Weekly Entertainment Guide – The Barber of Seville, Arcadia, & Titanoboa

     

    Figaro! Figaro! Figaro! Misunderstandings and misinterpretations from the 17th to 19th centuries with Opera Philadelphia’s The Barber of Seville and Lantern Theater’s Arcadia.

    What’s Happening

    Philadelphia River-to-River Great 12 Hour Tour

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    The 5th annual Philadelphia River-to-River Great 12 Hour Tour returns Saturday, September 27, 8am-8pm. The free tour celebrates the City of Brotherly Love and all of its cultural offerings and covers the city from “river to river and from Pine Street to Vine Street,” with four separate two and a half hour tours, scheduled so you can take any or all of them. Each one visits as many as 25 cultural or historic sites and is conducted by Association of Philadelphia Tour Guides. Schedule: Old City, 8am, Society Hill, 11am, Mid-City, 2pm and The Parkway, 5pm.

    Campus Philly’s CollegeFest

    The annual CollegeFest is back this Saturday, September 27, 10am-4pm, on the steps of the Philadelphia Museum of Art, geared to welcome new and returning college and graduate students to the Philadelphia area – one of the largest college “towns” in the country – with food trucks, free music and entertainment, free admission to museums and cultural attractions in the area, and more. Check in at the Campus Philly booth to get a wristband.

    Museum Day Live!

    Smithsonian Magazine’s annual Museum Day Live! is this Saturday, September 27, offering free admission for one person plus a guest (per household) to museums across the country. Participating area museums include Hagley Museum and Library, offering All-American Day from 1pm-4pm (pictured). Other museums include the New Jersey State Museum, Penn Museum, Delaware Museum of Natural History, African American Museum in Philadelphia, Academy of Natural Sciences of Drexel University, Battleship New Jersey, American Philosophical Society Museum, Athenaeum of Philadelphia, National Museum of American Jewish History, Brandywine River Museum of Art, the Rosenbach of the Free Library of Philadelphia and more. For a complete list and to reserve your free tickets, visit the website.

    New Hope Arts & Crafts Festival

    The 21st annual New Hope Arts & Crafts Festival returns this Saturday, September 27, 10am-6pm, and Sunday, September 28, 10am-5pm, with over 200 fine art, jewelry, crafts, and photography exhibitors, music, food, family activities, and more at New Hope-Solebury High School, New Hope, PA. Free admission and free shuttle to and from the downtown.

    Manayunk StrEAT Food Festival

    The Manayunk StrEAT Food Festival is SUNDAY, September 28, 11am-5pm, as Main Street is lined with more than 40 of Philadelphia’s best food trucks, gourmet food vendors and local farmers’ markets, live music in three locations and more including Recess, a kid-friendly activity zone and MNYK Beer Garden, to kick off Manayunk Restaurant Week beginning Sunday, September 28 through Friday, October 10, Manayunk.

    Pearl Street Block Party

    Asian Arts Initiative hosts the 2nd annual Pearl Street Block Party, Saturday, September 27, 1pm-5pm, a free neighborhood festival of arts and community that celebrates Chinatown North/Callowhill as a diverse, creatively rich, and burgeoning cultural hub, and provides an opportunity for Philadelphians to participate in all kinds of interactive art-making. The 1200 block will come alive with a myriad of activities, including live music, food, community art vendors, Neighborhood Workshop exhibition, and an array of multi-disciplinary art installations. Free and open to the public, Pearl Street between 12th and 13th Streets, via Asian Arts Initiative, 1219 Vine Street, Philadelphia. The event culminates in a community feast at 5pm (ticket required).

    Titanoboa: Monster Snake at Delaware Museum of Natural History

    In 2009 in Colombia, scientists uncovered the remains of the largest snake in the world, a reptile that lived approximately 60–58 million years ago. Explore the ancient, extinct reptile at the Delaware Museum of Natural History with the new special exhibit Titanoboa: Monster Snake, September 27 through January 25, 4840 Kennett Pike, Wilmington, DE. The display includes a full-scale model and two vertebrae casts made from the original fossils, a 17-foot-long modern green anaconda and the vertebra from Titanoboa, along with a video from a Smithsonian Channel documentary examining the discovery and reconstruction of the enormous reptile that measured 48 feet long and 2500 pounds, and a photo exhibit highlighting the many species of snakes found in the First State. Organized by the Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service in collaboration with the Smithsonian Tropical Research Institute, the Smithsonian Channel, the University of Nebraska-Lincoln, and the Florida Museum of Natural History.

    Puerto Rican Day Parade

    The 52nd Annual Puerto Rican Day Parade, Philadelphia’s largest outdoor celebration of Puerto Rican and Latino heritage is Sunday, September 28, noon-3pm (approx.), with an afternoon of music, dancing, floats and more along the Ben Franklin Parkway, ending at Eakins Oval, organized by the Council of Spanish Speaking Organizations of Philadelphia (Concilio).

    Onstage

    Opera Philadelphia’s “The Barber of Seville”

    Opera Philadelphia launches its 40th anniversary season with a new production of The Barber of Seville (Il barbiere di Siviglia), Rossini’s popular comic escapade full of calamity and mistaken identities. Michael Shell directs the lively, fast-paced new take on the 17th century love story, with five performances September 26 through October 5 at the Academy of Music. Starring Curtis Institute grad Jonathan Beyer as Figaro and Academy of Vocal Arts grad Taylor Stayton as Count Almaviva. Jennifer Holloway makes her company debut as Rosina. A co-production with Opera Theatre of Saint Louis, the show is performed in Italian with English supertitles and libretto by Cesare Sterbini. Opera Philadelphia offers a free broadcast at Independence National Historical Park Saturday, September 27, 7pm. The show will be shown in high definition on a giant outdoor screen on Independence Mall. Pre-show at 6pm. Tickets are free but registration is required.

    Lantern Theater Company’s “Arcadia”

    Lantern Theater Company opens its 21st season with the Tony, Drama Desk, and Olivier Award-winning Arcadia by British playwright Tom Stoppard. Considered to be one of the greatest plays of the last two decades, the comedy shifts between two centuries, moving from events in the past, the discussions between a young woman and her tutor, connected with the scholarly investigation taking place in the same house nearly 200 years later, full of misunderstanding and misinterpretations. Directed by Kathryn MacMillan and starring Alex Boyle, Maxwell Eddy, and Daniel Fredrick, making their Lantern debuts, September 25 through November 2. “In Arcadia: Celebrating Tom Stoppard’s Masterpiece,” a four day festival, accompanies the production, October 23-26, featuring a panel discussion with Toby Zinman, a high tea, special performances of some of Stoppard’s rarely-performed short works, a Lantern Pub, and more, St. Stephen’s Theater, 10th and Ludlow Streets, Philadelphia.

    Delaware Theatre Company’s “Love Letters”

    Do you remember your first Love? Delaware Theatre Company raises that question with their season opener, Love Letters, by A.R. Gurney. Emmy Award-winning actress Michael Learned (from TV’s The Waltons) and Daniel Davis (from TV’s The Nanny) bring to life the touching story of two souls as they read aloud accounts of their marriages, children, divorces, love affairs, and careers that took them down different paths, revealing how much they meant to each other over a half century. Bud Martin directs the Pulitzer Prize-winning two character play through October 5, 200 Water Street, Wilmington, DE. Related events include post-show talkback with the stars, September 25 and October 2, and pre-show “Viewpoints” on October 1.

    Music

    Emmylou Harris at the Grand

    The Grammy Award-winning singer songwriter Emmylou Harris comes to the Grand for one performance only, Thursday, September 25, 8pm, featuring special guest Nathaniel Rateliff solo acoustic, 818 N. Market Street, Wilmington, DE.

    Philadelphia Orchestra’s new season begins

    The Philadelphia Orchestra kicks off a new season with pianist Lang Lang and three performances, Friday, September 26, 8pm, Saturday, September 27, 8pm, and Sunday, September 28, 2pm in Verizon Hall at the Kimmel Center. The famed Curtis Institute of Music graduate joins Yannick Nézet-Séguin for a program including Strauss’s An Alpine Symphony, Mozart’s Piano Concerto No. 17, K. 453, and 40/40, celebrating the music director’s birthday (he’s 40). Works were chosen by the audience and feature pieces that haven’t been performed by the Fabulous Philadelphians in Yannick’s lifetime.

    40th Street Summer Series concludes

    The 40th Street Summer Series concludes this Saturday, September 27, 6pm, with the energetic, imaginative group Man Man. Needle Driver opens. Enjoy refreshments and children’s activities, behind the Walnut West Free Library, 40th and Chestnut Streets, Philadelphia. Free.

    Lucy Kaplansky at Burlap and Bean

    Catch soulful folk singer Lucy Kaplansky (pictured) at Burlap and Bean this Saturday, September 27, 8pm, performing songs from her latest album “Reunion,” and more, with Buffalo Stack opening. Upcoming concerts include Matt Duke with Irene Molloy, Friday, October 3, 7pm, Charlie Parr with Hinton, Bower, and Jones, October 8, 8pm, Lucy Wainwright Roche with Jesse Ruben, October 10, 8pm, The Shops at Springton Pointe, 203 South Newtown Street Road, Newtown Square, PA.

    Art Appreciation

    “Do it” at the Galleries at Moore College of Art & Design

    The Galleries at Moore College of Art & Design hosts do it, a traveling exhibition conceived and created by Hans Ulrich Obrist and organized by Independent Curators International, New York. The first time being presented in Philadelphia, the world’s longest running exhibition is the only one based entirely upon artist instructions, through December 6, 20th Street and The Parkway, Philadelphia. A publication featuring new instructions created by Philadelphia based artists accompany the exhibition. On Tuesday, September 30, stay for the Jump/Start Fashion Show at 6pm, Moore’s first fashion show of the new school year, Runway of Brotherly Love, inspired by the “Patrick Kelly: Runway of Love” exhibition on view at the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Free and open to the public. Pictured: Jérôme Bel, Shut Up and Dance.

    Art-In at Mt. Cuba Center

    Mt. Cuba Center hosts an Art-In, a day of art in the garden, an opportunity to draw, paint or photograph the beautiful botanical gardens on what is the former home and family estate of Mr. and Mrs. Lammot du Pont Copeland, Friday, September 26, 10am-4pm, 3120 Barley Mill Road, Hockessin, DE. Free but registration required. Rain date is Saturday, September 27.

    Marking the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964

    This summer marked the 50th anniversary of the Civil Rights Act of 1964, outlawing discrimination based on race, color, religion, sex or national origin. Several organizations examine the impact of slavery, emancipation, civil rights and race relations with special events and exhibits.

    The Underground Railroad in Philadelphia

    Join Moonstone Arts Center’s month-long, city-wide celebration of the Underground Railroad in Philadelphia. Philadelphians played a major role in the struggle against slavery, from the formation of the Female Anti-Slavery Society in 1833 through the adoption of the Fifteenth Amendment in 1870. Beginning September 29, the series explores the period from 1830 to 1870 with lectures on individuals, panels on the movement, films, a tour of Underground Railroad sites and historic markers that honor some of the period’s activists, and discussions on how it relates to the Civil Rights Movement and today’s struggles. Sessions held at locations all over the city. Pictured: Historical marker for Pennsylvania Hall, on the site of the WHYY building, 6th and Race Streets, Philadelphia, built in 1838 by abolitionists and burned to the ground by anti-black rioters three days after being constructed.

    For All the World to See: Visual Culture & the Struggle for Civil Rights

    For All the World to See: Visual Culture and the Struggle for Civil Rights explores the role of visual culture in shaping, influencing and transforming the fight for racial equality and justice in the United States from the late 1940s to the mid-1970s. The exhibit, at Mercer Museum, includes photographs, television and film clips, magazines, art posters, newspapers, and historic artifacts that trace how images and media consumed by Americans transformed the civil rights movement, through October 26, 84 S. Pine Street, Doylestown, PA. Also on display, “The Negative Imagery of Race: 100 Years of Stereotyping,” and “A Selection of Quilts by Linda Salley in Honor of the African American Museum of Bucks County.”

    Cash Crop & Audacious Freedom

    On display at the African American Museum in Philadelphia is Stephen Hayes’ Cash Crop, through January 5, featuring sculptures and a life sized installation comprised of 15 chained forms that represent the 15 million men, women, and children who endured the Middle Passage, along with historic slave dockets, videos, and more. Also on view, the permanent exhibit, Audacious Freedom: African Americans in Philadelphia 1776-1876, recounting the stories and contributions made by people of African descent in Philadelphia. Bring the kids for Macy’s Family Day, Saturday, September 27, 10am-5pm, with art and history activities for ages 5-11, 7th and Arch Streets, Philadelphia.

     

     

    Christine Kelley contributed reporting to this week’s Guide.

    To submit an event to be considered for the Weekly Entertainment Guide email Robin Bloom at artscalendar@whyy.org.

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