Chart-topping act Boyz II Men carries torch to Schuster

By Carol Simmons | Sunday, November 30, 2008, 01:51 PM

DAYTON — The 1990s chart-topping vocal ensemble Boyz II Men set the standard by which all other so-called “boy bands” of the decade aspired.

Now marking 18 years in the music business, three of the original four members continue to carry the torch for heartfelt melodic balladry sung with soul and style.

That torch blazed hot Saturday night, Nov. 29, at the Schuster Center as the trio performed a retrospective of its memorable catalogue of hits as well as a selection of classic Motown covers featured on its latest album, “Motown: A Journey Through Hitsville USA.”

Dressed in three-piece suits, Shawn Stockman, Nathan Morris and Wanya Morris (related only through music) took to a stage devoid of extraneous trappings. Three stools (barely touched), three microphone stands (rarely used) and a small riser (holding water and three bouquets of roses) were the only accessories.

This show’s special effects came in the form of the group’s soaring vocals, spine-tingling harmonies and synchronized dance movements.

With backup accompaniment from a programmed tape loop, rather than a live band, the hit-filled trip down memory lane might have begun to feel like a choreographed karaoke act, if not for the singers’ vocal originality and dexterity — and a brief technical glitch.

About half-way through the 90-minute show, as the trio concluded a high-energy, call-and-response-heavy rendition of Edwin Starr’s “War,” the anticipated segue into the next song faltered when the computerized musical backup stopped.

Calls to “sing a cappella” rang out from the audience, and after a quick on-stage conference, the trio responded with a soulful “Silent Night,” in three-part harmony.

“That’s the difference between us and other groups,” Stockman said, before continuing the show as planned.

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‘Soldier’ musical is contest finalist

By Terry Morris | Friday, November 28, 2008, 07:31 PM

“Summer of My German Soldier,” a musical by Dayton’s Encore Theatre directors David Brush and Jim Farley, has been named a finalist for the 2008 American Harmony Prize.

The second annual playwriting award, sponsored by the Stamford, Conn., theater company Curtain Call, spotlights new musicals that explore ethnic, religious and gender issues. The winner will be announced in mid-December and performed as a concert reading in Curtain Call’s Mondays series in February 2009.

Based on the novel of the same name by Bette Green, “Summer of My German Soldier” is about a 12-year-old girl in Arkansas who harbors an escaped German POW during World War II with the help of the family’s black housekeeper. It was previously a finalist for Theatre Building Chicago’s Stages festival and has been produced at the University of Dayton.

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Women in Guild play are together and alone

By Terry Morris | Thursday, November 27, 2008, 11:01 PM

DAYTON — What’s the real story behind a photograph? The Dayton Theatre Guild explores the question with mixed success in the R.T. Robinson play “The Cover of Life.”

It’s about three wives left behind in a small Louisiana town when their husbands go off to fight in World War II. They move in with their mother in law (Jennifer Lockwood in a quietly compelling performance). Her man is AWOL for less patriotic reasons. A writer from Life magazine (played by Debra Strauss) comes from New York to do a cover story on the wives and learns way more than she expected to.

Like a photo that’s open to interpretation, this two-act play directed by Fran Pesch is about more than that, and less.

With kooky characters named Tood (Angela Timpone as the play’s central character), Weetsie (Wendi Williams) and hometown reporter Addie Mae (Heather Martin in a crisp and lively portrayal), the first impression is a Southern-fried comedy. But that’s fleeting.

The script aspires to be more — too much more — with elements of tragedy. It doesn’t have the stuff to be convincing on that level very often. One exception is a well-played Act 2 soliloquy for Holly Kuhn as fast and flashy Sybil, who proves to have a soft and conventional soul beneath her modern, bold swagger.

What’s sorely missing is a connection between the women. That’s almost as nonexistent as their mostly unreliable men. We only see one of them (Matt Curry as Tommy) in imaginary visits while his wife, Tood, reads his letters. The main quest in her life seems to be to convince him not to go into his brother’s bait business. She’d rather switch to venturing out on their own.

For all of the suggestions that her struggle is somehow profound, the drama’s actual heft is much lighter. The blame for that is in the script, not in Timpone’s measured performance.

“The Cover of Life’s” most significant aspect is how alone and on their own all of these people are. Lockwood expresses the cost of that emptiness very clearly as Ola.

Performances continue on weekends through Dec. 7 at 2330 Salem Ave. Tickets are $10-$17 at (937) 278-5993.

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Screen dream reaches back to Sheen

By Terry Morris | Wednesday, November 26, 2008, 02:51 PM

Former New Lebanon resident Jeff Dorsten, who decided to take up theater in his mid-30s after attending an acting workshop led by Martin Sheen, may share a scene with Sheen’s brother, Joe Estevez, in his film debut.

Estevez, along with young stars Matt Bushnell and Michael Welch, who are fresh from the recent release “Twilight,” will be featured in “Rough Hustle,” an indie casino feature that’s being partially filmed in Mesquite, Nev., for a 2009 release.

Dorsten, who made his stage debut in 1998 at the Dayton Theatre Guild, moved to Mesquite two years ago. He has landed a speaking cameo in “Rough Hustle” as a standup comedian in one of the lounge scenes and said he has also been cast as a blackjack dealer.

“To have my first film be with Martin Sheen’s brother, I’m just on cloud nine,” he said. “I’ve been dreaming of this for a long time.”

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Rockettes an easy match for their hype

By Terry Morris | Tuesday, November 25, 2008, 11:59 PM

At least one hyped event of the season besides Thanksgiving dinner has turned out to be as advertised: “The Radio City Music Hall Spectacular.”

Starring the high-kicking, but also toe-tapping, Santa-impersonating, manger-visiting, tour bus-riding and soldier-marching Rockettes, the touring version of New York City’s winter tradition had its local premiere Tuesday, Nov. 25, at Wright State University’s Nutter Center.

The first of three performances — there were two more on Wednesday — featured the famed dance corps as expected. If a first-rate cast of 24 is a smaller contingent than in New York, their dancing and personality as the centerpiece of a wonderfully staged, beautifully dressed variety show lived up to their reputation.

The 90 non-stop minutes opened with the Rockettes as reindeer. Topped with flashing antlers and hitched to a never more understandably jolly Santa’s sleigh, they led a trip to the North Pole, a journey suggested by projected images on a screen stretching the width of the stage behind them.

The screen was used to more convincing effect to during a tour of New York on a double-decker bus with the Rockettes as passengers whose every move had been choreographed, and as the sky over Bethlehem.

The holiday production also incorporated an orchestra of musicians arranged above and at both sides of the main stage, six singers who helped fill the time for major costume and set changes, live animals including a camel for the living nativity scene near the end of the show, ice skaters, an extra contingent of male and female dancers, a girl in pointe shoes who portrayed Clara during a “Nutcracker” scene brimming with dancing bears, and a subplot featuring two young brothers whose skepticism about Santa evaporated following a traditional lesson about giving.

They and Santa flew high over the audience, as did streamers fired from cannons. But it was the Rockettes’ combination of grace, precision, happiness and sex appeal that earned top billing.

They displayed several variations of their trademark kick line, but their best number was the one in which they marched stiff legged as toy soldiers, only to be felled like slow-motion dominoes by a gunner who had the consideration to hurry behind the last woman in line and place a pillow there for her to land on.

If not the equal of what you can see at Radio City, it had to be close.

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They’re a Tom and Katt dance duo

By Terry Morris | Thursday, November 20, 2008, 04:23 PM

Guys two, three and four or more times Tom Balaj’s age may want to know what it takes to dance with Catherine “Katt” Saliba.

It takes knowing how, for one thing.

Tom, 10, a fifth-grader at Miami Valley School, studies with Saliba at Always Ballroom studio in Dayton and competed with her recently in the 2008 Ohio Star Ball in Columbus, the largest ballroom dance contest in the United States.

“Katt” Saliba in rehearsal with Tom Balaj

The only junior competitor from the Miami Valley, he was the youngest in a field of more than 60 couples on Tuesday, Nov. 16, during which he didn’t win the overall title for the Bronze level (his category), but he did take a first place. He was back on the floor with her on Saturday, Nov. 22, to compete in five international-style dances: waltz, fox trot, Viennese waltz and quickstep.

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Fox ends 32 years of Sinclair dance

By Terry Morris | Monday, November 17, 2008, 02:49 PM

Friends, students and colleagues said farewell to Sinclair Community College dance director Patricia Ann Fox on Sunday, Nov. 16, with a performance, reception and dinner.

She is retiring after 32 years of welcoming beginners of all ages to her classes on the top floor of Sinclair’s Building 2, turning many of them into performers, dance enthusiasts and teachers in local studios.

Entitled “The Long and Winding Road,” the performance included several works done to Beatles songs.

Choreographers included Middle Eastern dancer and dancemaker Denise Miller, Contemporary Dance Sinclair director Rodney Veal and Fox, in a piece performed by former student and current Sinclair staff member Vicky Korosei.

Longtime friend and collaborator Kathy Frauman played a medley of Beatles songs on the studio piano, ending with “She’s Leaving Home.”

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