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Sep 07 2025
Love0

Eureka Day: Laugh louder and longer than ever before in a theater

By Woody Weingarten

Don (Howard Swain, center) reacts to livestream comments projected above in Eureka Day at the Marin Theatre while (from left) Suzanne (Lisa Anne Porter), Carina (Leontyne Mbele-Mbong), Eli (Teddy Spencer), and Meiko (Charisse Loriaux) look on. Photo by David Allen.

 

By WOODY WEINGARTEN

To call Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s Thursday appearance before the Senate Finance Committee’s three-hour hearing contentious would be a monumental understatement.

Multiple Democrat and Republican senators charged him with making non-logical, false, and misleading claims about vaccines. The Secretary of Health and Human Services futilely struggled to pull answers out of his back pocket.

Humor: Absent.

Eureka Day, a play that also tackles the chasm between vax and not vax, uses satire to make you laugh louder and longer than you’ve ever done before in a theater during a single scene.

Laughter: Infectious.

Also contagious in the 105-minute play is a 15-student outbreak of mumps that ultimately triggers a debate about whether to mandate vaccinations at a private, progressive Berkeley elementary school where white privilege blankets the place.

A five-member executive committee keeps trying to reach a mandatory consensus when consensus is light years away.

The fast-paced comedy, which debuted in 2018 at the Aurora Theatre in Berkeley, is being partnered by that company at the Marin Theater in Mill Valley — despite the Aurora having to cancel its current East Bay season because of a money drain.

The Marin production’s being directed masterfully by Josh Costello, Aurora’s artistic director who also held the reins for the original version.

A caveat: The hilarious scene, featuring livestream comments projected on the rear wall of the set, is abruptly followed by an incredibly heavy change of pace (even though it’s sandwiched by many other moments that are less funny yet still quite amusing).

Each of the five main actors in the ensemble cast is phenomenal.

Howard Swain, who’s transcended so many roles in so many Bay Area venues that if you blink, you might find he’s already booked for 17 more, becomes Don, school executive committee leader with tangled white hair and white beard who desperately quashes potential squabbles. On occasion, he’ll read an indecipherable bit of prose or poetry to the others in a hopeful but valueless teaching moment.

Swain is in the minority, a performer who wasn’t plucked out of the original for this rendition. Ditto Leontyne Mbele-Mbong (Carina).

Eli (Teddy Spencer) embraces Meiko (Charisse Loriaux) amid emotional and intellectual turmoil. Photo by David Allen.

But the other three main characters — Charisse Loriaux (Meiko), Lisa Anne Porter (Suzanne), and Teddy Spencer (Eli) — are all vets of the original show. Clearly, the time between the first production and the revival hasn’t in the least diminished their mastery of their parts. Their range of emotions, their skill at showing feelings with a nuanced look or gesture, their ability to have learned about four zillion words from the script without blowing any, all that may have honed their chops.

One lady leaving the first row could be overheard to put it succinctly: “The cast is perfect!”

Another perfect fit is the jazz between scenes (unless, of course, you’re as anti-jazz as one character is anti-vax).

Eureka Day, which won the 2025 Tony for best revival for its Broadway run, has been performed in Austria, South Australia, and the United Kingdom.

The playwright, Jonathan Spector, a Berkeley boy, has made a few changes since his first effort. However, he’s kept everyone on stage skirting issues and being afraid of saying anything that another exec committee member might take offense at — and he’s inserted tons of swearing and characters interrupting and talking over each other like most real folks do.

That noisy writing strategy might resemble David Mamet’s style but Spector’s is funnier.

Eureka Day will run at the Marin Theatre, 397 Miller Ave., Mill Valley, through Sept. 21. Tickets: $38 to $89 (plus $6 handling fee). Info: 415-388-5208 or www.marintheatre.org.

Sherwood “Woody” Weingarten, a longtime voting member of the San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle and the author of four books, can be contacted by email at voodee@sbcglobal.net or on his websites, https://woodyweingarten.com and https://vitalitypress.com.

Sep 04 2025
Love2

Eureka Day

By Joseph Cillo


Satire with a Sharp Edge

Jonathan Spector’s Eureka Day was prescient when it premiered in Berkeley in 2018. In 2025, it feels uncanny. Just as Marin Theatre opens its revival, Florida’s Surgeon General has announced plans to eliminate all vaccine mandates, including for schools. What once seemed like satirical exaggeration now plays like a headline. The result is eerie, funny, and unsettling all at once.

At Marin Theatre, in partnership with Aurora Theatre Company, Eureka Day returns under director Josh Costello, who directed the World Premiere in 2018 at Aurora Theatre Company and now helms this Marin Theatre production. The play’s premise is simple: a private Berkeley school prides itself on inclusivity and consensus until a mumps outbreak throws the vaccine debate into overdrive. Idealism collapses, social media erupts, and the parents’ progressive bubble pops.

Lisa Anne Porter (Suzanne), Leontyne Mbele-Mbong (Carina), Howard Swain (Don), Teddy Spencer (Eli), and Kelsey Sloan (Winter)
Photo Credit: David Allen

Lisa Anne Porter (Suzanne) is perfectly opinionated — and perfectly awful in the way only a self-assured parent can be. Howard Swain (Don) nails the role of the procedurally accommodating figure, forever eager to keep every voice at the table. Together, they embody the comedy and tragedy of consensus culture run amok.

The rest of the ensemble matches that precision. Charisse Loriaux (Meiko) begins with calm authority that steadily unravels under pressure. Teddy Spencer (Eli) brings wry detachment, a cool counterpoint to the chaos. Kelsey Sloan (Winter), in her Marin debut, blends in seamlessly with crisp timing. And Leontyne Mbele-Mbong (Carina) lends steady poise, grounding the turmoil with quiet strength.

In some ways, the play is a comedic commentary on everyone being politically correct and trying to please everyone — an impossible task!

Costello shapes the action like a pressure cooker, none more so than the infamous “Zoom meltdown” scene. Equal parts hilarious and horrifying, it echoes countless school-board meetings and neighborhood threads. Scenic designer Richard Olmsted and costume designer Maggie Whittaker nail Bay Area chic, while Teddy Hulsker’s projections and Ray Archie’s sound design make the digital noise uncomfortably real.

Eureka Day is funny, biting, and alarmingly current. Spector’s satire dares us to laugh at dysfunction even as today’s headlines remind us how close we are to the edge.

sharp, timely, painfully funny

To See Eureka Day
Marin Theatre, Mill Valley
August 28 – September 21, 2025 (Opening September 2)
Tickets: marintheatre.org or (415) 388-5208
Prices: $38 – $89 (+$6 fee per order)

★★★★★

Authorship & Creative Statement

Each review is created through my proprietary FocusLens℠ method—an original editorial process shaped by firsthand experience, critical insight, and structured narrative design. Original photography, graphics, director quotes, and animated elements are incorporated to enhance reader engagement and visual impact. State-of-the-art scaffolding systems support organization and phrasing, but every sentence and decision reflects my own voice and judgment. These are not AI-generated reviews—they are authored, shaped, and published by me.

Sep 02 2025
Love0

6th Street Playhouse’s ‘A Chorus Line’ bridges gap between 1975 and today

By Joe Cillo, Woody Weingarten

6th Street Playhouse’s “A Chorus Line” continues through Sept. 28 in Santa Rosa. (Photo by Eric Chazankin via Bay City News)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

By Woody Weingarten, Bay City News

If you think the half-century-old dramatic musical “A Chorus Line” might be a little stale by now, think again.

The current 6th Street Playhouse production proves that the show, which goes behind the scenes at intense auditions for a musical, is as effervescent, touching and funny today as it was in its 1975 debut and record-breaking 8,137 Broadway performances that followed.

Bottom line: The Santa Rosa show, onstage through Sept. 28, is good entertainment for geezers and Gen-Zers alike.

Yes, parts of the storyline don’t have the same impact now, including some “big reveal” moments by characters whose backstories involve coming out of the closet or suffering abuse as a child.

But the classic tunes by Marvin Hamlisch and lyrics by Edward Kleban (the songs ar bouncy and/or heartbreaking) could fit the voices of Audra McDonald or Taylor Swift.

The large multi-ethnic cast of performers with varied body types does better than OK with vigorous unison singing and synchronized dancing. Choreographer Hannah Woolfenden nicely coordinates the diverse group.

Director Lorenzo Alviso makes sure the timing is near-perfect, emulating original triple-threat director Michael Bennett, who conceived and choreographed the Pulitzer Prize, Tony and Obie-winning show.

The two-hour show begins with the company messing up requisite dance steps for laughs and voicing anxiety about making the cut in “I Hope I Get It.” It’s quickly followed by “I Can Do That,” a tricky novelty number by Mike (Diego Rodriguez), who displays great dancing chops.

Tracy Hinman’s eye-catching costumes and Noah Hewitt’s mood-changing lighting choices are notable. The seven-piece band in the pit under the direction of Ginger Beavers successfully captures the characters’ moods, only occasionally playing a bit loud, muffling a vocal or two.

Monique Borses plays Cassie in 6th Street Playhouse’s “A Chorus Line.” (Photo by Eric Chazankin via Bay City News)

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Special solos include “The Music and the Mirror” sung poignantly by Cassie (Monique Barses); “What I Did for Love” and “Nothing” by Diana (Reilly Milton); and the angst-filled “Dance: Ten; Looks: Three by Val (Anna Vorperian).

Kudos also go to Sashas Holton, an understudy, as Sheila.

Tajai Jaxon Britten is consistent as Zach, the troubled director who must select four males and four females, from twice that number who are trying out.

If there’s a flaw in the production, it’s that it’s difficult to keep track of the numerous characters, a carryover from the original book by James Kirkwood and Nicholas Dante.

Imperfections, however, shouldn’t keep patrons from thoroughly enjoying this classic show. It has the trademark tall, movable mirrors at the back of the stage; slapstick bits like the wannabe who relates his childhood difficulties hiding frequent erections; and, of course, the delightful tap, ballet and jazzy dancing that characterize every chorus line.

6th Street Playhouse’s “A Chorus Line” runs through Sept. 28 at 52 W. 6th St., Santa Rosa. Tickets are $33 to $55.95 at 6thstreetplayhouse.com. 

This article was first published on LocalNewsMatters.org, a nonprofit site supported by Bay City News Foundation http://www.baycitynews.org/contact/. 

Sherwood “Woody” Weingarten, a longtime voting member of the San Francisco Bay Area Theater Critics Circle and the author of four books, can be contacted by email at voodee@sbcglobal.net or on his websites, https://woodyweingarten.com and https://vitalitypress.com.

Aug 31 2025
Love2

Featherbaby

By Joseph Cillo

 


Surreality with Bite

World premieres are always unpredictable. David Templeton’s Featherbaby takes that truth and runs with it — or rather, flies with it. This is a play told largely through the mind of Featherbaby, a rambunctious, foul-mouthed Amazon parrot who narrates, manipulates, and disrupts the lives of the humans around it.

The central tension comes when Angie, a quirky crime-scene photographer, brings Mason, a reserved puzzle competitor, into her world. Featherbaby does not approve.

Feeling threatened and territorial, the parrot wages war on Mason, biting (literally drawing blood), cursing, and scheming to sabotage the relationship. It’s needy, vulgar, and aggressively manipulative — not, from my perspective, an attractive character at all. But that is the point: this is a parrot with personality to spare, and the play’s drama and comedy spring from its relentless, often unsettling behavior.

At Spreckels, the title role alternates between Gina Alvarado and Matthew Cadigan. On the night I attended, it was Alvarado’s turn. She threw herself into the part with fearless commitment. At times her performance tipped toward the theatrical extreme, but always with conviction. She made the parrot magnetic and disturbing in equal measure, pulling the audience into a surreal but oddly familiar emotional tug-of-war.

Mercedes Murphy, Gina Alvarado, Nate Musser

Photo Credit: Jeff Thomas

The other characters — Mercedes Murphy as Angie and Nate Musser as Mason — provide the human framework. Yet in many ways they function as enablers, allowing Featherbaby’s bad behavior to dominate. Director Skylar Evans leans into this imbalance, crafting a production where the bird’s chaos drives the arc from conflict to an unexpected, if uneasy, connection between Featherbaby and Mason.

The design team reinforces this off-kilter world. Eddy Hansen’s lighting and set sketch out an environment where reality blurs into imagination, while Jessica Johnson’s sound design sharpens every moment of comic violence or tenderness.

Featherbaby is not cozy theater. It’s messy, bold, and occasionally vulgar. But that’s exactly its strength. Templeton has written a play that dares to put an unlikeable character at the center and challenges the audience to wrestle with it. And with Gina Alvarado’s performance, Featherbaby becomes hard to forget.

 

Featherbaby — needy, vulgar, manipulative … memorable.

And if one talking parrot isn’t enough, click here to experience another.

To See Featherbaby
Spreckels Performing Arts Center, Rohnert Park
August 29 – September 14, 2025
Fridays & Saturdays at 7:30 p.m.; Sundays at 2:00 p.m.; additional matinee Saturday, September 13 at 2:00 p.m.
Tickets: spreckelsonline.com or (707) 588-3400
Prices: $14 – $34

★★★★★

Authorship & Creative Statement

Each review is created through my proprietary FocusLens℠ method—an original editorial process shaped by firsthand experience, critical insight, and structured narrative design. Original photography, graphics, director quotes, and animated elements are incorporated to enhance reader engagement and visual impact. State-of-the-art scaffolding systems support organization and phrasing, but every sentence and decision reflects my own voice and judgment. These are not AI-generated reviews—they are authored, shaped, and published by me.

Aug 12 2025
Love0

The Quiet Earth Beneath

By Jo Tomalin

Review by Jo Tomalin
www.ForAllEvents.com
August 12 2025


The Quiet Earth Beneath

Casey Jay Andrews invites us into her space at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2025. The setting is different from the usual rows of seats, which is intriguing. In fact, looking around the space a musician is set up at one end of the large rectangular space with an impressive array of instruments and technology, Andrews stands at the other end next to a microphone on a stand, and there is a theatre ghost light center stage with one row of chairs in a large oval shape. While this sounds like a functional description so far, what we experience during the next hour is rather special!

Andrews takes charge speaking to us alternately at the microphone on the stand and then holding the mic as she moves around the space. This is her world, her creation and she is genuine in her approach. She does have a compelling performative presence and switches to her lower key self when moving around the space closer to us. She sets up stories of the underworld, imagined and real as well as poignant moments of truth from her deep self.

The story is well written with strong descriptive moments yet complex as Andrews weaves different aspects of stories or parallel thoughts together. A story about Sienna with a yellow suitcase staying in a strange B&B with fickle room numbers unfolds while Andrews layers the show with her own experiences of the underworld, literally as a young cave explorer in South Wales.

Jack Brett, the outstandingly creative musician plays his original music throughout the spoken word storytelling which adds other world quality to this performance – and adds so much more to the atmosphere. His mix of beats, rhythms and melodies complement Andrews’ spoken voice so well and add an unusual feeling and imagery as if an epic film is being created and playing out in front of us.


Andrews is an award-winning writer performer whose prior shows at fringe festivals have been acclaimed. She is also a designer with an impressive portfolio of cutting edge theatre design projects. In her own shows Andrews is able to bring all these imaginative strands together to create what is the reason we go to the theatre, to experience something else, to come out having been transported and this is what Andrews does. There is much quality in Andrews’ work and she opens her heart and whisks us away, away from our lives and thoughts and somewhere else!

For More Information:
https://www.caseyjayandrews.com/ 

Aug 11 2025
Love0

Theatre Re’s The Nature of Forgetting at Edinburgh Fringe 2025!

By Jo Tomalin

Review by Jo Tomalin
For All Events

The Nature of Forgetting

What does a piece of clothing mean to a person? Is it the color or comfort it gives – or something else? Memories are special to all of us and dementia means that they may become fragments of what they were originally.


We first see coat racks, tables and chairs, and a young woman and a man, Isabella and Tom. They interact and eventually Tom – sensitively played by Theatre Re Founder and Artistic Director Guillaume Pigé – remembers what to do as he puts on a coat or a jacket…flashbacks tell the story. Tom’s memories are vivid as he goes back in time to school days, friends and teenage romance – all brought to life by the dynamic cast of four actors who play all the characters.
 
Live music onstage comprising a drummer and keyboardist play vibrant to melodic music that underscores and adds dimension to this mainly wordless devised play. Gentle yet vivid music plays while Tom remembers earlier times in his life and varying volume, tempo and rhythms support the storytelling well. This early scene is beautifully created and is the foundation for the story of The Nature of Forgetting.



Seamless transitions and the quality of the physical and visual storytelling form an exceptionally well crafted and performed show.
 A scene of Tom with his mother helping him get ready for school and the subsequent journey supported by rhythmic music is strong imagery. The cast of four actors create several characters with gestures and posture changes to delineate them through their movement dynamics effectively.


When things go off kilter the very smart choices of a combination of awkward movement with sound, that build progressively, show how Tom’s memory is being affected. This series of episodic movement is subtle yet arresting in its simplicity and poignancy. A tender and lively scene with an outstanding movement sequence is when Tom is younger and is swept off his feet by a woman – it’s a glorious and evocative moment of a full life experiencing all that life offers.


Lighting helps to suggest atmosphere and mood really well and brief sound effects evoke the time and place. Tom incorporates interesting quirky movement and gesture as an adult and stops and starts as the movement device affecting his memory seems to disconnect it and be frustrating to Tom. This scene is particularly moving and well crafted.


Theatre Re take their time to tell this story and the cast emote physically and emotionally with expressive and precise movement and gestures. The range of emotional moments come from unexpected moments from Theatre Re – when less accomplished work will use literal thinking on which to base gestures. This play is extraordinarily well developed and performed and is a masterclass of story crafting and refinement. Poignant, moving and wildly inventive devised theatre that is dramatic, emotive artistic and human. This heartfelt exploration of a difficult subject has it all. Exceptional! 5 Stars!

More Information:
https://www.theatrere.co.uk/

Aug 11 2025
Love0

Peregrinus at Edinburgh Fringe!

By Jo Tomalin

Review by Jo Tomalin
For All Events

Peregrinus

KTO Theatre from Poland presents Peregrinus at the 2025 Edinburgh Festival Fringe at Summerhall. Peregrinus starts with dramatic imagery and deliberate immediacy! Wearing their uniform of neat business suits, white shorts and ties, about eight office workers appear in front of us. They line up in formation and take their turn kneeling and putting on giant masks. Standing in front of us the image is not only fascinating but also the similar expressions of huge masks suggest a group of Everyman. Immediately these employees know where to go and what to do and they share with us a day in their lives by getting very busy slickly moving in circles, or intricate patterns while encountering different reactions from each other.

Physical gestures say it all and there is no need for actual words, so the performance of Peregrinus can be understood by anyone of any language. They each pull a large silver suitcase on wheels so this is very relatable to anyone who travel and have those nifty four wheel rolling suit cases. However, these rollers have special powers!

Peregrinus is an original devised show performed by KTO Theatre from Poland that tour a repertoire of different shows internationally. Peregrinus is also co-financed by the Minister of Culture of Poland. KTO Theatre has been under the leadership of co-founder Jerzy Zon for 48 years and Zon created and directed Peregrinus with choreographer Eryk Makohon, inspired by a poem by T.S.Eliot about modern life and its traps. Underscored by vibrant music throughout this is a complete performance that is visually vivid but is also inspiring.

First, for those of us who appreciate original physical theatre it is a triumph of expression and physical storytelling; second, this is a highly entertaining show! The characters came from the grassy Meadows near Summerhall where they interacted playfully with people for about thirty minutes, some of whom following them into the Summerhall courtyard performance area for the start of the show.

Blending satire, spectacle with dynamic movement and choreography, the story shows this group of office workers setting off for work from their homes and what happens when they arrive at work to the end of their day. They travel, sit together, have lunch and do their work almost in unison yet each has their own character traits. It’s a vivid and sometimes playful image of life that we can each reflect and respond to in order to preserve our individuality.

There are some improvised moments that are fun and add depth to the characters and the show. At these times there are individual flashes of personality such as when one of the characters after a brief interaction, motioned to someone in the audience to “call me!”

If you see one show at the fringe, see Peregrinus!

More Information:
https://teatrkto.pl/

Aug 10 2025
Love0

Pickled Republic at Edinburgh Fringe 2025

By Jo Tomalin

Review by Jo Tomalin
For All Events

Pickled Republic

Ah, the life of a tomato! What are its hopes, dreams and more important, what are its upcoming realities? Doom, to be sure! Or is it? Ruxandra Cantir portrays one of these spirited vegetables to help us understand its plight! A tomato in a garden, next to a fence covered in sprigs of foliage. Voiceovers advise us to wash vegetables but to leave them some breathing room! Cantir’s contorted body of the tomato, in a tomato costume complete with a tomato stalk beret, leads this veggie to lament about life in a florid monologue with spicy attitude! This is a sad, tragic character indeed!

Using witty comments, shrieks, cabaret songs, comedy and fun ridiculousness Cantir changes costumes and characters, wears masks, shimmering dresses, and more to entertain. And entertain she does! After an uneven start with content this is zany and whacky stuff that brings laughs and guffaws as she struts around in support of veggies. With a sweater stretched over her head showing her face and a quif of green hair she approaches the audience with a singular voice and personality. There is some interaction with one or two audience members that is simply lovely, she somehow gains our trust and we dip into her world willingly!

This is part stand up and part clown and her wit and full on enthusiasm grows on you. There are a couple of running jokes with announcements of “fork”, or are the warnings? Just go with it! And there’s Eric the carrot, other relatives and then we get to the Pickle!

Now an imperious pickle limbers up and shows expert skills moving around the space, it’s all impressive from here on, if a bit hilariously ghoulish. Life happens what can we say! Cantir tops it all with a final image of a character introduced earlier. It seems time passed and these veggie will continue to appear – and disappear with the cycle of life. Expect the unexpected and enjoy what unfolds in the global pickled republic! Recommended! 3 Stars!

More information:
https://www.ruxandracantir.com/pickled-republic

Aug 10 2025
Love0

Works and Days at the Edinburgh International Festival 2025

By Jo Tomalin

Review by Jo Tomalin
For All Events

Works and Days



Works and Days is produced by FC Bergman / Toneelhuis and presented by the Edinburgh International Festival, August 2025 at The Lyceum. FC Bergman’s reflection on the poem Works and Days from the Ancient Greek poet Hesiodos “on living on and with the land” and all of the circumstances between birth, life and death is the starting point for this piece. FC Bergman is a four-person collective that creates site specific productions and installations that focus on themes of the working person.


The collective comprises Stef Aerts, Joe Agemans, Thomas Verstraeten, Marie Vinck who are the Directors, Dramaturgs & Set Designers. They also perform in Works and Days together with additional cast members Susan De Ceuster, Gert Goossens, Fumiyo Ikeda, Maryam Sserwamukoko.


A superb set piece center stage suggests a rusty plough from long ago. In fact, we are being taken back to when people lived on and from the land. The cast of eight characters wear unmatched work clothes in gray and brown tones with costume design by An d’Huys are clearly at home in this stark environment.


This is a world where farmers forge tools with their bare hands and use only body strength to work across fields – sometimes pushing a well used plough to rip up the earth. Others sew seeds as they follow the ploughed earth. Drum beats help the community work together to raise the heavy timber framework of a barn. They find an unsuspecting chicken who gives the townsfolk an egg, the chicken joined in the with sounds and we enjoyed watching its chirruping! Everyone works here to earn a living of the basics, food and a roof over their heads.


From a sacrifice nailed to a pole shows they are really living off the land and use everything – unlike the waste that is produced from our busy lives today. However, this is an offbeat, abstracted expression of daily work and its rituals that is certainly intriguing. Musicians onstage provide the rhythmic strength for everyone to be able to haul up timber structures. Visually, this is theme, design and lifestyle is very appealing and it takes a while to get in step and focus while trying to forget our appendages of technology that most of us insist on carrying around day and night!


While the homesteaders dress up their house with colorful fabric the story reflects how much we pay attention to worldly goods, when we have access to them. However, these townsfolk revere the huge statues of the future by their naked bodies coiling around them. Curious organ music plays at times, or a wonderful haunting tenor sax and more, which add so much to this life before our own reality, from composers and musicians Joachim Badenhorst and Sean Carpio. In fact this is a reality check for us to consider, knowing that there are still people living in these simple times relying on the tried and true farming and harvesting methods, without the technology that we rely on so much today. Highly Recommended!

 4 Stars!


More information:

Edinburgh International Festival
https://www.eif.co.uk/

Aug 09 2025
Love0

Dance People at Edinburgh International Festival 2025

By Jo Tomalin

Review by Jo Tomalin
For All Events

Dance People

Maqamat, the French-Lebanese contemporary dance company in collaboration with Cie Omar Rajesh present the World Premiere of Dance People at the Edinburgh International Festival, August 2025. Set in the beautiful Old College Quad, choreographers Omar Rajeh and Mia Habis create an innovative promenade performance with their dance company – that also invites the audience to mingle, sometimes join in and become part of the experience!


Ten dancers including Rajesh and Habis move around the huge quad space in combinations of solos, duets and small groups. Sometimes the entire ensemble dances together to original pieces set to vibrant music with dramatic lighting and roaming sets. Their aim is not only to offer a joyful experience but to also welcome the audience in to be more than passive observers. In fact, from the beginning, the space is open for the audience to roam around, watch – or to be among the set pieces comprising huge metal structures with lights and a musician. This sets up an interesting dynamic where audience members are participants when invited and are free to watch all of the production from anywhere in the quad. People are guided by the advance of the tall metal structures that sweep around us, pushed by the company opening or moving the observers to create new performance spaces.


The dancers are outstanding and they also briefly interact each other and everyone watching. A dynamic eclectic colorful costume design by highlights individuality of each performer. Choreography is vibrant and original mainly fast movement with some slower paced motifs. The. Lighting design by Guy Hoare is beautiful and creates not only atmosphere but also highlights performing space. There is no doubt that this show is pushing the boundary between performer and audience – with the addition of how the physical movement of the company spotlights democracy, dictatorship and culture. Later in the piece names of victims of such strife are projected on the set as it moves around reminding us of these times. Lively and soulful music is composed with live interpretation by Mathias Delplanque and Ziad El Ahmadie with voice by Abdul Karim Chaar.

This is a special event with experimental qualities that is moving, meaningful and entertaining. Highly recommended!
 4 Stars!

More information:
www.eif.co.uk