I didn't come into this world; I came out of it, like a leaf emerges from a tree.

The equity national touring production of "Les Miserables" has returned yet again to South Florida. The musical, especially the number "Bring Him Home" feels especially relevant at the end of 2025. This production doesn't present the 'Les Miserables' that previous generations experienced.

Life in our Paris may have been uncomfortable with few indoor toilets and fewer phones, but life was more relaxed than today, communication was slower, and the police seemed more tolerant. Maybe that was because the May riots of 1968 were still fresh in the collective memory of Paris.

Marty Supreme starring Timothee Chalamet goes into wide release on Christmas Day.  It is the Safdie Brothers  “Uncut Gems"  redux.  Shot by the fabulous Darius Khondji  in zoom close up, with the camera moving with the figures and placing us right beside characters we may not want to know so well, we are gripped for two and a half hours.

The highlight is the dancing. An early number, “The Best Things Happen While You’re Dancing,” sets up the expectations with a ballroom number by Phil and Judy. Act two opens with a perhaps over long but spectacular tap number, “I Love a Piano.” It stopped the show.

During the next five year cycle when conceiving and funding ambitious exhibitions, administrators, foundations and trustees will keep a watchful eye on potential offenses against the government’s ban on diversity, equity and inclusion.

A recovering art critic once asked after reading the 1619 Project, “Why don’t you hate all white people?” I asked, “What is a white person anyway?” We realized our identities are far more complex than the containers imposed on us. Whiteness is a burden, built on supremacy, nationalism, colonialism, slavery, and global violence.

Gailus as Hedda gives a performance that emphasizes her manipulative nature so much so that a friend of mine asked if she was a sociopath. The performance doesn’t reveal enough of her depression, despair, and sense of being trapped.

The Museum of Fine Arts, Boston, has announced that a suite of new galleries dedicated to modern art will open to the public on December 13. Four new spaces will be unveiled on the first floor of the Museum’s Evans Wing, each showcasing works from the 20th century that include highlights from the MFA’s collection, new acquisitions, and rarely seen loans from private holdings.

As a young man, he had volunteered as a kamikaze pilot. It was a great honor for his family, he said. The day he was supposed to fly his suicide mission, the war ended, and he was grounded. It was terrible, Namio told us, so shameful for him and his family.

The Clark Art Institute announces its exhibition schedule through 2026. The lineup includes the first public presentation of the Aso O. Tavitian Collection with an exhibition featuring selected highlights from the 331 works of art that were given to the Clark in 2024.

Must see theatre at Playhouse on Park in West Hartford.

The Ft. Lauderdale area's New City Players will present its holiday show at a different location this year. 'It's A Wonderful Life: A Live Radio Play' by Joe Landry will take place at General Provision Downtown, 300 S.W. 1st Ave., Suite 155, Fort Lauderdale.

Director Flemming Fynsk's moving film The Art Whisperer is in contention for awards this year. Its subject, Ginny Williams, was an art collector and gallery owner of remarkable instinct and vision.

In any long-term relationship, patterns of behavior, control, dominance, and power are fixed. But when one person begins to change the unwritten contract, it causes ripples. The other person often retaliates or fights back to reestablish the status quo.

Now in her late 80s. Patricia Hills overcame numerous obstacles to become one of the leading scholars and curators of American art. I knew her as a radical leftist feminist at Boston University. This intriguing and insightful memoir chronicles that daunting journey. The book conflates her life as wife and mother with struggles in academia which regarded the study of American art as "too easy." As a force majeure she trained a generation of Americanist scholars and curators.

For 90 minutes, a cast of eight produces sounds from a slew of props. The additions of rhythm and combinations of sounds produce an orchestration of beats. Together with choreographed movement, the result is a unique and energetic show.

Thinking Cap Theatre in South Florida presents the rarely staged William Shakespeare play, Cymbeline. This unwieldly play is a mashup of genres and styles. Scholars refer to Cymbeline as Shakespeare's "Kitchen Sink" play.

The Wick Theatre and Museum Club in Boca Raton, Fla. presents a heartwarming and invigorating production of 'A Christmas Carol.' The production features a large, talented cast that disappears into their characters.

Shakespeare & Company’s traditional winter show returns this year with Sense & Sensibility by Kate Hamill, a fast-paced, staged reading wherein the wit and romance of Jane Austen’s classic tale come to life. This year, the Austen-inspired production coincides with her 250th birthday on December 16. 

Go for the music; ignore the plot.  

I learned quite a bit about famous people from the way they treated the bartender. The ones who were polite were relaxed, I could sometimes tell just by the way they moved or sat at the bar waiting for the staff to prepare their table––that they were at ease in their skin, as the French expression goes, bien dans leur peau.

Is the large Norway maple in my garden trying to be alive? What specifically is it doing right this moment to be alive? The answer, if we are honest, is that the tree is doing nothing but allowing. It is not trying to push sap. It is not struggling to expand its canopy or striving to gather light. It is simply allowing the forces of the earth and sun to move through it. It exists in a state of perfect Wu Wei—actionless action.

Pigs Do Fly Productions' mounting of 'Better Late' by Larry Gelbart featured impressively convincing performances but scene transitions that lasted too long. The production recently ended following a three-week run.

Berkshire Opera Festival (BOF) announces its 2026 summer season under the vision of Co-founders Brian Garman (William E. Briggs Artistic Director) and Jonathon Loy (Director of Production), and new President and CEO Natalie Johnsonius Neubert. In its 11th year, the company remains unique in the culturally rich Berkshires for producing opera at the highest level.