Mountain Views News          Saturday, January 30, 2016

12

ARTS & ENTERTAINMENT

Mountain Views-News Saturday, January 30, 2016 

On the Marquee: Notes from the Sierra Madre Playhouse


SEAN’S SHAMELESS 

REVIEWS:

ST. LUCIA

By Sean Kayden

ARTISTIC VS. BUSINESS DECISIONS


By Artistic Director, Christian LebanoToday I 
feel like a grown-up. An odd thing to say for a 
man in his 50’s, I know. Today I said “no” to a 
project I had hoped to bring to the Playhouse. I 
know that audiences would have loved it, but it just 
didn’t pencil out. It might have sold better than 
the number I assigned to the calculations but I have 
learned to be conservative in my predictions after 
a couple of spectacular failures. I have to think 
about the long-term health of SMP and this show, 
while fun, would not have returned enough on 
its investment. I don’t think purely economically 
when I talk about returns either. I consider the 
extrinsic elements, as well – and when evaluating 
the whole package, it wasn’t worth pursuing.

 In contrast to that decision is a show I am hoping 
to announce soon for our summer slot – after 
Always…Patsy Cline we have decided to reserve 
the summers for our yearly musical offering and 
I hope you’ll be as excited about what we are 
planning as I am. It is one of the greatest musicals 
this country has ever produced and it will tax all the 
resources of the Playhouse. But this one does make 
sense to stretch for – it will assert what I hope the 
Playhouse will be, the kind of work we’ll do, and 
through its ambition declare that we’ve arrived. 
That’s a roll of the dice worth making.

 We are definitely trying to grow at the Playhouse. 
And I hear from many of you who have been long-
time patrons that you like the direction we are 
headed. To further that growth we are having a 
retreat this weekend for the Board and Staff. We’ll 
discuss strategies to help us get to where we all want 
to be – a thriving cultural hub of the San Gabriel 
Valley – and set some targets to help us get there. 
I’m not short of ideas for programs and initiatives 
that I would love to see come to fruition, but first 
we need to attend to our infrastructure. We are 
so short-handed that they all revolve around more 
staff to help us achieve our goals.

 I keep saying that I think SMP is poised on the 
brink of truly wonderful things. With your help 
and support we’ll make our dreams reality and our 
inspirations manifest. After all, we do it for you, 
our loyal supporters – please let me know what 
you think. You can write me at ArtisticDirector@
SierraMadrePlayhouse.org. 

* * *

The Granados Concert (part of our Series with the 
Colburn Conservatory) is this Sunday, January 
31. Tickets for the concert are $20 for adults 
and $15 for students. A few essays back I talked 
about making the Playhouse your drop-in living 
room. How wonderful to amble down and hear 
this beautiful music just blocks from your home. I 
think for those of you who haven’t attended one, a 
single visit will make you a fan. 

* * *

Deathtrap is selling briskly, it runs through 
February 20. This one is great fun – opening night 
audience were shocked by all the surprises - don’t 
miss it. Reviews have been glowing! Please visit 
our website at SierraMadrePlayhouse.org or call 
Mary at 626.355.4318 to arrange your purchase. 

South African-born Jean-Philip Grobler, aka St. Lucia 
is prepared to release his much anticipated sophomore 
record, Matter via Columbia Records. Grobler, who is now 
Brooklyn-based, released the first single, “Dancing On 
Glass,” a fetching 80s-inspired dance track last October. 
It was teeming with hooks and snyth-pop beats. While 
Grobler has been dropping remixes every so often in the 
past two years, “Dancing on Glass” was the first original 
music since his effervescent 2013 debut, When The Night. 
The electro-poppers also include Grobler’s wife, Patti 
Beranek on back-up vocals, guitarist and bassist Ross 
Clark, keyboard player Nicky Paul, and drummer Dustin 
Kaufman. For album number two, it was a collaborative 
effort. “Dancing On Glass” was written with Tim Pagnotta 
(Walk the Moon, Matthew Koma) and “Help Me Run 
Away,” brought Grobler and Bleachers’ Jack Antonoff 
together for something imaginative. On the production 
side, the band tapped Chris Zane (Passion Pit and The 
Walkmen). It’s clearly evident that Grobler has expanded 
his musical purview with the new record. With eleven brand 
spanking new tracks, St. Lucia will immediately be kicking 
off a US tour to coincide with the January 29th release.

 “Do You Remember?” launches the record in the best 
possible way. The roaring opener is bold, sumptuous, and 
striking. It takes grasp on the listener with spectacular 
hooks and infectious beats. “Home” is a dazzling 80s 
dance-pop tune. The robotic-like snyth beats are drenched 
with 80s-pop ingredients. You can envision a goofy and 
unabashedly silly music video to be paired up with it. 
Basically it makes you want to jump out of your seat and 
simply dance. In fact, it seems St. Lucia’s intent all along is to 
have people to get up and dance. And I’m not sure how one 
could refrain from doing so while listening to this heavily 
pop-induced record. “Dancing On Glass,” the band’s 
monumental single is unquestionably awesome. It is, hands 
down, the catchiest, most addicting song in recent memory. 
The song feels like a companion piece of Walk The Moon’s 
“Shut Up and Dance” and we all know what that song did 
for them. Hopefully and much deserving so, this mellifluous 
effort will push St. Lucia into new heights, professionally. 
“Physical” places St. Lucia in another bold direction 
with vocal loops and trancelike snyth arrangements. The 
throbbing beats trigger a wild sensation that gets your body 
moving in a “physical” matter. 

 “Game 4 U” is a fairly gentler paced jam, but it’s one of the 
most captivating tracks found on Matter. The relationship 
themed tune is a charming endeavor that marks yet another 
refreshing approach for the band. The sounds and beats take 
on a different vibrancy than the previous tracks that feels less 
snyth-y and more natural. The inclusion of horns and what 
seems to be a saxophone in the tail end of the song allow for 
the tune to standout more so than others on Matter. “Love 
Somebody” is an R&B inspired tune that brings to mind 
other acts such Active Child and Chad Valley. With the 
snapping of fingers and seductive beats, “Love Somebody” 
is a deliberately paced track that will have you slow dancing 
this time around. “Help Me Run Away” feels like the perfect 
workout song. It has this go, go, go mentality about it. The 
chorus just bursts with the title line “help me run away” 
and combined with the explosiveness of layered sounds, 
the combination is breathtaking since it feels like you never 
have a moment to come up for air. The thing is, Matter is 
an album filled with breathtaking moments mostly deriving 
from its splendid hooks, energetic demeanor, and breakneck 
pace, but sometimes there are those uncommon surprises 
that materialize. One of those surprises comes in the form of 
the closing track, “Always”. The anthemic pop-rock effort is 
grandiose and immensely affecting that appropriately feels 
like the superlative choice for a closing track from St. Lucia. 
The song features backup vocals of Beranek, who is able to 
sparkle with her own angelic vocals. In the end, it has one 
believing that St. Lucia is in no way one-dimensional as they 
tap into a powerful sound that pushes their boundaries both 
lyrically and musically. St. Lucia explores more than your 
typical snyth-pop outing on Matters making it a true gem 
amongst a sea of pearls. 

Grade: 8 out of 10

Key Tracks: “Dancing on Glass,” “Do You Remember?” 
“Game 4 U,” “Always”

St. Lucia Burst Back and It Does ‘Matter’

Artist: St. Lucia

Album: Matter

Label: Columbia Records

Release Date: January 29th, 2016

Review By: Sean Kayden

Don Savage is Porter Milgrim in Deathtrap. 

Photo by John Dluglolecki

Jeff’s Book Pics By Jeff Brown

SPECIAL MUSIC EVENT CELEBRATING 
GRANADOS AT SIERRA MADRE PLAYHOUSE 

ON JANUARY 31

The Geography of Genius: A Search for the 
World’s Most Creative Places from Ancient 
Athens to Silicon Valley by Eric Weiner 
Travel the world with Eric Weiner, as he journeys 
from Athens to Silicon Valley and throughout 
history, to show how creative genius flourishes in 
specific places at specific times.Acclaimed travel 
writer Weiner sets out to examine the connection 
between our surroundings and our 
most innovative ideas. He explores the 
history of places, like Vienna of 1900, 
Renaissance Florence, ancient Athens, 
Song Dynasty Hangzhou, and Silicon 
Valley, to show how certain urban 
settings are conducive to ingenuity. 
With his trademark insightful humor, 
he walks the same paths as the geniuses 
who flourished in these settings to see 
if the spirit of what inspired figures 
like Socrates, Michelangelo, and 
Leonardo remains. In these places, 
Weiner asks, “What was in the air, 
and can we bottle it?”This link can be 
traced back through history: Darwin’s 
theory of evolution gelled while he 
was riding in a carriage. Freud did his 
best thinking at this favorite coffee 
house. Beethoven, like many geniuses, 
preferred long walks in the woods.
Sharp and provocative, The book 
redefines the argument about how 
genius came to be. His reevaluation 
of the importance of culture in 
nurturing creativity is an informed 
romp through history that will surely 
jumpstart a national conversation.
Dreaming of the Bones 
by Deborah Crombie 
Crombie’s fifth novel, Dreaming of the 
Bones, was a New York Times Notable 
Book in 1997 and named by the Independent 
Mystery Booksellers as one of the 100 Best Crime 
Novels of the Century, was an Edgar nominee for 
Best Novel, and won the Macavity award for Best 
Novel.It is the call Scotland Yard Superintendent 
Duncan Kincaid never expected. When talented and 
tormented poet Lydia Brooke dies, it is assumed that 
she has taken her own life. Now obsession has taken 
hold of Victoria McClellan. A feminist biographer at 
Cambridge, Vic finds herself immersed in the poet’s 
world. Uneasy about the manner of Lydia’s death, 
Vic calls on her ex-husband, Superintendent Duncan 
Kincaid, for help. But before he can take action, Vic 
herself is dead--and there’s no question that this 
one is murder. As Kincaid and his 
lover and partner, Gemma James, 
investigate, they are exposed to secrets 
that have reached out over three 
decades and poisoned a dozen lives.
The Open Secret by Tony Parsons 
“Throughout my early life I felt that 
there was another possibility which, 
once realised, would transform 
all and everything. One day that 
possibility became a reality, and it was 
simple and ordinary, magnificent and 
revolutionary. It is the open secret 
that reveals itself in every part of our 
lives. But realisation does not emerge 
through our attempts to change our 
lives, it comes as a direct rediscovery 
of who it is that lives. The Open Secret 
is a singular and radical work which 
speaks of the fundamental liberation 
that is absolutely beyond effort, path, 
process or belief,” Tony Parsons.


Stiff: The Curious Lives of Human 
Cadavers by Mary Roach 
“One of the funniest and most 
unusual books of the year,Gross, 
educational, and unexpectedly 
sidesplitting.”Entertainment Weekly.
Stiff is an oddly compelling, often 
hilarious exploration of the strange 
lives of our bodies postmortem. For 
two thousand years, cadavers some 
willingly, some unwittingly have been involved in 
science’s boldest strides and weirdest undertakings. 
In this fascinating account, Mary Roach visits the 
good deeds of cadavers over the centuries and tells 
the engrossing story of our bodies when we are no 
longer with them.Recommended by Beth Copti.

Sierra Madre Playhouse and Colburn Conservatory 
of Music continue their collaboration of presenting 
superior evenings of traditional and contemporary 
classical music for a third season. Our first such 
event this year is Celebrating Granados: His Life, 
His Influences, His Music.

 Enrique Granados (1867-1916), revered in his 
native Spain, is less well-known by American 
audiences. Our January concert commemorates 
the centennial of his death. In 1916, following the 
New York premiere of his opera Goyescas (based 
on his earlier piano pieces inspired by the paintings 
of Francisco Goya) and a special piano recital for 
President Woodrow Wilson, Granados and his 
wife set sail for the return voyage to Europe. They 
perished when their vessel was sunk by a German 
U-Boat. They were survived by six children, one of 
them a musician.

 Prize-winning pianist, recording artist, and 
former Fulbright scholar Régulo Martinez-Antón, 
the recipient of the Professional Studies Certificate 
from the Colburn Conservatory of Music and 
currently a piano faculty member at the Colburn 
School of Performing Arts and the Montecito 
International Music Festival, has assembled the 
program for the January 31 concert. A native of 
Madrid, Martinez-Antón has a special affinity for 
the works of Granados. The concert will feature 
not only works by Granados, but also by his 
influences.

 The program:

 Robert Schumann (1810-1856) Arabeske in C 
major, Op. 18

 Fredreric Chopin (1810-1849) Nocturne op. 62 
in B major

 Franz Liszt (1811-1886) Sonetto 47 del Petrarca

Sonetto 104 del Petrarca

Sonetto 123 del Perrarca

Intermission

 

Enrique Granados (1867-1916) from Danzas 
españolas, op. 37 Andaluza

Oriental from Goyescas Los requibros (The

 Compliments)

Quejas o la maja y el ruiseñor (Complaints 
or the Maiden and the Nightingale)

 El pelele

“Martinez-Antón’s performance was astounding.”-
---Stage & Cinema

 “The music of Régulo Martinez-Antón is always 
an adventure:----Rhein Zeitung (Germany)

 

 Celebrating Granados promises to be an 
extraordinary evening of musicianship and 
listening pleasure. It’s not to be missed.


Jeff’s History Corner By Jeff Brown

1.The Founding Fathers penned the first couple 
of drafts of the Declaration of Independence on 
hemp paper, since at the time at least 75 percent 
of all the world’s paper was made from cannabis 
hemp fiber. The democratic delegates eked out the 
document’s first and second

drafts—completed on June 28th and July 2nd 
1776, respectively—on Dutch hemp paper. The 
final document had a more official air, though, as it 
was printed on parchment.

 2.The American flag was the brainchild of a high 
schooler.Robert Heft was 17 years old when he 
submitted his design for a new American flag for 
a school project in 1958. After receiving a B- for 
his work, Heft contested his grade with his teacher 
and an agreement was made that he

would receive an A if it was accepted by the 
US Congress. In the following year, which saw 
Alaska and Hawaii join the union, Heft’s flag was 
adopted by the nation and his grade was changed 
accordingly.

 3.FDR escaped an assassination attempt 
before he was famous.Franklin D Roosevelt was 
diagnosed with polio in 1921, yet led a somewhat 
charmed life. In February 1932, just three weeks 
prior to his inauguration, a revolver bullet meant 
for him was directed off target as it was fired, 
fatally wounding the Mayor of Chicago instead. An 
American submarine mistakenly fired a torpedo 
at the battleship Iowa, missing it by a fraction, as 
he held a secret meeting on it in November 1943. 
These brushes with death were preceded, however, 
by a close escape in 1919 when he gave Mitchell 
Palmer, the notorious Attorney General, a lift 
home from a boozy party. FDR politely refused the 
offer of a nightcap, driving off and leaving Palmer 
to retire upstairs before the front portion of his 
house then exploded as part of an attempt on his 
life.

Had FDR accepted Palmer’s hospitality, both men 
would have been killed.

 4.Cross-dressing women served in the Civil War. 
Hundreds of women are thought to have disguised 
themselves as men in order to participate in the 
Civil War. Most famous is Sarah Emma Edmonds, 
who felt compelled to play her part for the Union 
Army and enlisted in the 2nd Michigan Infantry 
with the alias “Franklin Flint Thompson”. She 
served between 1861 and 1863, with Malaria 
curtailing her involvement. She wrote a memoir of 
her time in the army, selling almost 200,000 copies.

 5.Months before World War Two ended, the 
Japanese found themselves in a bit of a pinch. 
Making the most of the strong air current across 
the Pacific Ocean, the Japanese crafted what was 
likely the first intercontinental weapon system and 
attached bombs to hydrogen balloons, in what 
was known as the Fu-Go campaign. Depending 
on weather conditions, it would take each balloon 
anywhere from 30 to 60 hours to reach the United 
States. Researchers estimate that the Japanese said 
sayonara to around 9,000 bombs—which were 
approximately 33 feet in diameter— to the United 
States, with 342 known to have reached the United 
States. Many of them landed and exploded, with 
one even killing a whole family in Oregon in 1944. 
Rumor has it that there may still be dozens – 
potentially still active – lying around.

Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com