Shoreline inspirations
Paddle out catch it “Swell” rises at the Manhattan Beach Art Center by Bondo Wyszpolski The opening last Friday of “Swell” gathered high-fives in place of hang-tens; it’s an exhibition of surf-and-sea inspired art that sidesteps traditional imagery (surfers and surfboards) and focuses more on the materials used to evoke the combined effects of sand, […]
If the Founding Fathers had been Founding Mothers
The revolution continues “1776” at the Ahmanson features an all-female, gender-expansive cast by Bondo Wyszpolski John Cage is quoted as saying, “I like being moved. I don’t like being pushed,” and I’ve sensed that many viewers of “1776,” in the production recreated by directors Jeffrey L. Page and Diane Paulus, have felt not so much […]
Temperature rising
“Dimanche” at the Broad Stage pleases and provokes by Bondo Wyszpolski I received an extra graduate degree at UCLA simply by attending dozens and dozens of theatrical and musical performances in Royce Hall, Schoenberg Hall, and the Freud Playhouse. Most of these took place a very long time ago but I was thinking of them […]
An ancient castle, a primeval forest, and forbidden love
Somewhere in time Debussy’s “Pelléas et Mélisande” at the Music Center by Bondo Wyszpolski It’s always autumn in a Symbolist work of art, often lit by the pale, fading light of dusk. And even if that’s not quite the case every time it’s elevated and exemplified in Claude Debussy’s dreamily sensual opera which he composed […]
All she needs is wealth, culture, and social standing
Rags to Riches A big hand for “Little Me” in Manhattan Beach by Bondo Wyszpolski The Manhattan Beach Community Church Theatre began with a few productions in the latter 1950s, and then really went to town in the ‘80s and hasn’t stopped since. While we often speak of theater groups as companies, this one seems […]
Child drama, adult trauma
Scattered leaves “The Secret Garden” wilts at the Ahmanson by Bondo Wyszpolski In the 1911 novel by Frances Hodgson Burnett a cholera epidemic sweeps through British India and 10-year-old Mary Lennox is orphaned, then sent to Uncle Archibald Craven in Yorkshire, to a forlorn mansion that would be at home in a gothic tale by […]
Poetic license
Sensible and sensitive Jess Morton’s transition from physics to poetry by Bondo Wyszpolski For half a century, JB Kennedy sold secondhand books, moving from one South Bay beach town to another. My initial encounter with him was in the late 1970s when his bookstore was on Pier Avenue in Hermosa Beach. He later owned a […]
Art, yes; grace and beauty
Pictures from an exhibition The art looked nice, and so did many of those in attendance by Bondo Wyszpolski The LA Art show is up through Sunday, Feb. 19, in the West Hall at the LA Convention Center, 1201 S. Figueroa St., Los Angeles. I took a few photos, and here are some of them. […]
Music of the spheres at Disney Hall
Starlight, star bright To the heavens with the Los Angeles Master Chorale by Bondo Wyszpolski Well, with one thing and another, I’ve missed attending performances by the L.A. Master Chorale, but I’m grateful to have attended “Choose Something Like a Star” this past Sunday at the Walt Disney Concert Hall. The program, conducted by Grant […]
Founding fathers found in Torrance
John Adams, rock star The Aerospace Players fly high with “1776” by Bondo Wyszpolski Okay, there were some tech issues and so forth on opening night, but the large and mostly amateur cast that staged the musical “1776” pulled it off. And quite well, actually. We’re talking about the 1969 work with music and lyrics […]
Motown melodies
The musical legends of Motor City “Ain’t Too Proud to Beg–The Life and Times of the Temptations” (a review) by Bondo Wyszpolski For some viewers this is a new experience – Ah, so that’s what it was like! – and for others it may be a two-hour trip into the past, immersed in the era’s […]
Meanwhile, down in San Pedro…
Making a show of it Ron Linden has championed artists for over two decades by Bondo Wyszpolski When the gallery director resigned from Los Angeles Harbor College, Jay McCafferty knew who to ask to take over her position. “And I said sure,” Ron Linden recalls. “I’d had limited experience when I was fresh out of […]
Bringing that blank page to life
“Novelist as a Vocation,” by Haruki Murakami, trans. by Philip Gabriel and Ted Goossen (Alfred A. Knopf, 208 pp, $28) by Bondo Wyszpolski With over 20 books available in English, Haruki Murakami is the most widely-read Japanese author in this country. His recent novels include “Killing Commendatore” and “Colorless Tsukuru Tazaki and His Years of […]
Roots of the Romantic era
“Magnificent Rebels”, by Andrea Wulf (Alfred A. Knopf, 495 pp, $35) by Bondo Wyszpolski I suppose not many people in this country have heard of Jena, which in the late 18th and early 19th centuries had a population of about 4,500. It was, however, a university town, and for some years an oasis of free […]
It’s spider season in Palos Verdes!
Spiders from Mars… and other 8-legged wonders by Bondo Wyszpolski Visitors to the Spider Pavilion, a tent-like enclosure at the South Coast Botanic Garden, are greeted near the entrance by a tarantula of gargantuan proportions. It’s either a signal to turn around and go home or to bravely step forward and enjoy your arachnid experience. […]
Step right up, folks! Circus Vargas is back
All aboard for the “Circus Vargas Express” Thrills and chills under the big top by Bondo Wyszpolski The pandemic hasn’t been kind to traveling shows of any sort (when was the last time you saw an ad for Cirque du Soleil?), but there’s been a gradual comeback, and among those who’ve taken to the road […]