Theatre

​Love story for anybody

February 25th, 2015

Photo by Carina DuMarce

Revamped ‘Romi/eo and Juliet’ takes a transgender focus at MSUM

For centuries, “Romeo and Juliet” has remained as one of William Shakespeare’s most celebrated love stories.

But for Patrick Carriere, theater faculty at Minnesota State University Moorhead, the story has been one of the bard’s “most lightly treated” plays, leading Carriere to select a modernized update of the story for MSUM Theatre. The result: “Romi/EO & Juliet,” a retelling of Shakespeare’s text,…

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​Don’t fear ‘the woods’

February 19th, 2015

MTFM explores Sondheim’s metaphors and music in fairytale season closer

In a season themed with fairy tales, Music Theatre Fargo-Moorhead is pulling every one’s favorite characters and creatures together in an outing marked with fantasy, realism, music and metaphors.

Stephen Sondheim’s “Into the Woods” follows the musical theater master’s own couple of characters (a baker and his wife) as they meander through the woods with a wish of their own. All around them, other fairy…

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​Raising ‘Metal Children’

February 11th, 2015

Photo by Brianne Lee

Concordia College Theatre ‘pushes boundaries’ in adult-themed play

By Jack Dura

Concordia College Theatre cracks the can on adolescents in adult themes with its spring play, “The Metal Children” by Adam Rapp.

Based around a banned book in a small Pennsylvania town and the events that stem from it, “The Metal Children” tackles several social themes affecting adolescents and young adults.

“The play is significantly about censorship, authority … when is a person really an…

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​Fasten your seatbelts: ‘Boeing Boeing’ lands at The Stage for two weekends

February 4th, 2015

Fly away with the Fargo-Moorhead Community Theatre in a farce that’s picking up passengers the next two weekends.

Marc Camoletti’s “Boeing Boeing,” the most performed French play in the world, brings sky-high laughs in FMCT’s production, splitting a season with drama and musicals with a farce in February.

In the story, the womanizing Bernard thinks he can juggle his three foreign fiancees as their stewardess schedules on Boeing aircraft always keep two away whenever one is with…

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​Don’t Take It Personally: Interview with Lisa Lampanelli

January 21st, 2015

Photo by Dan Dion

In life there’s usually two sides to every story.

Especially coming from any entertainer with such stature as comedian Lisa Lampanelli. And for those who have willing ears to hear, she has the ability of delivering comedic stories in a way that can be equally hilarious as well as appalling.

But don’t be alarmed, Fargoans. Since 1990 this seasoned comedian has rung many cowbell-sized dings among the ‘status quo’ of all racial, sexual and cultural types.

Lampelli’s got a lot to…

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Bending mind and body

January 16th, 2015

TU Dance brings art of movement to MSUM

A short winter break gave the arts in the area a chance to catch its breath before beginning the second half of the 2014-2015 season, and one arts program returns with its signature diversity next weekend.

Minnesota State University Moorhead’s Cheryl Nelson Lossett Performing Arts Series invites to its stage TU Dance, the St. Paul, Minn. dance studio headed by husband and wife Uri Sands and Toni Pierce-Sands.

The 12-member company is slated for…

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​2014 in F-M theater: A retrospect

December 24th, 2014

NDSU's Sweeney Todd / Photo by Dan Koeck

The curtain has closed on another year of theater in Fargo-Moorhead, and what a year 2014 was.

With theater of all types from straightforward plays to opera, ballet to bunraku, or musicals to Greek tragedies, the area’s performing companies offered a taste of everything to their hungry audiences.

We saw some notable moments from a number of companies, such as Theatre NDSU. The college company observed 100 years of theater at North Dakota State, marked with a season of celebrations and…

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​Another Bare Stage ‘Tuna’

December 17th, 2014

David Lassig // Photo by Perry Rust

Theater is far from wrapping up for the year in Fargo-Moorhead, as the folks of Bare Stage Theatre present their Christmas sequel to “Greater Tuna” the next two weekends.

“A Tuna Christmas” picks up with the two-man cast of David Lassig and Mark Seeba, who juggle 22 characters. It’s a mix of women, men, kids and even a cat, cooking up an outing of theatrical tomfoolery for area audiences. David even portrays three siblings in the same scene, changing costumes and moving quickly…

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​Do you hear what I hear?

December 10th, 2014

F-M Opera brings back Christmas-themed ‘Amahl and the Night Visitors’

It’s an old, familiar favorite this time around with the Fargo-Moorhead Opera’s latest offering.

Arriving just in time for the Christmas season is “Amahl and the Night Visitors,” the operatic telling of the three wise men stopping over at the home of a woman and her son while journeying to Bethlehem.

Premiering as a CBS television special in 1951, “Amahl and the Night Visitors” has been seen in…

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​Q&A with the Trailer Park Boys

December 6th, 2014

Julian, Bubbles and Ricky of the Trailer Park Boys

*Adult language advisory*

With the holiday season resonating swiftly day by day, we took a shot (no chaser) at interviewing the trio of Trailer Park pioneers. These Canadian musketeers of sub-high-class living quarters return to Fargo on December 8 for their “Dear Santa Claus, Go F#ck Yourself Tour.”

High Plains Reader: How'd you fellas spend your first night after completing the Community Service Tour?

Julian: We got really really drunk ... Hung out with some ladies at Sunnyvale…

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