Tag Archives: Center for the Art of Performance at UCLA (CAP UCLA)

KYLE ABRAHAM — DEAREST HOME

The great dancer and choreographer Kyle Abraham brings a special presentation of his work DEAREST HOME—“an interactive dance work developed over multiple years, focusing on love, longing and loss”—to UCLA, where he is a faculty member in the department of World Arts and Cultures/Dance.*

The various solos, duets, and small groups that make up DEAREST HOME will be performed “in the round,” with a score by Jerome Begin that is optional – depending on whether you chose to wear the seatside headphones or not.

KYLE ABRAHAM—DEAREST HOME

Thursday through Saturday, April 5, 6, and 7, at 8 pm; Saturday, April 7, at 3 pm.

FREUD PLAYHOUSE, UCLA, 245 Charles E. Young Drive East, Los Angeles.

* cap.ucla.edu/kyleabraham

Above: Jeremy Jae Neal, Vinson Fraley, Jr., and Catherine Ellis Kirk, in Dearest Home.

Below: Connie Shiau, Matthew Baker, and Tamisha Guy.

Photographs by Carrie Schneider. Image credit: Abraham.In.Motion.

TAYLOR MAC IN LOS ANGELES

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Near the end of his recent T magazine essay on queer theater and the landmark plays of Mart Crowley (The Boys in the Band), Tony Kushner (Angels in America), Larry Kramer (The Normal Heart), Harvey Fierstein (Torch Song Trilogy), and Paul Rudnick (Jeffrey), Jesse Green wrote:

“Among the new works I’ve actually seen, the only… piece that rises to the level of those I’ve beatified is Taylor Mac’s A 24-DECADE HISTORY OF POPULAR MUSIC… Miraculously, it combines Kushner’s vision, Kramer’s anger, Crowley’s cattiness, Fierstein’s warmth and Rudnick’s wit (plus a whole lot else) into one subversive astonishment…”*

Prepare to be astonished as Taylor brings his complete magnum opus to Los Angeles, starting this week. Each chapter in this CAP UCLA presentation in downtown L.A. comprises a 6-hour performance.

TAYLOR MAC—A 24-DECADE HISTORY OF POPULAR MUSIC

CHAPTER 1 (1776-1836), Thursday, March 15, at 6 pm.

CHAPTER II (1836-1896), Saturday, March 17, at 6 pm.

CHAPTER III (1896-1956), Thursday, March 22, at 6 pm.

CHAPTER IV (1956-2016), Saturday, March 24, at 6 pm.

THEATRE AT ACE HOTEL, 929 South Broadway, downtown Los Angeles.

cap.ucla.edu/taylor_mac

* Jesse Green, “A Brief History of Gay Theater, in Three Acts,” T, New York Times, March 4, 2018, 79:

nytimes.com/gay-theater-history

See: “A Time to Be Born: Taylor Mac in Conversation with Barlo Perry,” PARIS LA 15:

cap.ucla.edu/PARIS_LA_15_Taylor_Mac

Taylor Mac in Brooklyn, autumn 2016. Photographs by Teddy Wolff.

ABDULLAH IBRAHIM — FOR HUGH MASEKELA

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This weekend at Royce Hall, Abdullah Ibrahim & Ekaya will celebrate the late Hugh Masekela and pay tribute to South Africa’s first black jazz band The Jazz Epistles—the collaboration between the Dollar Brand Trio from Cape Town, Kippie Moeketsi from Johannesburg, and Moeketsi’s protégés Jonas Gwangwa and Masekela.

(Dollar Brand would later be known as Abdullah Ibrahim and his Trio, with Johnny Gertze on bass, and Early Mabuza or Makaya Ntshoko on drums. At the Royce Hall concert, Freddie Hendrix will play trumpet.)

“Mr. Ibrahim’s stark pianism and gently rapturous compositions are steeped in the bright harmonies and bouncing rhythms of his native Cape Town, and they seem to suggest that escape or transcendence could almost be possible. But then there’s the inevitable longing for home, for harmony, for rest. He lives in that balance.”*

ABDULLAH IBRAHIM & EKAYA IN TRIBUTE TO THE JAZZ EPISTLES, Saturday, March 3, at 8 pm.

ROYCE HALL, UCLA, 10745 Dickson Court, Los Angeles.

cap.ucla.edu/jazz_epistles

* nytimes.com/jazz-epistles-abdullah-ibrahim-review

hughmasekela.co.za/family-statement

abdullahibrahim.co.za

Abdullah Ibrahim.

ON LINCOLN

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“If destruction be our lot, we must ourselves be its author and finisher. As a nation of freemen, we must live through all time, or die by suicide.” — Abraham Lincoln

Tony Kushner (Angels in America and the screenplay for Lincoln) and Sarah Vowell (Assassination Vacation) will examine the life and legacy of Abraham Lincoln this week at Royce Hall.

TONY KUSHNER AND SARAH VOWELL IN CONVERSATION

THE LINCOLN LEGACY—THE MAN AND HIS PRESIDENCY, Thursday, February 22, at 8 pm.

ROYCE HALL, UCLA, 10745 Dickson Court, Los Angeles.

ucla.edu/kushner_vowell

Gloria Reuben, Sally Field, and Daniel Day-Lewis in Lincoln (2012). Image credit: DreamWorks.

OKWUI OKPOKWASILI AT REDCAT

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In a Los Angeles premiere, the great Okwui Okpokwasili brings her POOR PEOPLE’S TV ROOM to Redcat for a long weekend of performances.

Mixing music and video with “ritualistic and hallucinogenic movement,” Okpokwasili and collaborator Peter Born create a dystopian dreamscape, investigating the erasure of Nigerian women’s resistance movements by means of collective amnesia and apathy.

POOR PEOPLE’S TV ROOM is performed by actor, singer, dancer, choreographer, director Thuli Dumakude; performance artist and writer Katrina Reid; dancer, choreographer, educator, and activist Nehemoyia Young; and Okpokwasili.

This program is part of the Sharon Disney Lund Dance Series in association with CAP UCLA.

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OKWUI OKPOKWASILI—POOR PEOPLE’S TV ROOM, Thursday through Saturday, February 8 through 10, at 8:30 pm. Sunday, February 11, at 7 pm.

REDCAT, Disney Hall, Music Center, downtown Los Angeles.

redcat.org/event/okwui-okpokwasili

Above: Okwui Okpokwasili.

Below: Katrina Reid (left) and Okwui Okpokwasili in Poor People’s TV Room. Photograph by Paul B. Goode. Image credit: New York Live Arts.