Interludes

VIEWPOINTS – THE BEST OF 2020: Theater, Music/Cabaret, and Dance

• By drediman
• January 1, 2021
• No Comments

In all respects, 2020 was a stunted year, and few industries was hit harder than the performing arts. Nonetheless, out of the rubble, defiant gems arose – sometimes in the unlikeliest of places. In no particular order, here are my picks for the best in the performing arts during the year that shall not be named.

Caveat: To level the playing field, I’ve only included projects that occurred after the March shutdown. Extra points went to endeavors that resourcefully thought outside the box to deliver the joys of live performance, either virtually or in-person (socially-distanced, of course).

BEST IN THEATER

The Plastic Bag Store (in real life, or “IRL”)
Pomegranate Arts / Times Square Arts
Robin Frohardt’s sneakily urgent cautionary tale about the fate of humanity was playful, immersive, and — unexpectedly — epic.

A Thousand Ways (IRL)
600 Highwaymen
A phone call with a stranger turned into a potent and deeply moving reminder of the essence of theater and storytelling.

Circle Jerk (Live-stream)
Fake Friends
Michael Breslin and Patrick Foley channeled the high ridiculousness of Charles Ludlum and the manic thrill of creating live theater.

Fly Away (IRL)
Petzel Gallery
Derek Fordjour’s exquisite puppet show artfully contributed to the BLM conversation, particularly as it relates to the Black Artist.

Theater in Quarantine (Live-stream)
TiQ Mastermind Joshua William Gelb conjured theatrical alchemy from his tiny closet in high concept works such as The 7th Voyage of Egon Tichy and I Am Sending You the Sacred Face.

Manual Cinema (Live-stream & on-demand)
The singular multimedia collective celebrated its 10th anniversary with a generous retrospective. It also gave us a disarming live-steamed Christmas Carol.

Dot. Dot. Dot. (Live-stream)
Lawrence Batley Theatre
Daniel Kitson, lovably neurotic as ever, hit the nose – aggressively – in his latest solo rant about the pandemic.

The Third Day: Autumn (Live-stream)
Punchdrunk / Plan B Entertainment / Sky Studios
The folks at Punchdrunk et al. put Jude Law through the ringer in this audacious and immersive 12-hour single take on a creepy island.

Apple Family: Life in Zoom (On-demand)
The Public Theater / Apple Family Productions
Richard Nelson, true to form, once again took the pulse of the nation in real time in a trio of gentle Zoom plays featuring his beloved Apple family.

Theatre for One: Here We Are (Live-stream)
Brookfield Place
Imagine having a (micro) play performed only for you in a virtual room and you get the picture; an eye-opening exercise in connection in an age of isolation.

Honorable Mention: Eliza Bent’s Karen, I Am (Live-stream), Christopher McElroen’s Static Apnea (IRL), Gelsey Bell’s Cairns (On-demand/IRL)

BEST IN MUSIC AND CABARET

Riz Ahmed: The Long Goodbye (Live-stream)
BAM / Manchester International Festival
Both deeply personal and explosively confrontational, Mr. Ahmed’s ferocious reckoning was exactly the kind of no-nonsense, lucid dissection of the race problem we needed.

An Evening with Audra McDonald (Live-stream)
New York City Center
City Center’s annual gala had me falling in love with the six-time Tony winner’s lustrous soprano and down-to-earth persona all over again.

Justin Vivian Bond: Good Morning Midnight, It’s Christmas (Live-stream)
Joe’s Pub
V gave us a uniquely skittish but ultimately sensitive holiday cabaret act that was especially appropriate for 2020.

Seth Rudetsky & James Wesley: Stars in the House (Live-stream)
Seth Rudetsky and husband James Wesley’s remarkably long-running series was a godsend all throughout the pandemic. They deserve MVP accolades for their relentless support of displaced theater artists.

Heather Christian: Prime & I Am Sending You the Sacred Face (On-demand)
Playwrights Horizons / Theater in Quarantine
This year, Heather Christian explored spirituality in hew own quirky way in these addictive musical nuggets.

David Greenspan: Wartime Canteen for a New Era (IRL)
En Garde Arts
From the stoop of a Brooklyn brownstone, Mr. Greenspan, in a gutsy move, gave many their first taste of in-person performance in many months. Do we have a budding cabaret star here?

Birdland Jazz Club (IRL)
For a few hopeful weeks, the storied Midtown jazz club opened its doors to present talents like Billy Stritch and Natalie Douglas live on the stage of its subterranean theater. It was definitely fun while it lasted.

Don’t Tell Mama (IRL)
The longstanding Restaurant Row establishment defiantly kept the flame alive this fall/winter with a series of spirited outdoor performances, even when indoor dining was halted for the second time.

54 Below Premieres (On-demand)
Feinstein’s / 54 Below
“Broadway’s Living Room” made a splash this holiday season with a trio of filmed shows. Each was gorgeously captured in HD, establishing a new high standard for viewing virtual cabaret acts.

Ellen Reid: Soundwalk (On-demand/IRL)
New York Philharmonic
Pulitzer Prize-winning composer Ellen Reid’s innovative and interactive composition brought aural majesty to my many walks through Central Park during the pandemic.

Honorable Mention: San Francisco Orchestra’s Throughline: From Hall to Home (On-demand)

BEST IN DANCE

Finally Unfinished: Part 1 (Live-stream)
The Joyce Theater
Pam Tanowitz’s captivating and experimental new work was an austere but poetic love letter to The Joyce Theater. Strangely engrossing.

State of Darkness (Live-stream)
The Joyce Theater
No less than seven accomplished dancers (including the great Sara Mearns) took on Molissa Fenley’s grueling 1988 solo, resulting in a harrowing, surprisingly varied marathon.

Fall for Dance (Live-stream)
New York City Center
Always a popular draw, 2020’s virtual FFD programming featured four satisfying world premiere commissions, including a wistful pas de deux with Sara Mearns and David Hallberg.

Voyeur: The Windows of Toulouse-Lautrec (IRL)
Bated Breath Theatre Company
The immersive downtown production reimagines the life of the iconic French artist through a series of tableaus that frame dance in unexpected, dynamic ways.

Alvin Ailey American Dance Theater (On-demand)
This December, Alvin Ailey was one of the few dance companies to assemble some semblance of a season, which included two notable world premieres.

American Ballet Theatre (On-demand)
In four premieres, Ballet Theatre effectively reimagined itself into a more inclusive and open-minded institution.

Nederlands Dans Theater (On-demand)
NDT bid farewell to Paul Lightfoot and Sol León in high style with the lavishly filmed Standby and She Remembers.

On Pointe (On-demand)
Disney Plus
Thoughtfully chronicling a year at SAB, the Disney documentary series is an inspiring ode to the capacity of children and young adults to thrive.

Move (On-demand)
Netflix
On Netflix, another dance documentary enthralled, profiling some of contemporary dance’s most prominent choreographers in accessible, fresh ways.

The Nutcracker at Wethersfield (IRL & on-demand)
BalletCollective
Kudos to Troy Schumacher for having the vision and the organizational know-how (especially in these difficult times) to muster the troops to present what many of us have secretly pined for – a successfully immersive staging of The Nutcracker.