Shen Wei Dance Arts

In a Performance Art piece at the Los Angeles Music Center, 12 dancers painted a canvas groundcloth created by Rose Brand during the performance.

The imaginative Shen Wei Dance Arts Company performs their pieces for forward-looking audiences. In a Performance Art piece at the Los Angeles Music Center, 12 dancers painted a Canvas groundcloth created by Rose Brand during the performance.
Direction, Choreography, Sets & Costumes: SHEN WEI

Performance Artist

Performance Artist Confronts Chengguan Officers in Kunming

A performance artist in Kunming put a yoke around his neck – a punishment for prisoners in ancient China – and covered his clothes with 100 yuan notes on a public street. During the performance, he was confronted by chengguan (urban management) officers.

query the saddest song sung in the movies from Kurosawa's Ikiru.

Beast Women

Beast Women 2010 Spring Series

By J. Scott Hill

Why is the variety show a dead form on television? Being from Chicagoland, being of a certain age, my understanding of what counts as entertainment was formed by Bozo’s Circus. Bob Bell, Ned Locke, Marshall Brodien, and especially the great Roy Brown introduced me and countless other Midwestern kids to the old pie-in-the-face routine, The Grand Prize Game, The Stone of Zanzibar, and the slow burn (poor Cookie). Alongside these influential performances was an endless parade of variety acts: magicians, acrobats, wire walkers, unicyclists, singers, jugglers, and what seemed like a new plate spinner every single day. Even now, I can’t have lunch without hearing “Sabre Dance” in my head.

Variety may be dead on TV, but live cabaret still thrives in Chicago. Barely a mile away from 2501 West Bradley Place, from where Bozo’s Circus was on the air, PROP THTR plays home to the Beast Women and the 2010 Spring Series of their all-female cabaret.

Beastmistresses Michelle Power and Jill Erickson have assembled an eclectic clowder of whip-smart kittens. Michelle Power continued her role as emcee with confidence and guile, explaining the Beast Women concept with warmth and wit, managing the flow of the evening, and rousing the late-night rabble. The opening night lineup was a delight.

Singer-songwriter Annah London performed her own brand of Alanis Morissette-influenced folk rock with a hint of Kristy MacColl. Jen St. Stjärna brought a Carole King-meets-Tori Amos vibe with tracks from her forthcoming album Horizon. St. Stjärna’s “Harry Houdini” seems destined for immediate airplay and a wide audience; you can give “Harry Houdini” a test-listen at:

Not to be outdone by those lyricists, poetry slam-type spoken word performers Angela Oliver and Kay Kron each gave breathtaking performances, full of complex structure and dizzying internal rhyme schemes. Thankfully, they were not pitted against one another in verbal combat, lest the tippling crowd be sobered by the dueling fierce wisdoms.

Not all of the Beast Women were out to appeal predominantly to the ear. Deb Webb, with her impossibly long hair, performed a cabaret act that served up the tease without the strip. Belly dancer Mahira displayed amazing, sometimes baffling, muscular control. Sarah Lowry provided one of the show’s highlights with an extremely unique Burlesque: a reverse-striptease with a bizarre twist that thrilled the crowd.

At one point in the show, the audience was herded outside for Jessica Bonomo’s fire hoop act. (see top image) Bonomo worked a hula-hoop that had firepots jutting out of it at five of six equidistant points around its outside circumference. In the chill of that March night, the audience could feel the heat from every revolution of flames, as well as the absence of that heat when the blank spot on the hoop came around. This was great fun.

Original Beast Woman Jillian Erickson kept the audience’s full, rapt attention with a monologue about insomnia, sleep aids, and dreams. No one captures innocence and menace simultaneously with such a palpable and palatable texture as Jillian Erickson. She plays both sides of contradictions, building art in that no-man’s land in-between.

If a Beast Women show were a competition, the night’s winner would have been Roberta Miles. Roberta is well established around Chicago as a jazz singer, but at Beast Women she is a monologist. As she takes the stage, she gives off that classy air one might expect from a jazz singer or a classicist or an ethnographer about to regale the audience with tales from the field. When I have seen Roberta Miles perform, invariably her subject matter has been sexual misadventure, her own sexual misadventures. If the disparity between her poise and her sexual abandon does not grab you, the thoughtfulness of her self-effacing writing will. She covered a lot of ground: her naïve attempt in her youth to straighten a gay friend with her bed artistry, a spoiled three-way fueled by pot cookies, the truth about fellatio, and a list of sexual regrets that was both unique and unapologetic. Roberta Miles is not some trampy broad bragging about her many exploits; she is an articulate libido and a beguiling conscience. I laughed, I winced, I shook my head, and I laughed again.

Beast Women 2010 Spring Series brings together a true variety of variety acts. There wasn’t a plate spinner and “Sabre Dance” was not among the musical selections, but the love of pure entertainment — instilled in me and so many others by Bozo’s Circus in our younger days — is metamorphosed into its adult form and honored well. If all this talk about Bozo has you jonesing for a clown, you are in luck: most of the remaining performances of Beast Women 2010 Spring Series feature a clown act. With the rotating lineup, every performance is different. With the rollicking entertainment provided by the Beast Women 2010 Spring Series, you may find that on Saturdays at 10:30 your TV is dead to you.

Alicia Keys, Rihanna & Beyonce Among Winners At BET Awards

June 28, 2010

LOS ANGELES, Calif.

It was comeback night at the BET Awards.

Kanye West opened Sunday’s show in his first TV appearance since dissing Taylor Swift at last year’s MTV Video Music Awards. T.I. made a triumphant return to TV for his first performance since being released from prison in December. And 1980s hitmaker El DeBarge blazed back onto the stage to play old hits and the title track from his first new album in 16 years

Jay-Z Leads Nominees At Music-Filled BET Awards

June 27, 2010

LOS ANGELES, Calif.

Jay-Z and Justin Bieber. Kanye West and T.I. John Legend and Prince.

Hosted by Queen Latifah, Sunday night’s BET Awards promise to be a star-studded affair, and organizers say it will be packed with more performances than in previous years.

Stars Catch World Cup Fever After USA Win

June 23, 2010

JOHANNESBURG, South Africa

The World Cup might be half way around the globe in South Africa, but Hollywood was glued to the action on the field on Wednesday morning as they watched the American team advance to the second round following a win over Algeria.