahaney Center for the Arts since 2007 were torn down yesterday and turned into mulch. The temporary art installation, officially called So Inclined, was made by Patrick Dougherty. I, for one, will miss them. They have been in place at the CFA since I’ve gotten to Middlebury and they had become a fixture for that part of campus. But they’ve been looking kind of dilapidated lately, I guess it was time for them to go.
Oct 29
Meghan Leathers '13.5 and Forrest Carroll '14.5 in Big Love
Arts Runoff is a Middblog series of performance reviews, originally written by JP Allen ’11. We’ll do our best to continue his thoughtful, thorough, and timely work!
Summary: A super weird remix of Aeschylus’s The Suppliants written by journalist/historian/activist/playwright Charles Mee//Big Love is about 50 Greek sisters who flee to Italy from arranged marriages to their Americans cousins. When the grooms find them, the fifty brides, led by ultra-feminist Thyona, decide together to marry their husbands, seduce them on the first night of their marriage, and then murder them. All fifty wives carry out the plan (WARNING: there is a castration in this scene), except for protagonist Lydia who falls in love with her husband and can’t bring herself to kill him.//The play is full of political statements about gender roles and inequality, rape, and domestic abuse, but it actually is a comedy and an extremely funny show. Read more
Arts Runoff is a Middblog series of performance reviews, originally written by JP Allen ’11. We’ll do our best to continue his thoughtful, thorough, and timely work!
Summary: Written by Middlebury graduate John Kolvenbach ’88, Love Song is an “off-kilter” comedy centered around four characters: playful Harry; his high-strung wife, Joan; her quirky brother, Beane; and his mysterious girlfriend, Molly. The characters interact in different pairings and occasionally as threes, but never all together for reasons made clear in the play’s final scenes. In this production, 10 actors (for nine of whom Love Song is a first performance at Midd), take turns playing these four characters.
About the First Year Show: “ The Theater Department selects actors, a stage manager and an assistant to the director from a large group of freshmen and sophomore-feb hopefuls, then pairs them with a director who’s a recent alum.” (thanks, JP)
Good: Some great performances by newcomers. Standouts included Charlotte Michaelcheck ’15 who opened the show as a hysterical, totally-but-not-annoyingly neurotic Joan, and Adam Milano ’15 who starred alongside her as Harry. He seemed to genuinely love pushing her buttons. Chelsea Melone ’15 was a stellar Joan as well. // Transitions: switching roles posed a challenge, but the cast made them work with momentary mirroring and the use of a single prop to transfer from one actor to the next.
Bad: As with most shows on opening night, there were a few minor line flubs. I expect the show will only get better as the weekend goes on. // Having different actors play the same role is risky; there were times when I felt like the Mollys were a little too dissimilar. Overall, though, the cast navigated the roles well.
Contextual Rating: If you have something important to do this weekend,
…do it, and see this show if you can.
…put it off and see Love Song. Bring the parents, why don’t ya?!
…skip it. SEE THIS SHOW.
“Love Song” in the Hepburn Zoo. Three more shows: Friday at 8:00 and 10:30, Saturday at 8:00. Tickets $4.
Lamb Chop and the Mint Jam perform a show in a social house. Hopefully there will be more concerts happening with the help of MMU
A little less than a month ago, MiddBlog posted an article about Midd’s hardly happening music scene and Middlebury Musicians United (MMU)‘s mission to turn things around. MMU has revamped its approach to livening the social scene by actively recruiting musicians and promoting the formation of new bands. With access to a multitude of venues and the purchase of brand spankin’ new equipment for the recording studio and practice space, MMU is forging ahead in their quest to shake things up on the social front.
It’s been a few weeks since the start of school and many bands have started to get their wheels rolling, so I decided to check in with MMU president Mike Gadomski ’13.5 to get an update on MMU’s progress and find out what music events are going down this weekend. Read more
Sep 27
Diaz signs copies of The Brief and Wonderous Life of Oscar Wao after his lecture
Junot Diaz, author of the Pulitzer Prize winning novel The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, walked up to the podium in Mead Chapel wearing sneakers, dark jeans and a hoodie over his t-shirt. He then thanked several faculty members in the audience he knew, including Julia Alvarez, ending by saying “You guys are lucky to go here, this place is fuckin’ jacked.” This set the tone for the evening, an honest and informal discussion of one of the biggest books of the 2000′s.
Mead Chapel surprisingly was not even close to capacity, making me wonder “Where the hell is everyone? This is one of the hottest, most important authors of the past decade, what are people’s priorities?” They really missed out, because tonight’s talk was way better (in my opinion) than Ian McEwan’s dry lecture last fall, which did draw a full house in Mead. Read more
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