Celebrating Our First Anniversary At An Intuitive Perspective.

I am not exactly sure when to celebrate our first anniversary…but I actually published our first post on March 20, 2020, so I am going to use today as our official birthday.

For those of you who have visited here before and read our Welcome to An Intuitive Perspective page know that I am a fan, student, and practitioner of the arts and culture. I have a BFA in art education and at one time or another produced prints, photos, watercolors, and oil paintings. And there was a bit of time in high school and college when I played in a number of rock, blues, and proto-punk bands. I showed work in the art rental and sales gallery of the Art Institute of Chicago, was represented by a north loop gallery in Chicago, and had art in a number of regional shows. But all of those were so last century so to speak. And of course I have attended a gazillion openings and plays and concerts over the years. Great times!

But as often happens in life, I got sidetracked or interrupted. And for nine years I had been scratching another itch…writing…and writing for a political blog…and publishing it for four years. And I started to burn out and knew that I wanted to move on with my writing in retirement after the 2020 elections…so started the groundwork for An Intuitive Perspective!

So on March 20, 2020, I published a half dozen pieces, all reprints of my responses to plays presented by the Milwaukee Repertory Theater…pieces that I had written on Facebook as part of my involvement with the Rep’s Social Media Club. And then I was determined to build from there with all of my future visits to galleries, museums, theaters, dance companies, etc…and just as I was hitting the publish buttons over and over, the live arts and culture scene came to a grinding halt because of the coronavirus pandemic.

But I found some silver linings in the daily hovering gray clouds. I attended art history courses at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee virtually. I found any number of new theater groups who were doing virtual readings or presentations. There is a lot of very exciting stuff out there. And I wrote about many of them as my energy and emotions would allow during a very troubling year. I hope you go back and look at a few of them.

And as a hold over from my political blog where we featured music one day a week, just for a break from the seriousness of the site, I brought that feature here as Monday Music. And I started out with some pop songs that I find spiritually magic and then others that I enjoy a great deal. And in 2021, I have mixed in some more serious music…much of it from smaller groups that are new to me or are playing modern composers who are new to me. If you have had a chance to listen to them, I hope you have been entertained.

This anniversary note will be my 117th article on An Intuitive Perspective…granted about 50 of them are Monday Music entries and the first two handfuls, reprints from other sources…but an accomplishment given the state of the arts over the past year and the effects on my spirit.

And for 2021? Well more of the same…sort of. Plus a few original posts that are slowly percolating in the back of my mind…and fingers crossed…many many new responses to live in person arts experiences!!!!

And as always, if you want to reach out to us, leave a comment after a post that has drawn your interest…or if about just something whatever, reach out to: contactaip@anintuitiveperspective.com

Thank you for visiting and I look forward to hearing from you!

Ed Heinzelman

RBT: The Woman Hater

“…wear out the drums of his ear…” Sir Roderick, the Woman Hater, describing a man’s destiny in life if he were living with a woman!

And Sir Roderick’s defiant misogynistic comment could at once describe the rabbit hole that playwright FRANCES BURNEY presents us with in The Woman Hater. Certainly a satire, we soon have a comedy of class and manners and love.

Not unlike other rather prominent authors from the English isles, we have comedic and tragic actions based on misinformation and mis-identities and missed connections…the stress on the viewer in anticipation of the next miscue, or better yet, resolution, at first intolerable becomes delightful.

And words, words, words. It took me a while to get into this play. Not for lack of trying on the part of the Red Bull Theater, cast and director. They regaled the words with everything at their disposal…but I was overwhelmed at first…my ear drums were wearing out…and I think it’s Ms. Burney’s issue! Although this might work better on stage too…the movement from character to character as their scenes and speaking roles change can be a bit distracting in Zoom.

screen capture by AIP

But once I got acclimated, this became an enchanting and frustrating (in a good way).exhibition. And we want to fall in love with all of the characters at one point or other…and we will as the story progresses. But knowing the whole story as we do as audience, you just want to jump into the screen and tell everyone what’s what…as one character follows poor advice…and the next mistakes someone for a third party…and everyone has only part of the story because they are ALL afraid to be forthright…and we have seventeen years of this similar deceit and denial and ignoring of feelings to fill in and overcome and eventually forgive.

And don’t overlook the two comedic relief characters here. They both play key roles and both love words. There is of course Lady Smatter who presents herself as a lady of letters who apparently is spending her fortune to support poets in exchange for the flattery of inscriptions or dedications to herself! The joke here is she quotes them incessantly and constantly but incompletely and inaccurately and continually via the wrong attributions. And this is all portrayed with the proper edge by VEANNE COX. And the other is Arnie Burton as Old Waverly who seems to be a wordsmith…well at least when he is assigning attributes to others. Just an amazing sequence as he peers out from under his powdered wig!

And kudos to EVERETT QUINTON for pulling this off…this is not an easy timeline to keep straight while also recognizing the shifting moods and relationships and then being able to move the actors to each specific action and scene…watching that interplay is a joy in itself.

And the the cast here…this is an intense and fast moving play….with as I think I said…words, words, words…and these words are all important and not necessarily easy dialogue to follow or perform. Just an amazing accomplishment by all hands…particularly in the Zoom virtual format rather than on stage in person with the usual cues and habituations. Here is the cast list of these amazing people:

Young Waverly……………………………………NICK WESTRATE
Wilmot | Old Waverly…………………………ARNIE BURTON
Steward………………………………………………BILL ARMY
Sir Roderick………………………………………..MATTHEW SALDIVAR
Lady Smatter……………………………………..VEANNE COX
Nurse | Prim | Phebe………………………….JENNE VATH
Sophia | Joyce……………………………………CHERIE CORINNE RICE
Eleonora ……………………………………………REBECCA S’MANGA FRANK

screen capture by AIP

And thank you for the great costumes and props…and the careful orchestration of passing off the several props from one character to another…who were of course in separate frames and miles apart…not something that other theater groups have put enough thought into. RBT nailed it!!!

Well, as Milton said, “All’s Well That Ends Well” or was it Spencer?

This presentation will be available online for free (but please send them a donation, they deserve it). The recording is available until 7:00 PM EDT on Friday, January 29 – then it disappears.

It’s Time To Make Your Christmas Carol Plans At The Milwaukee Repertory Theater…Virtually Of Course!

Hey, this may be a little repetitive, but it’s great news, and the reminder just hit my email inbox this morning! But here again, are all of the details you need to need join the Milwaukee Repertory Theater’s presentations of a reprise of A Christmas Carol (and it’s free) and their 2020 presentation of Jacob Marley’s Christmas Carol (and it’s a bargain!).

photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater

Purchase to watch Dec 10 – 24 Jacob Marley’s Christmas Carol featuring Lee E. Ernst

A once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to experience the incomparable Lee E. Ernst playing more than a dozen characters in the Dickens’ classic with a unique soundscape developed by foley artist Dan Kazemi, under the direction of Milwaukee Rep Artistic Director Mark Clements. Our fully realized production will be taped and distributed to a limited number of people on a first come, first served basis. The production will be available to view for $20 per household December 10 – 24. Proceeds from streaming sales will be used to employ and compensate artists involved in the production.

Click here from more details on Jacob Marley’s Christmas Carol at the Milwaukee Rep!

And purchase virtual TICKETS HERE!

And for those of you who want to enjoy the Milwaukee Rep’s A Christmas Carol, you can sign up for a live stream presentation, here are some details!

photo courtesy of the Milwaukee Repertory Theater

FREE from December 1 – 24 Mark Clements’ Classic Production of A Christmas Carol

Each year, nearly 40,000 people experience Milwaukee Rep Artistic Director Mark Clements’ epic adaptation at the beautiful historic Pabst Theater. We are opening our video vault to bring you a never-before-seen recording of the 2016 production filmed and produced by HMS Media. This production will be available for FREE to view December 1 – 24 as our gift to theater lovers worldwide.

And for more details on this presentation, click here!

AND, to receive the free link to this production please fill out the registration form via THIS LINK!

Merry Christmas!