Review

Connect the dots
By Aasimah Navlakhi
November 5, 2011 - 9:28pm
Keynote speaker Alec Soth inspires at the SPE Conference
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Bat Boy flaps, doesn't fly
By Lauren Smart
November 2, 2011 - 3:47pm
Review: The bizarre musical at The Red House spooks viewers this Halloween season.

If you give a Bat Boy a home, he’s going to ask for an education. If you give a Bat Boy an education, he’s going to ask to attend a church revival. Obviously.

If you’ll play along with the campy storyline, Red House Arts Center's latest production, “Bat Boy: The Musical” delivers the energy required by this fun show. But if you’re looking for theatrical genius, you will surely be disappointed.

Spin Doctors bring 20 years of Kryptonite to Syracuse
By Erin Carson
October 22, 2011 - 12:31pm
Review: The 90s rockers played their hit album Pocket Full of Kryptonite in its entirety at The Westcott Theater

The audience at The Westcott Theater was split Friday night.

On one hand there were run-of-the-mill college kids – 90s babies. On the other, a crowd of folks who might have passed for their parents.

Alec Soth Reveals A Gritty America
By Amy Brueckman
October 13, 2011 - 8:38am
Review: Photography exhibit shows abandonment, loneliness, and the everyday person

If you're looking for bright, colorful photographs of cute kids and pretty neighborhoods, you won't find them in Alec Soth's exhibition at the Everson Museum of Art. And that's a good thing.

Symphony Syracuse met with warm welcome
By Leah Harrison
October 10, 2011 - 4:56pm
Review: Local musicians bring symphonic music back to Syracuse after the bankruptcy of the SSO.

Sunday's Symphony Syracuse concert delivered two things: music and a message. This organization—meant to serve as a lifeboat to symphonic music after the declared bankruptcy of the Syracuse Symphony Orchestra—made a case for themselves through several impassioned speeches, but more convincingly, by playing beautifully together.

Joni Mitchell: Courting blackness and sparking music
By Kelundra Smith
October 9, 2011 - 11:56am
Review: Eric Lott explains Joni Mitchell's "Pimp Game" and more.

An icon of musicians, flower children and their children alike, Joni Mitchell has proven to be more than a product of 60s and 70s counterculture. Born Roberta Joan Anderson on Nov. 7, 1943 in Ft. Mcleod, Canada, her music has been sampled and covered by numerous artists from Prince to Crosby Stills and Nash.

Chairs to make you sit down and think
By Sarah Desantis
October 3, 2011 - 6:48pm
The 'Furnished' exhibit features faculty-made furniture at Slocum Hall.

Often, furniture reflects on the building it inhabits. Because of the close relationship between the two, the subject of Syracuse University School of Architecture’s exhibition, 'Furnished', should be no surprise. 

Syracuse Stage opens season with The Turn of the Screw
By Leah Stacy
September 25, 2011 - 12:03pm
Review: Jeffrey Hatcher’s adaptation is a do-it-yourself ghost story

A rainy Friday night greeted the 39th season opener of Syracuse Stage: American novelist Henry James’ ghost story The Turn of the Screw. A thick audience streamed in for the performance, swaddled in raincoats and peeking from under dripping umbrellas.  

Sex is power in 'Lysistrata'
By Diep Tran
February 25, 2011 - 12:22am
"Lysistrata" at SU Drama or, how many times can you say "sex" in a review? The answer, not enough.

If anyone is wondering where their socks went, look in the obscenely tight pants of the male cast members in Lysistrata, now being performed by SU Department of Drama. It features numerous male cast members in their underwear, which inevitably gives rise to the question: “Is it real or stuffed?”

For this bawdy sexual comedy, this kind of thinking is necessary to enjoying it. So lay back and get in position.

'Love Letters' or 'Hate Mail'? Maybe Just Call
By Diep Tran
February 13, 2011 - 2:45pm
Not Another Theater Company's double feature production of "Love Letters" and "You've Got Hate Mail" illuminates the problem of miscommunication in relationships.

It’s said, through advice columns, self-help books, and many (many, many) romantic comedies, that the most important aspect in a relationship is communication. In the Not Another Theater Company’s double feature of plays, “Love Letters” and “You’ve Got Hate Mail,” in light of Cupid day, that sentiment rings especially true.