Arts & Literature

Broadway’s Back in Atlanta

Published

3 years ago

August 25, 2021

Elizabeth Sigmon

Fox Theatre, from their site.

After an 18-month hiatus, Broadway is finally coming back to Atlanta — partly thanks to Peachtree Corners resident, Russ Belin. Belin is vice president of the southeastern division of Broadway Across America.

In addition to overseeing the Broadway series at the Fox Theatre in Atlanta, he also oversees the Broadway touring seasons in New Orleans and Jacksonville. He brings “the biggest and best hits” directly from the Broadway stage to the Fox Theatre. Belin has worked for Broadway Across America for 10 years and has been a resident of Peachtree Corners, where he lives with his family, since 2008; he is married and has two sons, Jaykb (12) and Bryce (8). Both children attend local middle and elementary schools: Pinckneyville Middle School and Simpson Elementary School, respectively.

Belin is an active member of the Peachtree Corners community, he attends the Summer Concert Series at Town Center, and his children are both involved in local sports teams. “I love the location [of Peachtree Corners] but I also love the amenities, the neighborhoods, the sports,” he said, “but a lot of it comes down to location and how easy it is to get to [Downtown Atlanta]; it’s 25 to 30 minutes, which is reasonable,” he said. “I think Peachtree Corners is a gem.”

The return of Broadway

In its return from the pandemic shutdown, live theater will kick off on a high note and is sure to attract a diverse audience of eager theatergoers. “We have a great line-up this season!” Belin said. The Fifth Third Bank Broadway 40th Anniversary season does not disappoint after its much-anticipated return. “We are bringing six season titles along with four specials, including Hamilton — which is going to be our return on August 22nd,” he added.

The ground-breaking, 11-time Tony award-winning show is sure to be a smash debut. Tickets are going fast since they went on sale July 8th. Hamilton is the story about the creation of America using the faces and voices of today’s America. The Lin-Manuel Miranda score fuses elements of R&B, hip hop, jazz, rap and musical theater to put together a story about the titular “Ten Dollar Founding Father” that is resonant with every living generation.

Alexander Hamilton’s life story set to music has caused an unprecedented cultural and political revolution. The production has gained international acclaim, sweeping at the U.K.’s Olivier Awards, winning the Pulitzer Prize for Drama and even achieving an historic Kennedy Centers Honors Award. Tickets are available by visiting FoxTheatre.org/Hamilton. Hamilton will run August 22 to September 26, 2021.

Entertainment for everyone

Aside from Hamilton, there are many other shows to get excited about this season! Ain’t Too Proud: The Life and Times of the Temptations is another title right off the Broadway stage that is sure to be a crowd pleaser. Ain’t Too Proud tells the incredible journey of the Temptations from their Detroit origins to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. With a Motown score will have everyone dancing in their seats and singing along, this Tony-winning musical will be in Atlanta from March 8 to 13, 2022.

Another must-see show is the musical adaptation of the 2004 Tina Fey classic, Mean Girls. This Tony-nominated musical comedy about hilarious yet ruthless high school girls will have audiences laughing out loud and humming the songs as they walk out of the theaters. With brilliant full-company dance numbers in a high school cafeteria and brilliant ballads that ring true to the original movie, the show is expected to be a standout of the season. Watch your back, because Mean Girls is coming to town July 19 to 24, 2022!

Undoubtedly, families will be lining up at the Fox this season to see Frozen. The Disney show is pure family-friendly fun. It’s coming straight off-Broadway as well, and will be here next summer, starting June 12, 2022. The show is enjoyable for everyone, from toddlers to grandparents. First-timers will quickly fall in love with the perky and loving Princess Anna and gasp in awe when Elsa, the Ice Queen, transforms into her iconic blue dress right before the audience’s eyes during the Academy-award-winning song, “Let it Go.” This icy fairytale warms the heart with its powerful tale about the love between sisters and brings out everyone’s inner child with that “classic Disney magic.”

That’s not all, folks!

Other titles for the season include:
■ Fiddler on the Roof —November 9-14, 2021
■ Dr. Seuss’ How the Grinch Stole Christmas! The Musical —December 7-12, 2021
■ Tootsie — Jan. 25-30, 2022
■ Jesus Christ Superstar — April 19-24, 2022
■ Beautiful: The Carole King Musical — May 20-22, 2022
■ Blue Man Group — July 8-10, 2022

Ready to meet any challenges

When asked if “Broadway is back in Atlanta” after a year and a half of theater doors across the world being closed, Belin was greatly optimistic. “Yes! We are back!” he said. “It will 550 days since we closed Hello Dolly [the last production performed before shut down]. New York is reopening and the vaccine is available to anyone who wants it, so it feels like people are ready and now is the time to reopen.”

The biggest challenges lie within the shows themselves, Belin noted, as actors are displaced throughout the country with the closure of theaters, and new protocol and mandates have changed theater in many ways.

“It’s hard to tell what’s going to change… obviously some of the procedures have changed for the actors and crew as they travel around the country,” he explained. “Some people may remember being able to stand at the stage door and say hello or try to get an autograph; those things might not happen for a while. But outside of that, I don’t think much will change for the guest experience.”

After a year of virtual concerts and glitchy Zoom cocktail hours, live entertainment is finally back in business. We can now catch a baseball game at full capacity at Truist Park and even go to a live concert at Peachtree Corners’ own Town Center.

And Peachtree Corners is ready, more than ever, to be entertained. Broadway Across Atlanta is more than happy to provide.

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Elizabeth Sigmon

Elizabeth Sigmon is a junior Creative Writing Major and Music Minor at Young Harris College. She graduated from Norcross High School in 2018, and has lived in Peachtree Corners her entire life. After college she plans to pursue higher education along with her writing. Aside from writing, Elizabeth has been singing and performing as long as she can remember and music will always hold a special place in her heart. You can follow her on Instagram @_efsigmon to follow her on her adventures and life updates!

Around Atlanta

The High Museum to Showcase “Thinking Eye, Seeing Mind”

Published

1 week ago

December 12, 2024

Peachtree Corners Magazine staff

Oil on paper artwork by Terry Winters. A large red circle with smaller blue circles on top of it and gold/yellow accents. All of it on a dark brown background.

The special exhibition of the Medford and Loraine Johnston Collection will run January 17 through May 25, 2025

In the mid-1970s, artist and Georgia State University professor Medford Johnston, along with his wife and collaborator Loraine, began collecting works by artists who were in the vanguard of contemporary art. Today, they hold one of the finest collections of postwar American drawings and related objects of its kind, now numbering more than 85 works.

In 2025, the High Museum of Art will present Thinking Eye, Seeing Mind: The Medford and Loraine Johnston Collection, featuring their collected works, which is a promised gift to the museum. Featuring artists such as Sol LeWitt, Brice Marden, Elizabeth Murray, Martin Puryear, Ed Ruscha, Al Taylor, Anne Truitt, Stanley Whitney and Terry Winters, among others, the exhibition will demonstrate how establishing the parameters of an art collection requires infinite patience, focus, discipline and a keen eye.

“The Johnstons have been friends of the High for a very long time. They’ve also built an impressive collection featuring works by many of the 20th century’s most significant abstract artists,” said the High’s Director Rand Suffolk. “We are honored that they have promised to leave their collection to the Museum where it will be preserved for future generations — and we are delighted that they are sharing it with our audiences now, hopefully inspiring the next generation of art collectors and supporters.”

A curated collection

The Johnstons’ story is a testament to, in the words of the High’s Wieland Family Senior Curator of Modern and Contemporary Art, Michael Rooks, “knowing the difference between what is right and what is almost right” when building a collection.

Although the Johnstons acquired several paintings and objects when they first began collecting in 1972, they quickly narrowed their focus to drawing, primarily by artists working on the frontlines of abstraction in the mid-1960s during a time of great innovation and experimentation.

Ink drawing by Anne Truitt, rectangular lines and shapes made with black ink on off-white background — Anne Truitt (American, born 1921), *Ink Drawing ’59 [11]*, 1959, ink on paper, The Johnston Collection. © Estate of Anne Truitt / The Bridgeman Art Library / Courtesy Matthew Marks Gallery, New York.

Rooks added, “Med and Loraine’s collection struck me at once by its single-minded focus on a specific moment in time, which was essentially the time of their contemporaries. The artists in their collection are like close friends to the Johnstons — in fact many are or were. What is equally astonishing about the collection is the Johnstons’ dogged pursuit of quality. Their in-depth knowledge of each artist’s practice combined with their understanding of specific qualities to look for — or more appropriately, to hold out for — will be a revelation to emerging collectors.”

The Johnstons have built their collection with the High in mind as the benefactor of their passion and discernment. For them, their collection “is a labor of love, pursued over more than 50 years, and we are delighted to be able to help the High Museum document and celebrate these important artists working during the same decades as our lives.”

About the exhibit

Thinking Eye, Seeing Mind: The Medford and Loraine Johnston Collection will be presented in the Special Exhibition Galleries on the second level of the High’s Stent Family Wing.

The exhibit is organized by the High Museum of Art and made possible through the generosity of sponsors:

Premier Exhibition Series Sponsor Delta Air Lines, Inc.
Premier Exhibition Series Supporters Mr. Joseph H. Boland, Jr., The Fay S. and W. Barrett Howell Family Foundation, Harry Norman Realtors and wish Foundation
Benefactor Exhibition Series Supporters Robin and Hilton Howell
Ambassador Exhibition Series Supporters Loomis Charitable Foundation and Mrs. Harriet H. Warren
Contributing Exhibition Series Supporters Farideh and Al Azadi, Mary and Neil Johnson, Mr. and Mrs. Baxter Jones, Megan and Garrett Langley, Margot and Danny McCaul, Wade A. Rakes II and Nicholas Miller and Belinda Stanley-Majors and Dwayne Majors.

Support has also been provided by the Alfred and Adele Davis Exhibition Endowment Fund, Anne Cox Chambers Exhibition Fund, Barbara Stewart Exhibition Fund, Dorothy Smith Hopkins Exhibition Endowment Fund, Eleanor McDonald Storza Exhibition Endowment Fund, The Fay and Barrett Howell Exhibition Fund, Forward Arts Foundation Exhibition Endowment Fund, Helen S. Lanier Endowment Fund, John H. and Wilhelmina D. Harland Exhibition Endowment Fund, Katherine Murphy Riley Special Exhibition Endowment Fund, Margaretta Taylor Exhibition Fund, RJR Nabisco Exhibition Endowment Fund and USI Insurance Services.

About the High Museum of Art

Located in the heart of Atlanta, the High Museum of Art connects with audiences from across the Southeast and around the world through its distinguished collection, dynamic schedule of special exhibitions and engaging community-focused programs.

Housed within facilities designed by Pritzker Prize-winning architects Richard Meier and Renzo Piano, the High features a collection of more than 19,000 works of art, including an extensive anthology of 19th- and 20th-century American fine and decorative arts; major holdings of photography and folk and self-taught work, especially that of artists from the American South; burgeoning collections of modern and contemporary art, including paintings, sculpture, new media and design; a growing collection of African art, with work dating from prehistory through the present; and significant holdings of European paintings and works on paper.

The High is dedicated to reflecting the diversity of its communities and offering a variety of exhibitions and educational programs that engage visitors with the world of art, the lives of artists and the creative process.

For more information about the High or to purchase tickets, visit high.org.

Top image: (from the collection) Terry Winters (American, born 1949), Orb, 2020, oil on paper, The Johnston Collection. © Terry Winters, Courtesy Matthew Marks Gallery, New York.

Around Atlanta

City Springs Theatre Company Presents the Hit Musical Jersey Boys

Published

6 months ago

July 3, 2024

Peachtree Corners Magazine staff

The megahit musical Jersey Boys is making its regional premiere with the City Springs Theatre Company in a five-week run.

The megahit musical Jersey Boys makes its regional premiere in City Springs Theatre Company’s (CSTC) first-ever, five-week run at the Byers Theatre in Sandy Springs.

Directed by Atlanta’s-own Shane DeLancey, and choreographed by Meg Gillentine, Jersey Boys tells the rags-to-riches story of Frankie Valli and The Four Seasons. The show details their remarkable journey from the streets to the top of the charts, to their 1990 induction into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame.

Leading the cast of Jersey Boys is Haden Rider as Frankie Valli. Rider is a City Springs Theatre Company veteran, with recent roles in both Legally Blonde (Emmett) and Fiddler on the Roof (Perchik).

Presented by Resurgens Spine Center, Jersey Boys runs from July 12 through August 11, and shines a special spotlight on home-grown talent, as the show’s four leading men are all Atlanta-area residents.

With phenomenal music, memorable characters and great storytelling, Jersey Boys follows the fascinating evolution of four blue-collar kids who became one of the greatest successes in pop-music history.

“City Springs Theatre Company is very proud to be the first in the southeast region to present Jersey Boys,” said CSTC Artistic Director and Tony Award-winner Shuler Hensley. “Our audiences have been asking for this particular show since we opened. The production is truly stacked with talent onstage and off, and we’re pulling out all the stops to bring audiences an experience that will rival any previous version of the show.”

Jersey Boys premiered at the La Jolla Playhouse in 2005, prior to its 13-year Broadway run, from 2005 to 2017. There have been productions of the show in Las Vegas, UK/Ireland, Toronto, Melbourne, Singapore, South Africa, the Netherlands, Japan, Dubai and China.

Jersey Boys features a book by Marshall Brickman and Rick Elice, with music by Bob Gaudio, and lyrics by Bob Crewe.

Individual tickets to see Jersey Boys are on sale now ($42 – $108), with discounts for seniors, students, groups and active and retired military personnel.

CSTC’s Box Office is open Monday through Friday from 10:00 a.m. – 5:00 p.m.

Call 404-477-4365 or visit CitySpringsTheatre.com for more information.

This production contains adult language and is recommended for mature audiences.

Performance schedule:

Arts & Literature

Local Students Show Off Their Artistic Creations

Published

7 months ago

June 2, 2024

Peachtree Corners Magazine staff

Courtney Escorza, Colleen Nikopour, Laura Hwang, Jennifer Jackson, Norcross. Laura ELizabeth Martin, Payton Hirschmann, Paul Duke HS

From May 11 through May 18, the Norcross Gallery & Studios kicked off a fantastic exhibition, Reflections at Rectory, which showcased the works of 36 rising stars: AP and IB art students from our local high schools.

The opening reception celebrated their creativity and dedication. Gallery director Anne Hall presented a dozen awards generously sponsored by the community, a testament to the local support for these young artists.

One prestigious award, the Terri Enfield Memorial Award, holds special significance.

Established by Terri’s daughters, it recognizes not just artistic excellence, but also leadership, work ethic and the spirit of collaboration. Last year’s winner, Aidan Ventimiglia, even played a part in selecting this year’s recipient Jasmine Rodriguez.