Broome Arts Mirror – Local Theatre Reviews
The Broome Arts Mirror is a group of volunteers affiliated with the Broome County Arts Council who write previews and reviews about local performances and arts shows. For inquiries, including having someone review your local production, please contact us at bamirror@broomearts.org.
Last chance today to catch commendable 'Last Five Years'
Reviewed by Lee Shepherd What a sad and poignant story is The Last Five Years, staged by SRO Productions III for the past two weekends at the Schorr Family Firehouse Stage in Johnson City. The story – the romance, marriage and break-up of two folks who move New York City to make [...]
BU students offer delightful take on 'Tartuffe'
Reviewed by Lory Martinez This past weekend (April 24-26) audiences piled into Watters Theater at Binghamton University for Tartuffe, the classic French farce by Molière. The production, translated by Richard Wilbur and directed by Tom Kremer, is full of surprises, laughs and well-acted satire. As a student of French literature [...]
Were the arts part of your weekend?
Spring has sprung (well, sort of), and more folks are getting out and about. Please share with your fellow BAMirror readers what you have been doing in the arts lately. Was it Master Class at EPAC? The Last Five Years from SRO? A gallery exhibit? A bar band? An [...]
Gregori owns role of Callas in EPAC’s 'Master Class'
Reprising the role for the fifth (and certainly not the last) time with her company, Theatre Street Productions, Andrea Gregori this weekend is bringing her signature portrayal of diva Maria Callas to the Endicott Performing Arts Center. This not-to-be-missed performance, previously presented regionally at the Ti-Ahwaga Playhouse in Owego, the Roberson Center [...]
'Danny Collins' is a Hollywood film in the best of ways
Reviewed by Patrick Hao There is a genre of Hollywood movies that can be classified as nothing other than “charming.” These movies bathe Hollywood in a conceptual sleekness, in which big stars play on their charisma and persona and stakes are just high enough to warrant investment that is [...]
World premiere only one of many treats at BPO concert
Reviewed by Lee Shepherd The Binghamton Philharmonic Orchestra’s concert Saturday (April 18) at Binghamton University – dubbed “Framed Artistry” -- offered a gripping and exciting armchair adventure tour of Iran, Spain and Russia. No passport required! All the works were “programmatic,” that is, evoking scenes and places, with “you [...]
Organist Phillips heads thrilling performance
Reviewed by Lee Shepherd Craig Phillips is a distinguished organist and composer of organ and choral music. If anyone had any doubt about that, they weren’t after his concert Sunday afternoon (April 19) at Binghamton’s United Presbyterian Church, where he played to a select, but appreciative audience. Philips, who [...]
Life imitates art, sort of, in Cider Mill’s 'Stage Kiss'
Reviewed by Nancy Oliveri I got the feeling while trying to follow the action in the Cider Mill Playhouse’s production of Stage Kiss, that playwright Sarah Ruhl has more than a few gripes about theater people. She takes swipes at writers, actors and directors, painting most of them as the jerks she [...]
TCO 'Faust' pleases audience despite some disappointing performances
Reviewed by Sherri Strichman Tri-Cities Opera’s final production of the season, Gounod's Faust, opened last night (April 17) to great audience approval, some of it well-deserved. The opera is adapted from Goethe’s tale of an aged scholar who has become so jaded with life that he has nothing to [...]
Superb cast brings 'Time Stands Still' to life
Reviewed by George Basler Photo journalist Sarah Goodwin (Amoreena Wade) has returned to her Brooklyn apartment with physical injuries and emotional scars from covering her latest war overseas. James Dodd (Eric Michael Patten), her writer boyfriend, is nursing her back to health while suffering from his own sense of [...]
"An Artistic Discovery" winners advance
At the Broome County Arts Council (BCAC), six student artists from area high schools have won awards in “An Artistic Discovery Broome County Congressional High School Art Competition. They now advance to the final round of competition sponsored by U.S. Representative Richard Hanna for high schools in the 22nd [...]
Orpheus: A Celebration of Love and Music
Reviewed by Patrick Hao: The Greek myth of Orpheus and Eurydice is a story of love, music and ultimately death. Those universal themes resonate throughout civilizations and cultures, making the story malleable to different cultures; from Stravinsky’s ballet, Orpheus, in 1948 to the Oscar-winning Marcel Camus film, Black Orpheus, [...]
Oscar-nominated film depicts microcosm of fundamentalism
Editor’s note: Today is your last chance to see Timbuktu at the Art Theater … and your first chance to read a review by BAMirror’s newest writer, Patrick Hao of Binghamton University. Reviewed by Patrick Hao In the opening scene of Abderrahmane Sissako’s Academy Award-nominated film, Timbuktu, the fundamentalist Islamic [...]
TCO debuts new look, new direction for 2015-2016 season
By Barb Van Atta To belabor a tonsorial metaphor, Tri-Cities Opera plans to continue grooming musical students and highlight rising stars in a 2015-2016 season bookended by the theatrical world’s most famous barbers: Figaro and Sweeney Todd. At a press conference today (March 24) at the 66-year-old company’s headquarters [...]
BPO Pops, Sinatra stylist bring a swinging time to Forum
Reviewed by George Basler The air was frigid outside The Forum Saturday night (March 21), but the atmosphere inside was warm and festive. There was a little touch of Las Vegas in the Binghamton night, and that made for a swinging evening. The good vibes came courtesy of the Binghamton Philharmonic Pops, some superb guest musicians and guest vocalist Steve Lippia, who for two solid hours [...]
