Times Square Gossip

Czechoslovak American Marionette Theatre NEW YORK – "The New World Symphony: Dvorák in America" is a puppet and object theater work examining the influence of African-American and Native American music upon the great 19th-century Czech composer Antonín Dvorák (1841-1904). The piece is written and directed by Vít Horejš and performed by Czechoslovak American Marionette Theatre. It traces how Dvorák helped America accept its beautiful multicultural musical traditions by his enthusiasm for African-American and Native American music during his short but influential time in the USA. La MaMa Theatre will present the play's world premiere run March 10 to 27, 2016 in its Ellen Stewart Theatre, 66 East 4th Street (East Village). Composer and Musical Director is saxophonist James Brandon Lewis. The piece depicts Dvorák's creative and family life during his tenure as the Director of the National Conservatory of Music of America in NYC, and the highlights ...

Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre Czechoslovak-American Marionette Theatre returns to the Jan Hus Playhouse, 351 East 74th Street, April 10 to May 4 with "Don Juan, or Wages of Debauchery," conceived and directed by Vit Horejs, adapted and directed from an anonymous play of itinerant puppeteers. In 18th century Europe, Don Juan ("Don Shayn") was among the top "hits" of the Czech marionette repertoire. The only theatre truly available in small towns and villages were shows by itinerant puppeteers. Their plays were a whimsical mixture of "Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous," heroic legends, and rudimentary pre-Shakespearean tragedies. There is nothing very glamorous about the character of Don Juan in the Czech puppet play--he ends up as a common robber, hungry, rejected by all his former conquests and riled constantly by his inept servant Kasparek, the earthy Bohemian cousin of Mr. Punch and Leporello. The produc...