”Corteo” models its costumes and acts on turn-of-the-century Europe. The title is Italian, meaning “procession,” and the atmosphere is a mix of Sicily and vaudeville. Many of the men wear fedoras, suspenders, and seersucker outfits, while the women wear dresses and bloomers. Cirque clowns always have an old-fashioned bag of tricks – props, pratfalls – but the “Corteo” clowns look old-fashioned, like Depression-era hobos. For the moment, Cirque had dropped the “nouveau.” This is the kind of circus your great-grandfather used to see.
“Descent into the Inferno,” playing this weekend at the Butoh Dance Festival, is based on “The Aeneid” by the Roman poet Virgil. In theory, the performance tells the story of the founding of Rome. But under the direction of Fred Herrera, this special Butoh performance promises to disorient and confound the viewer.
By painting important figures in the nation’s history, Tomás Povedano helped an entire generation of schoolchildren understand their place in the world. When many of these paintings were adapted as plates for printing money, the artist helped establish the colón as contemporary currency.
This year, William Shakespeare turned 450 years old. To celebrate, Lugiérnaga Producciones is offering a course on how to perform Elizabethan monologues.
