This week's stunning Sarasota Ballet production, the first of the season, was quite remarkable and seemed to usher in a new level of performance by the already accomplished company.  At the beginning of the evening, Iain Webb, Director, came on stage to report the good news that the Ballet is in the black and is off to a great start this season.  He then showed us a recorded interview he conducted with a former dancer, Wendy Ellis Soames, who staged and owns the rights to the first piece…

This weekend, Sarasota Ballet hosted a remarkable production of the Paul Taylor Dance Company, their only performance in Florida this season.  Paul Taylor, 82, is arguably the greatest living choreographer working today.  Earlier this month at the Ringling International Arts Festival, we were treated to a performance by Mikhail Baryshnikov, 62, the greatest living dancer, who performed with the Mark Morris Dance Company, another of the pantheon of the great American modern dance…

Asolo Rep's 2011-2012 season has given its audience a unique opportunity to explore the early evolution of the role of women in our society.  Currently, "Fanny Brice, America's Funny Girl" is playing at the theater.  The show examines the life and career of the first lady of comedy in America, who succeeded in a male dominated field.  Go to http://www.asolorep.org/ for ticket information.

The season opened with one of my favorite shows of…

Since becoming a mother, I filter nearly everything through a new lens.  On a simple level, I am wistfully nostalgic when I see pregnant women or babies smaller than my own; but more deeply, when I see a report of a young child hurt or missing, my sorrow seems to go someplace more primal, where I am connected to all mothers who have come before me and those who will follow.

When my husband I were last in New York City for a babymoon, Broadway’s “God of Carnage,” frankly, wasn’t on our…