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Coming Home
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 By Kathy Finn
Once again, conductors will lift batons in the Mahalia Jackson Theatre
Like gifted vagabonds, they’ve traipsed from stage to stage during the past few years with instruments, costumes and equipment in tow. They performed in just about any space that would have them, never stopping in any place long enough to call it home.
Soon, for many of the city’s performing artists, that lifestyle will change. The Mahalia Jackson Theatre for the Performing Arts will open its doors to the public in January, three years and four months after floodwaters wrecked the theater and left its former occupants homeless. That same flood rendered several other major stages useless as well, including the grand old Orpheum Theater. (More) |
Connecting Up Close
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 By Keith Brannon
For intimacy with an audience, nothing tops cabaret.
Today she might be considered the “first lady” of local cabaret, but Barbara Motley knew she was courting trouble nine years ago when she opened Le Chat Noir Cabaret Theater in the Warehouse District.
At the time, the word “cabaret” conjured one of two images – either an upscale strip club or the 1972 film that starred Liza Minnelli.
“I got a lot of advice from everyone who said, ‘Call it a theater!’ ”Motley says. Friends warned her that audiences might get the wrong impression from the seemingly tawdry term.
Motley embraced the challenge and made it her mission to rehabilitate the genre by educating local audiences about the fine art of cabaret. Now, Le Chat is the epicenter of the city’s small, but active cabaret community. (More)
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First Act Food
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 By Keith Brannon
Where to dine before — or after — the performance
In a restaurant town like New Orleans, sometimes the hardest thing about a night out at the theater isn’t scoring tickets to the right show. It’s making a decision about where to eat.
There are so many options that audiences can choose a different restaurant for every show in a season and never go to the same place twice.
Fortunately, some restaurants make the choice easier with tempting offers aimed specifically at theatergoers. (More) |
A Conversation with Diana E.H. Shortes
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 By Kathy Finn
Events of recent years seem to have made New Orleans home to Diana Shortes, a performing artist who lately has focused on writing and performing works about the city and its history. In “The Baroness Undressed,” she examined the woman behind the Vieux Carré buildings called the Pontalba Apartments, and the incredible injustices the Baroness Pontalba endured at the hands of her relatives. In “Ventriloquist Verses,” Shortes explored loss and forgiveness in post-Katrina New Orleans. She has contributed to and collaborated on some 30 local productions during the past seven years.(More) |
A Beautiful Sight
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 By Kathy Finn
Performing arts activity is always a little frenzied at this time of year, so crowded event calendars come as no surprise. Still, is it just me, or is the action almost over the top?
The lineup of theatrical and musical offerings in November, December and January verges on mind-boggling. The only downside for local audiences is that it won’t be possible to catch every performance that’s worth witnessing. There’s just that much.
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Highlights of the Winter Season
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A Fringe of Our Own
The concept took root six decades ago in Edinburgh, Scotland, where independent theater folks — many of whom had been shoved to the fringes of mainstream theater in hot arts centers like London — got together to showcase their own talent. The Fringe Festival was born.
More than a dozen U.S. cities today have a Fringe Festival of their own, and this year New Orleans joins their ranks. The nonprofit New Orleans Fringe Inc. launches its first (hopefully annual) festival Nov. 13-16. The theater event aims to promote new and emerging theater by presenting it at affordable prices, in multiple settings, primarily in Marigny, Bywater and the French Quarter.(More) |
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