In March 2011, with his 90th birthday six months off, Hamilton recorded 28 new tracks with his Euphoria group that was assembled to become his new CD, Revelation.

From the Revelation CD liner notes by Maxwell Chandler: ”The excitement of new works from Chico is not derived from any absence as he has not stopped, nor is it due to the curiosity factor of seeing what type of artistic phase he is entering into. He does not create in that manner or care about such things, bringing the best of what he has found with him even if only as a component to further his forward moving trajectory. The excitement is due to the knowledge that here is an addition to the oeuvre of an artist who is the rare to find, possessor of freedom derived equally from intellect and soul.

You can catch Chico live at Drom May 20^th, playing with his Euphoria Group: Paul Ramsey on bass; Nick Demopoulos on guitar; Evan Schwan on sax,  Mayu Saeki on flute and Jeremy Carlstedt on percussion. They will be playing off  their recently released cd: Revelation.

Saluted by the Kennedy Center as a Living Jazz Legend, Hamilton is considered one of the most important living jazz artists and composers. A must-see event: www.dromnyc.com

Encore Mag: Tell us about Burlesque to Broadway.

Quinn Lemley: Burlesque to Broadway is a theatrical concert that celebrates the icons that broke through boundaries and went from burlesque, Broadway and beyond. It has it all! Sequins, feathers, fans, a hot ten-piece band, corny jokes of the era, provocative choreography, the girls and me! The music takes us on a journey from Irving Berlin to Tom Jones, there is something for everyone.

EM: Are you excited to be showing back in NYC?

QL: I am thrilled to be back in New York, especially at the historic Millennium Theatre. It’s a state of the art 1,400 seat theatre. Brighton Beach has so much to offer: great restaurants, markets, and the Millennium Theatre. Plus, it’s only 45 minutes from Times Square, and a block from the Q train! We have been touring over the past 3 years so it’s great to be back!

EM: As a performer who has toured the World, how do your experiences in New York differ from other cities?

QL: In New York, there is a theatre family, where you can find so much talent. There is so much to see and do, and you can get inspired by anything!

But it’s also interesting being on the road, I love it. Big cities are like smaller communities, but since it’s so big, it’s hard to feel and to see how the community is connected. In smaller communities it’s very transparent.

We were recently in Fairfield, Iowa at the Sondheim Center and at the Newberry Opera House in South Carolina; the theaters were the stimulus for economic growth and development. It brought people from miles away to eat in their great restaurants and to shop in their galleries and stores. So many industries are connected to the theater in some way. Theatre is an important part of economic and cultural development around the world.

EM: The show has been touring for some time now; do you feel that it has evolved since it premiered?

QL: Oh yes! The show started as a concept and has transformed and shaped itself. We’ve all grown and learned a lot developing this show. It’s been exciting to have the opportunity to see what works and what needed to change. The show is connected to the audience, there is no fourth wall. The audience is a huge part of the show, like a rock concert! Its energy, humor, and other things… you’ll have to come and find out!

It took awhile to get the right team, but we did. My girls, Natalie Loftin Bell, who plays Gracie, and Stacey Harris, who plays Raz, are fantastic triple threats and are a sheer delight to work with. We have so much fun, it’s one show stopping hit song after another!

The costumes by Wendall Goings are stunning and the choreography by Merete Muenter is provocative, while also telling a story in dance and movement, reflecting my storytelling throughout the show.

It has definitely been a process. I’m a perfectionist and I am passionate about this show. I demand the best out of our team, and out of myself. We are always growing — that’s what’s so exciting about live theatre, it’s in the moment, it’s connected, and it’s a shared experience.

EM: You did some writing for your previous projects, did you get to contribute to this one too?

QL: The Heat is On, my Rita Hayworth show, I collaborated with writer/director, Carter Inskeep on creating the story, which was a huge success. Burlesque to Broadway is my baby.

After the success of Rita, I needed another show.  My producer, Paul Horton didn’t want me to play someone else, I was ready to develop my own personality on stage.

I was always fascinated about Gypsy Rose Lee.  I wondered, “Outside of the musical, Gypsy, what did Gypsy Rose Lee do? What was her nightclub act like?” In doing so, I started reading all of the books on Gypsy, June Havoc, which lead me to study burlesque and its icons, like Fannie Brice, Mae West, Sally Rand, Cher, Bette Midler and now we have Lady Gaga.

They all pushed the boundaries which shaped and influenced, fashion, humor, music, television as we know it today. My God, they are still influencing art and culture, as we know it! I was able to weave their stories with my own experiences growing up learning about them as a child from my Grandmother.

EM: Is this a scripted show?

QL: In its essence, it’s a theatrical concert, like Bette Midler, Cher, Ann-Margret, Liza. It’s the next generation of shows that celebrate what these women created and is lacking today on the market. I grew up with the variety show. I’ll tell a story between songs, corny jokes from the period, but at the same time it sizzles in the modern day with dazzling costumes and show stopping music!

EM: You’re quite the admirer of the old Hollywood glamour. Do you think that it’s the elaborate gowns and hairstyles or the music that got you hooked?

QL: Both! Definitely! I love glamour. In style, I’m a contemporary throwback. I grew up with my Grandmother. She was so hip, she introduced me to all of the Hollywood stars, taught me about the standards and big bands…and burlesque! It was only natural to do a show on the life of Rita Hayworth and now celebrating the art of the tease with my ladies of Burlesque! I celebrate women and all who love them. What subject is better to celebrate? To sing the standards, with those great lyrics and gorgeous melodies, what’s not to love?

EM: What is attractive about cabaret?

QL: The connection and intimacy with the audience, and getting to put together a collection of songs in various genres with great musicians. Like Bette Midler, Eartha Kitt and numerous others, I started in cabaret and love playing the same stages as these icons.

EM: Looking back, would you still have chosen to start in cabaret?

QL: I got my start in cabaret. It’s a great learning ground to perfect one’s craft and try out new material — it’s about the process.  Occasionally, I return to the Half Note in Athens, Greece. I’ve sold out over 45 shows for them. The club calls me the “iconic face of the Half Note”. A lot of my songs are from classic films, which the Greeks know and love, so it was exciting to sing the American Songbook and have audiences of all ages know the lyrics to the songs everything from Cole Porter to Burt Bacharach. They all sing along to, “My Heart Belongs to Daddy” and “Put the Blame On Mame”.

EM: You are synonymous with cabaret and the NYC nightlife. Any plans on giving TV or film a shot? What kind of genre can you see yourself enjoying a lot?

QL: Yes! I’d love to do film and TV, along the lines of comedy, film noir — anything with style. It’s too bad there aren’t the great kinds of Variety Shows any more like Carole Burnett, Sonny and Cher, or Ann-Margret’s specials.

EM: Are you currently working on any other projects?

QL: Of course! I’m working on a CD of Burlesque to Broadway, writing a book about creating the show; we are touring Burlesque to Broadway and will do a special tour of The Heat is On! Later this year and I’m starting a cookbook with my family, who is famous in Indiana for their catering and restaurants. We are all about entertaining!  It’s only appropriate that I sing, “Let Me Entertain You”!

“I enjoy the challenge of creating  an accessible collection for today’s urban lifestyle”, explains one of the sisters. “Poleci is an attitude, it is timeless, provocative and sophisticated or the way I describe it as minimal but expressive.”

VP of Sales Richard Baker takes us through the store and Poleci’s new Spring 2012 Collection for women. (See video.)

www.poleci.com

An interview with the director, Gérald Hustache-Mathieu:

It is hard to categorize the genre of your film. Is it a thriller, a comedy…?
Genre films are interesting because of the structure they present. I wanted to tackle the Film-
Noir genre, to have a change in tack from my previous films. But you can never completely
reinvent yourself…The thriller aspect is just a backdrop to this film. The film style tends more
towards comedy and also, I hope, to drama. In cinema, I like mixing genres, combining the
serious with the seemingly light-hearted…because as I see it, real life is like that.

Why did you choose to set the story in this town, the coldest in France?
I once heard about Mouthe in a news story and ever since I have always wanted to make a
film there. There is something quite strange and mysterious about this town and the people
who live there. Another reason was in the snow the Hauts-Doubs region reminds me of the
Midwest and Minnesota. Filming there, gave me some relief to my frustration of not being
able to film America’s wide-open spaces! As French filmmakers, we constantly find ourselves
up against the American myth. I wanted to work my way around this by going and finding the
“America” in Mouthe.

Where did the idea to take inspiration from Marilyn Monroe come from?
It really wasn’t the intention from the start. The idea was to make a thriller in Mouthe, and to
tell the story of an improbable encounter: a detective and a victim, who was already dead.

A surface that you project onto can also metaphorically act as a mirror. What did her
image reflect back?
Marilyn epitomises the American Dream, in fact she is the dream. The dream to one day
become “somebody”. Yet, she also epitomises the flipside: both the tragedy and the inability
to be happy. She was the most famous actress in the world but also “the saddest woman in the
world” according to Arthur Miller. She had fame, beauty and men at her feet, but her self-
esteem was non-existent. She embodies the subject I wanted to address in my film more than
any other person.

What does the “American Dream” mean to you?
It’s the dream: “I’d be safe and warm if I was in L.A”. The illusion of a land where everything
is possible. It’s something that a lot of  the characters in the film have in common

Nobody Else But You opens May 11th, Cinema Village: http://www.cinemavillage.com

Like Wim Wenders’s Pina, Never Stand Still immerses us in the lives of extraordinary
artists and the power of dance.

Directed by veteran documentary filmmaker Ron Honsa, the beautifully crafted Never Stand Still reveals the passion, discipline, and daring of those who choose a life in dance. Performances filmed live at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival, interviews with extraordinary artists, rare archival footage, and behind the scenes insights bring dance to life, as Never Stand Still visits the iconic international nexus for dance: Jacob’s Pillow.

Director’s Statement
As a young filmmaker in New York City, I was hired to film the Lar Lubovitch Dance
Company at Jacob’s Pillow Dance Festival in the early 1980s. I was struck by the beauty
and intelligence of the work that was taking place at this secluded dance festival. I began
to learn about the Pillow’s unique history and met one of its earliest dance pioneers,
Barton Mumaw. This experience ultimately led Honsa to the making of his award-winning 1985 documentary The Men Who Danced, the story of Ted Shawn, Barton Mumaw, and the first all-male dance company in America.

The release of Never Stand Still coincides with the 80th Anniversary Season of America’s longest running dance festival. This collection of converted barns and farmhouses from the 1700s in the Berkshires of Massachusetts evolved into “the dance center of the nation” (The New York Times) – a destination for artists and audiences from all over the world.

Opens May 18th at The Quad.

www.quadcinema.com/

I’m as big a fan of dysfunctional family drama as the next world-famous theater critic and few companies can do it better, or more often, than the New Group.  So it was with cautious confidence that I and my perky and ever-optimistic plus-one, Jenna, ascended the theater’s stairs, first for a pre-show refreshment and eventually to our aisle seats to await the beginning of an evening that hopefully wouldn’t be as hard on the audience as it would be for the characters on stage.  Having survived the New Group’s nearly three hour revival of Sam Shepard’s A Lie of the Mind, (which was actually trimmed from its original 4+ hours) I felt I could endure whatever tornado of domestic distress Mr. Rabe could muster.

For the most part, my melodrama-phobia (fear of being trapped in a cramped seat for hours watching characters I don’t care about tear each other apart like rabid raccoons) was kept in manageable check.  Thanks are indeed due to an accomplished ensemble cast, a dynamic script that injected a few laughs into its story of family, and friends being separated by generational differences and times that were-a-changing. Jo Bonney’s deft direction kept the action moving, despite one prolonged Elvis break, where we all shared a dramatic pause too long with the King.

Set in a small Midwestern town in the early 1960s, An Early History of Fire smolders around the plight of Danny (Theo Stockman) an angry, confused and horny young man just a few years out of high school, his allegiances to his Pop (Gordon Clapp) a Nazi survivor, and Danny’s loyalty to his boyhood buddies Terry (Jonny Orsini) and Jake (Dennis Staroselsky).  Danny fantasizes about escaping his lower middle class life of manual labor and would like nothing more than to open a blues club, sail down to New Orleans or even scuba dive away if need be, as long as his circle of father and best friends can come along.  But for the moment, they’re making the best of things and have each others’ backs when trouble comes, even when they go looking for it themselves.

Female complications ensue, as they often do, one fateful day at the bus stop when Danny meets Karen (Claire van der Boom).  Though her name is fit for a burlesque queen, Ms. Boom manages to light up the stage with her clothes on, for the most part. Karen is back in town from college in Philadelphia, and her pretty hyper-active head is filled with the works of J.D. Salinger, Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg and other Beat Generation authors whose words would change the world, one copy of Howl at a time.  Once she meets Danny, she discovers that the weak mind in a strong body she’d been longing for to help silence her existential questions had ideas of its own.  Furthermore, this equally self-questioning lunk-head comes with a side of dumb friends and an old man who, though he escaped the Nazis, could never leave his inability to defeat them behind.

So what’s a small town lad with big city dreams to do, stay loyal to his boyhood buds and spend his days hauling cement, nights hoping to “neck” with some local girls or if necessary, pay for the company of Shirley (Erin Darke), Terry’s ex-fiance who is now one of the municipality’s five known prostitutes?  Or, should Danny follow his urbane desires and follow Karen back east, whether she wants him to or not, and water the creative seed she’s planted of documenting his own thoughts and becoming a writer himself?  (Hint: if Danny stays home, the night’s entertainment doesn’t get written and it is Sam Shepard time again at the New Group.)

Dramatic kudos are also owed to Devin Ratray as “Benji,” Pop’s dim-witted, but faithful young sidekick and potential chess partner, Neil Patel, for his handsome set design that delivers another disheveled two-story domicile (a New Group trademark) to a midtown Manhattan playhouse, and Doug Paulson for spot-on dialect coaching that takes Gordon Clapp’s already exemplary performance over the top, with a side of schnapps.

In closing I’d like to use the aesthetic trifecta I learned in my own misspent days at Philadelphia’s Temple University: is it art, is it good art and do I like it?  To that I say a definite: yes, no and meh.  Despite outstanding efforts in all directions, I didn’t like it enough to love it nor dislike it enough to hate it and for $178 million I couldn’t tell you what the title means.  It harkens back to the sparks that flew to light Mr. Rabe’s artistic journey would be my best guess.  Do I get a lifeline?  The truly intrigued have until May 26 to decide for themselves.  But there’s one thing everyone can agree on. Intermission should be at least fifteen minutes.

http://www.thenewgroup.org/

Joffrey: Mavericks of American Dance tells the story of this groundbreaking cultural treasure,
known as the first truly American dance company. Narrated by Tony® and Emmy®  Award winner Mandy Patinkin and directed by Bob Hercules (Bill T. Jones-A Good Man), the film documents how The Joffrey Ballet revolutionized American ballet by daringly combining modern dance with traditional ballet technique, combining art with social statement, and setting ballets to pop and rock music scores.

The Columnist is based upon the real-life story of Joe Aslop (John Lithgow), whose columns at the time of his 1974 retirement were running three times a week in more than three hundred newspapers. It’s a deft blend of history and storytelling. A hilarious, searing portrait of the glorious rewards and devastating losses that accompany ego, ambition, and the pursuit of power.

David Auburn is an American playwright whose 2000 play, Proof, won the Tony Award for Best Play and the Pulitzer Prize for Drama.

www.thecolumnistbroadway.com

Brother and sister Alia and Jamil Juma offer their Juma collection with  a variety of colorful prints, cool urban silhoettes and ethnic-inspired drape that is influenced from their international travel and art culture.

Their collection is largely unisex that cater to the young , creative people yet have something for almost every demographic.

A large selection can be found at Eva Boutique in the East Village, www.evanewyork.net.

Nik had early success in the Los Angeles eighties post-punk scene. After some demoralizing setbacks,  he withdrew from the scene but not from his calling. He continued to record music and make records.  He also kept track of his ascent- in fanzines he wrote himself, in reviews, both positive and negative, also written by him and in the Chronicles, the fictional story of his famous life. All of his work was for a tiny audience: a few former band members, ex-girlfriends and, most importantly, hi sister Denise.

Now Denise and Nik are in their 40’s, and Nik’s relationship with the real world is becoming increasingly tenuous. Denise has always taken care of Nik- she is literally his number one fan and a frequent supplier of funds and encouragement. But as they get older, she finds the pressure to protect him almost unbearable.

At the center of Stone Arabia lies the question: What is the value of art if that art has no audience? What if the audience is one person? It’s a story about intense and life-long sibling bonds, the relationship between artist and fan, and the dignity – or lunacy – of continuing to make art when the world has stopped paying attention.