A deceptively simple tale: Dmitry Gurov, a comfortable, middle-aged husband, father and womanizer, has a casual affair with Anna Sergeyevna, an unhappy young wife, while vacationing in Yalta; to his amazement, the jaded Gurov falls in love for the first time in his life, just as Anna does with him.. Kama Ginkas has made a career of creating powerful theater based on the prose of classic Russian authors, including Fyoor Dostoevsky, Alexander Pushkin...

Seductive, fearless, and outrageous, Marina Abramovic has been redefining what art is for nearly forty years. Using her own body as a vehicle, pushing herself beyond her physical and mental limits––and at times risking her life in the process––she creates performances that challenge, shock, and move us. Through her and with her, boundaries are crossed, consciousness expanded, and art as we know it is reborn. She is, quite simply, one of the...

Episode five highlights the Taco Shop Poets of Southern California, early tent theater of the Southwest called Carpas, and performance art in San Francisco. Performance artists covered include Guillermo Gomez-PeA±a, performance troupe ASCO, and the performance art pioneers Royal Chicano Airforce. The Taco Shop Poets, a group of Chicano poets living in San Diego, blend the spoken word with lively beats. The poets strive to take their social and political...

The “Dance Theatre of Harlem’s” birthplace was in a disused garage in Harlem, a black district of New York. Arthur Mitchell, the founder who still acts as its artistic director, set up the ballet school with the aim of giving black dancers the opportunity of sound training, as their skin color meant that they often encountered difficulties finding employment with existing companies which consisted mainly of white dancers. Since its humble beginnings...

The Poetry Lounge: Self-Expression Through The Spoken Word is a free, multicultural open-forum for self-expression, inspiring young people to find their own voice and let it be heard. Hosted by award-winning Def Poets Shihan and Poetri, the "Lounge" has become the largest weekly open mic forum in the country, and was one of the inspirations for Russell Simmons' 2003 Tony-winning show, Def Poetry Jam. Taken from a recent Poetry Lounge event, this program...

Episode three features Luis Valdez and the legendary Teatro Campesino, a segment of San Antonio's Day of the Dead Celebration, the image of the Virgen de Guadalupe as a Latina icon, experimental border filmmaker Willie Varela, and a profile of Chicago's soapbox artist Carlos Cortez..

Richard Strauss completed his second-to-last opera “Die Liebe der Danae” in 1940. Written under war clouds, the “merry mythology” based on an idea by Hugo von Hofmannsthal was given a provisional, by-invitation-only dress rehearsal premiere at the 1944 Salzburg Festival the day before all theaters in the “Reich” were closed by order of the Ministry of Propaganda. The official world premiere took place at the 1952 Salzburg Festival –...

A literary and dramatic analysis of the key elements in Shakespeare’s most famous tragedy. ABOUT THE PROGRAM: This program is an enormously valuable historical, literary and dramatic analysis of the essence of Macbeth showing how the significant parts of the drama tie together with scenes from the play. Our expert hosts Rebecca Flynn and Gary Taylor introduce Macbeth The Tragic Pair using the stunning backdrop of the Scottish Highlands to lift the...

Don Florestan has been falsely imprisoned for threatening to expose the evil Don Pizarro. While he starves to death with other political prisoners his wife, Leonore tries to find him. She disguises herself as the young man, Fidelio, and wins the confidence of the gaoler, Rocco and his daughter Marzelline. Sir Peter Hall’s outstanding 1979 Glyndebourne Festival Opera production of Fidelio remains remarkably faithful to the way Beethoven intended...

The award winning PBS series VISIONES: LATINO ART & CULTURE, is a journey through the music, words, dance, painting and performance of rich Latino cultures made more complex and fascinating by their history in our country. The series explores how contemporary Latino artists continue to build on rich traditions that reflect a unique multi-ethnic experience, taking established art forms and reinventing them, constantly challenging themselves and the...