There is something beautiful in the air.
After worrying so much about dangerous pathogens floating among us, it’s refreshing to be distracted, however briefly, by what the New Victory Theater unleashes into its atmosphere: feathers, balloons, umbrellas, flowing fabrics, shiny particles, and most importantly joy.
They all feature in ‘Air Play’, a mix of circus, science, comedy and music to be enjoyed in person until March 6, or virtually until March 20. (Tickets are $20 to $45; online viewing on demand is $25.) Presented by Seth Bloom and Christina Gelsone, the married duo known as Acrobuffos trusts this delightful hour-long revival — the show first found here place in 2018 – on the kinetic energy of the artists and Daniel Wurtzel’s aerial sculptures to hold up both objects and spirits.
What is an air sculpture? It is the result of combining carefully placed electric fans with materials that can float. You’ll see silk swaths dance, balloons sway timidly, and orbs and glitter form a swirling, star-studded universe.
All the while, expert clowns Bloom and Gelsone play with each other, their props and their spectators, who shouldn’t expect to remain completely entrenched themselves.
LAUREL GRAAEBER
Betty White’s death at age 99 on New Year’s Eve caused not only national mourning, but renewed nostalgia for “The Golden Girls,” the NBC sitcom White starred in, which aired from 1985 to ’92.
That sentimentality could extend to “That Golden Girls Show!” also. The puppet parody, which originally ran Off Broadway in 2016, is back on the road for what is billed as the ‘Final Farewell’ tour. Starring Miranda Cooper as Sophia, Dylan Glick as Dorothy, Lu Zielinski as Blanche, and Samantha Lee Mason as Rose, the show commemorates classic moments from the sitcom where Sophia makes plans, Blanche flirts, Rose summons St. Olaf, and insults Dorothy a lot.
Remembering Betty White
The actress, whose pioneering career spanned seven decades, died on January 31. She was 99.
- Obituary† After creating two of the most memorable characters in sitcom history, White continued to be a beloved presence on television.
- Remembered with love: Hollywood stars, comedians, a president and seemingly the entire internet paid tribute after her death was announced.
- Last joke: People magazine found themselves in an awkward spot when a cover for White’s upcoming 100th birthday hit newsstands just before her death.
- From the archive† In a 2011 interview, White shared the memory of a relationship she held dear — with an elephant.
Recommended for ages 13 and up, “That Golden Girls Show!” is the first production to reopen Queens Theater. Performances are on Sundays at 3 and 7 p.m. and tickets start at $20. If you miss the tour this time, it returns to the city from April 29 with a four-week run in Theater Row.
SEAN L. McCarthy
“It’s my nature now to record — to try to preserve everything I’m going through,” says Jonas Mekas in voiceover in “Lost Lost Lost.” First screened in 1976, this diary film is a compilation of images taken by Mekas between 1949 and 1963, capturing his life and friends in a changing New York, along with his feelings of displacement from his native Lithuania.
A writer, filmmaker, champion of the avant-garde and founder of Anthology Film Archives, Mekas passed away in 2019 at the age of 96; he would have turned 100 this year. A retrospective of his major cinematic works begins Friday at Film at Lincoln Center and includes “Lost Lost Lost” (on Saturdays and Wednesdays). A related exhibition, “Jonas Mekas: The Camera Was Always Running”, opens the same day at the Jewish Museum, showing Mekas’ films in a 12-screen prismatic installation format, and where Mekas performed a film series in the late 1960s.
On Sunday, Film at Lincoln Center will screen Mekas’ nearly five-hour “As I Was Moving Ahead Occasionally I Saw Brief Glimpses of Beauty,” spanning from 1970 to 1999. In his story at the beginning, Mekas says he rolls from film “coincidentally, the way I found them on the shelf.”
BEN KENIGSBERG
art museums
Reinventing Appalachia
Last summer, singer-songwriter and recording artist Moses Sumney held a concert in the Blue Ridge Mountains. It resulted in a 14-track album, ‘Live From Blackalachia’, and a 70-minute movie simply called ‘Blackalachia’, a portmanteau of ‘Black’ and ‘Appalachia’.
Sumney performed without an audience, unless you count the lush greenery that set the stage for his concert. At one point in the film, as I lay in a tub full of flowers, Sumney said, “I needed a space to articulate my own loneliness.” He does find some sense of belonging in the Appalachians, however, by reinventing a place that bears little trace of the history of the black people who once migrated through it.
‘Blackalachia’, along with stills from the concert, is on display at the Nicola Vassell Gallery in Chelsea through March 5. The film will be screened six times a day during the gallery’s opening hours from Tuesday to Sunday. Details can be found at nicolavassell.com.
MELISSA SMITH
Jazz
Stars on the Hudson
It’s been two insanely tough years for festival planners, but with Covid-19 cases easing and nationwide restrictions lifted, Hudson Jazz Festival organizers are among the lucky ones.
Two hours upriver from New York City, in an old opera house on the main drag of Hudson, NY, the festival culminates this weekend with nightly performances of some of the best jazz music. On Friday evening, vibraphonist Warren Wolf pays tribute to the historic duets of Chick Corea and Gary Burton; the rising star singer Jazzmeia Horn leads a quartet on Saturday; and tenor saxophonist Jimmy Greene closes with a Sunday matinee.
Tickets for most of the weekend’s performances are still available for tables of two and four, starting at $70. Can’t attend in person? Each night’s program can be livestreamed for free, if you reserve a seat in advance, at hudsonhall.org.
GIOVANNI RUSSONELLO
