Arts

Trinity’s delicately balanced Merchant of Venice

The light and the dark
The Merchant of Venice gives modern audiences a lot to think and talk about — including, we can forget, a surprising amount of comedy. But the main concern is it being such a head-shaking case study of the era's anti-Semitism.

By: BILL RODRIGUEZ | February 15, 2012

A supersized Mary Poppins at PPAC

The bitter and the sweet
There's no secret why the hit musical Mary Poppins has filled more than 9 million seats around the world over the last seven years.

By: BILL RODRIGUEZ | February 15, 2012

The ‘2012 RISCA Fellowship Exhibition’

Bright spots
Last weekend The New York Times proclaimed Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning , the debut video game of former Red Sox pitcher and outspoken Republican millionaire Curt Schilling's 38 Studios, "one of the finest action role-playing games yet made."

By: GREG COOK | February 15, 2012

Interview: Alice Bag of Stay at Home Bomb

Once a punk rocker, always a punk rocker
Alice Bag (nee Armendariz), who shone bright in the Los Angeles punk scene of the late-1970s, will be in town Saturday to read from her book Violence Girl: East L.A. Rage to Hollywood Stage and to play a few tunes at 7 pm at Rochambeau Library.

By: DAVID SCHARFENBERG | February 10, 2012

‘Valentined’ showcases geek love at Craftland

Heart-felt
These missives don't have the swooning, steamy, bodice-ripping passion of romance novel covers.

By: GREG COOK | February 08, 2012

A knee-slapping Lend Me a Tenor at PC

Hilarious high notes
As hilarious as the race for the Republican presidential nomination is, even that is no competition for Ken Ludwig's Lend Me a Tenor.

By: BILL RODRIGUEZ | February 01, 2012

‘Taoist Gods’ and ‘Immortals’ at Brown and RISD

The language of aesthetics
As China marked the beginning of the Year of the Dragon with lion and dragon dances and fireworks last week, Brown University's Haffenreffer Museum of Anthropology was debuting "Taoist Gods from China: Ceremonial Paintings from the Mien".

By: GREG COOK | January 31, 2012

2nd Story’s Take Me Out

A dramatic grand slam
Ironic, isn't it? To your ordinary man in the street or workplace, masculinity usually isn't an issue. Yet macho scale rankings readily come up in professional sports, where prowess should be enough evidence of testosterone levels.

By: BILL RODRIGUEZ | January 25, 2012

Myoda and Pender in ‘Illuminations’ at Chazan Gallery

Tricks of the light
Paul Myoda's kinetic sculptures are beautiful and unsettling.

By: GREG COOK | January 24, 2012

The Gamm’s Festen is a fractured family tale

Secrets and lies
A certain lugubrious prince had a difficult time in another Danish household, but that was all tea and sympathy compared to the turbulent family in Festen .

By: BILL RODRIGUEZ | January 24, 2012

SALT showcases Lindsay-Abaire and Broccoli

Small pleasures
Intending to enhance the flavor of local theater, SALT (Stage Actors Live Theater) is presenting its second production at Artists' Exchange in Cranston through January 29.

By: BILL RODRIGUEZ | January 25, 2012

Ben Blanc’s intriguing ‘The Exchange’ at AS220

Selling an idea
Two hundred black wood sculptures, resembling abstracted chunks of coal from some old video game, are lined up on a shelf running around the room in Ben Blanc's installation "The Exchange" at AS220's Project Space (93 Mathewson Street, Providence, through January 28).

By: GREG COOK | January 17, 2012

Lyn Ford will tell her stories at Funda Fest 14

The power of sharing
I have always considered the art of storytelling one of the purest forms of theater: it runs the gamut of emotions, presents a wealth of diverse characters, and can almost literally hold you spellbound.

By: JOHNETTE RODRIGUEZ | January 11, 2012

Wilbury’s darkly humorous Exit the King

The reign man
Playwright Eugene Ionesco, a progenitor of Theater of the Absurd along with Samuel Beckett and Harold Pinter, put a lot of himself into Exit the King instead of keeping his usual ironic or satiric distance.

By: BILL RODRIGUEZ | January 11, 2012

‘Chicken Little’ and ‘Manchester Tracks’ at the RISD Museum

Discomfort and joy
The star of New York painter Nancy Chunn's epic installation "Chicken Little and the Culture of Fear" at the RISD Museum (224 Benefit Street, Providence, through April 15) is the fabled fowl — you know, the one who mistakenly thought the sky was falling.

By: GREG COOK | January 10, 2012