State Street Ballet’s World Premiere of
The Little Mermaid
By Kerry Methner / VOICE
Lured by the hope for new sights and sounds and seeking to satisfy her curiosity about the world above, The Little Mermaid is drawn to the surface in State Street Ballet’s World Premiere production of the classic story. Opening at the Lobero Theatre with three performances, Saturday, March 1st, at 7:30pm and Sunday, March 2nd at 2pm, and a sensory-friendly performance on Saturday, March 1st at 2pm, The Little Mermaid promises to be a magical adventure to satisfy all ages.
Featuring all-new sets, costumes, and large-scale puppets designed by Christina McCarthy, alongside an original musical score by Charles Fernandez, this unique reimagining follows the mermaid’s daring journey as she sacrifices her tail and voice to become human in pursuit of love.
Megan Philipp and Cecily MacDougall teamed up again, creating vibrant choreography for the new production.
“The Little Mermaid is an enchanting ballet, perfect for introducing young children to the magic of dance,” related Artistic Director and Choreographer Philipp. “Bursting with vibrant colors, captivating adventures, and heartwarming charm, this unique twist on the classic tale is sure to delight audiences of all ages.”
McCarthy’s stunning life-sized puppets and the production’s intricate sets and beautiful costumes will transport audiences into an enchanting underwater world.
Thanks to funding from The Manitou Fund/Nora McNeely Hurley, the production will feature live accompaniment by the Opera San Luis Obispo Grand Orchestra, led by Maestro Brian Asher Alhadeff, bringing the world-premiere score to life in an immersive and powerful performance.
Executive Director and Choreographer MacDougall added, “Through this ballet, I hope to inspire a deeper reflection on how we treat those whose abilities differ from our own. Whether she is learning to walk or navigating the world without use of her voice, The Little Mermaid’s journey encourages us to approach every being with the compassion and respect they deserve.”
To that end, the show will integrate American Sign Language, expanding accessibility for a broader audience. Special outreach performances for local students will take place on Friday, February 28th, and a sensory-friendly performance on March 1st at 2pm, as State Street Ballet acts to make the production inclusive for all. The Ballet also developed on-line lesson plans for a range of grades to help children and teachers get the most out of their Little Mermaid experience.
Whether you are familiar with the tale or discovering it for the first time, The Little Mermaid follows an unforgettable journey into the world of magic, love, and adventure.
For tickets and more info visit:
statestreetballet.com
or call 805-845-1432.
Young audience members are invited to enter the theater at 1:15pm on March 2nd to take a photo with a real ballerina and hear her tell the story of The Little Mermaid. Families with special needs or small children are invited to SSB’s first sensory-friendly performance on March 1st at 2pm. During sensory-friendly performances, the lights in the theater stay on, the music is played more quietly, fidget items are welcome, and patrons can move, vocalize, and behave in ways that are often unfamiliar in other performance settings. Tickets are $20; subsidized tickets are available upon request.
State Street Ballet, founded in 1994 by Rodney Gustafson, is an internationally acclaimed dance company based in Santa Barbara, California, and led by Artistic Director Megan Philipp and Executive Director Cecily MacDougall. A pioneering collaborative that supports international ensemble members, the company consistently strives for new and innovative artistic opportunities to serve a broad audience. Each season is dedicated to bringing the highest standards of artistry and originality to tried-and-true classics, and creating innovative works that reflect the contemporary nature of the ensemble. Public performances, educational outreach, community partnerships, and training programs are fundamental to their mission, at home and on tour.
UCSB Arts & Lectures: Santa Barbara Debut
Lakecia Benjamin
and Phoenix
“Lakecia Benjamin plays jazz that is sprinkled with the rich flavors of funk and soul – she’s a crafty traditionalist
who remains in step with the rhythms of the young generation.” – The New Yorker
Fans of John Coltrane, Wayne Shorter, and Ornette Coleman listen up – there’s a new horn in town, and she’s ready to roar. Experience Lakecia Benjamin and Phoenix live at Campbell Hall in a UCSB Arts & Lectures Jazz Series concert on Friday, February 7th at 8pm.
Saxophonist, composer, and arranger Benjamin fuses soul and hip-hop with a strong foundation in the canon of modern jazz. The Manhattan native has worked with an impressive roster of jazz greats, including Clark Terry, Reggie Workman, Gregory Porter and Christian McBride. Her 2023 release, Phoenix, earned Grammy nominations in two categories – Best Jazz Instrumental Album and Best Jazz Performance for her original composition Basquiat. In 2024, Benjamin was nominated again in the same two categories: Best Jazz Instrumental Album for Phoenix Reimagined (Live) and Best Jazz Performance for the album’s title track.
Benjamin’s new album, Phoenix Reimagined, focuses on the music from her acclaimed Phoenix project and adds three new songs. It was captured live-in-studio at Brooklyn’s the Bunker, a great-sounding space whose alumni include everyone from Brad Mehldau to Bang on a Can to the Black Keys. Combining the spontaneous magic of a live LP with the crisp, crystalline audio that only a world-class studio can deliver, Phoenix Reimagined illustrates that vibrant togetherness between Benjamin and her live listeners. In the case of the Bunker show, that meant pretty much anyone who adores music as much as she does. “I was like, you know what? Let’s celebrate life. Let’s celebrate everything. I’m going to invite everybody to this studio,” Benjamin recalls with a chuckle. “The studio personnel were lucky I didn’t just open the door!” The atmosphere took the saxophonist back to her earliest years hitting the NYC jam-session scene: the heat, the camaraderie, the competition, the hard-earned lessons. “It just reminded me why I love music,” she says.
The success of her most recent release Phoenix Reimagined (Live) won her a nomination for the 2024 Grammy’s Best Jazz Instrumental Album and Best Jazz Performance. Her previous releases, 2023’s Phoenix and 2020’s Pursuance: The Coltranes, positioned Benjamin among jazz’s most celebrated recording artists: In addition to absolute raves in outlets like The New York Times, The Guardian, and DownBeat, she received three Grammy nominations for Phoenix, as well as an NAACP Image Award nomination for Outstanding Jazz Album. Earlier this year, she was named Alto Saxophonist of the Year by the prestigious Jazz Journalist Association.
She’ll share the stage with Jazz great Phoenix, a respected ensemble comprised of Oscar Perez, piano; Elias Bailey, bass; and Dorian Phelps, drums.
To witness a live performance by the alto saxophonist, MC, and bandleader Lakecia Benjamin is to never forget it. The ever-rising star from Washington Heights remains, at her core, an improviser best experienced in her soul-stirring concerts. Each and every time she hits the bandstand, she takes her repertoire and her wide-ranging audience to sublime new planes. Her message of spiritual uplift and social and political liberation soars higher still.
Given Benjamin’s personal story over the last few years, her live dates are nothing short of life-affirming. In 2021, she was involved in a car accident that resulted in more than one potentially career-ending injury: Benjamin broke her jaw, shoulder blade, and ribs and ruptured an eardrum among other wounds. Today, she’s regained her confidence and physical strength, embracing whatever limitations her accident may have engendered. She also realizes she has decades of more music and travel to go. “I don’t think about the accident anymore. Some people might see my shows now as a victory lap, because inspiration comes in multiple forms,” Benjamin says, “but I really feel I’m still learning. I’m trying to get uncomfortable. I’m trying to grow. I’m trying to play better.”
Lakecia Benjamin is presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures in association with UCSB Department of Music. Jazz Series Lead Sponsor: Manitou Fund. Special thanks: KCRW 89.9 FM and KCSB 91.9 FM.
Sara Miller McCune is 2024-2025 Season Sponsor. Natalie Orfalea Foundation & Lou Buglioli are Community Partners of the 2024-2025 season.
Ensemble Theatre Company
Parents In Chains: An ETC World Premiere
By Mark M. Whitehurst / VOICE
A fresh new comedy about texts, treks, sex, and empty nests, will shed light on parenting in the 21st century. Parents In Chains, in its world premiere, will open at the Ensemble Theatre Company, in association with J. Todd Harris, on Wednesday, March 12th, and run through Sunday, March 30th at the New Vic Theatre.
Parents in Chains is a play about six L.A. parents who exchange texts as their 17-year-old daughters drive home from a weekend in San Francisco during the approach of a hurricane. The trip and the inclement weather bring out both the best and the worst in the parents as they confront, – as a group, as couples, and as individuals, – what it means to let go of their kids. The dialogue is viciously comic and poignant. Written by Emmy and Peabody award-winner Jay Martel, the play will be directed by Andy Fickman (Heathers The Musical and Reefer Madness).
“I’ve noticed (and this is not an original discovery) that texting causes people to express themselves in a very primal, sometimes primitive way that I find very entertaining — and fortunately, our audiences do, too!” commented Martel, playwright for Parents In Chains, in an email interview with Voice Magazine.
Illuminating conversations that are entirely electronic opens a new realm of imagination.
“The first time I read the play – I was in – hook, line and sinker” commented Fickman, director of Parents in Chains, also in an email interview with Voice Magazine. “I am a father of two – who, like many parents these days, has spent far more time texting with the parents of my kids’ friends than ever speaking with them for long periods of time on the phone. While we treat it as a time saver – in reality – it can have the opposite effect. The waiting for a response game can go for minutes…hours… even days. The sheer decoding needed to understand the other person’s tone and delivery – can be exhausting – were they trying to be funny or were they being serious? You read their words – but you hear their voices in your head – with your delivery. I found Jay’s play rich with opportunities to explore this very modern phenomena.”
Interpersonal relationships developing from texting offers a simple way of knowing, but often leaves texters wanting to know more.
“I have been on many text chains with other parents that have led to Parents In Chains, especially when the chain binds together several parents with similar concerns about their children. And of course, there is nothing that makes people crazier than concerns about their children. Like the parents in the play, I have teenage children who are either on their way to college or already there, and I was surprised at the emotions that these transitions brought out in me and in others,” related Martel.
When asked about how texting affects the rhythm of the play, Fickman replied, “What I love is how seemless the device is for the audience to immediately find themselves invested. So it actually makes the structure really flow with a comedy rhythm. For the most part – everyone texts – and if they don’t – they know someone who does. So the build up of stating one’s case and waiting for the response provides perfect comedic and dramatic opportunities on stage.”
The ETC is thrilled to be presenting this world premiere.
“Parents in Chains is a hilarious and inventive new play that captures the chaos and heart of modern family life in a way that’s fresh and unforgettable,” said Scott DeVine, executive artistic director of Ensemble Theatre Company of Santa Barbara. “The script is razor-sharp, and the innovative use of text messaging as a storytelling device adds a uniquely contemporary twist. This production perfectly reflects Ensemble Theatre Company’s mission to celebrate the human spirit with bold, imaginative works that push the boundaries of how stories are told on stage. I am thrilled to bring this amazingly talented team of award-winning artists to Santa Barbara and I can’t wait for our community to experience the laughter and surprises of this one-of-a-kind world premiere.”
Sharon Lawrence is the first cast member to be announced. Additional casting information will be revealed soon. Lawrence is an award winning actor and a native of North Carolina. She began acting at UNC-Chapel Hill in summer stock. Her professional career began soon after on Broadway in the 1987 revival of Cabaret. She also performed in Fiddler on the Roof, Zorba, and Chicago.
Lawrence recently had a series regular role in the Paramount + series Joe Pickett based on the best seller of the same name. Previously she starred opposite Kirsten Dunst in the Showtime series On Becoming A God In Central Florida, , and as an elusive librarian in Home Before Dark for Apple TV. She also had recurring roles including Rebel with Katy Sagal and Andy Garcia, a serial killer in CBS’s Criminal Minds, Fiona’s acerbic boss on Showtime’s Seamless, Sam Elliott’s love interest in The Ranch, as well as in the critically acclaimed series Queen Sugar produced by Ava DuVernay.
She established her television career in the 1990’s on programs like Cheers and Star Trek: Voyager. In 1993 she was cast as Assistant District Attorney Sylvia Costas in the ABC police drama series NYPD Blue created by Steven Bochco.
Lawrence received a Screen Actors Guild Award for Outstanding Performance by a Female Actor in a Drama Series, a Satellite Award for Best Actress – Television Series Drama, and several Primetime Emmy Award nominations for Outstanding Supporting Actress in a Drama Series. She also received three additional Emmy Awards nominations for her later television performances. Lawrence is the Second Vice President of the SAG-AFTRA Foundation.
A multiple genre writer, playwright Jay Martel has won Emmy, Peabody, Writers Guild of America, and American Comedy awards. He was a showrunner and head writer on Key & Peele in addition to many other comedy series, including Alternatino, Teachers, Halfway Home, and Strangers With Candy. His plays have been staged in New York and Los Angeles. His third novel, The Present, was published in 2022, and the movie version, starring Greg Kinnear and Isla Fisher, was recently released worldwide. He’s written numerous movies, including Get Hard, starring Will Ferrell and Kevin Hart, and is a contributor to The New Yorker, where his humor appears regularly.
An award-winning director, writer, and producer, whose work spans film, television, and theater, Andy Fickman is as busy as he is creative. He recently directed Heathers the Musical, which wrapped a record-breaking, sold-out run at The Other Palace in London. The production won multiple awards, and has completed two successful UK/Ireland tours. Before its transfer to the West End, the show had a successful New York run at New World Stages, where it was nominated for multiple Drama Desk, Outer Critics Circle, and Lucille Lortel awards. The show premiered in Los Angeles to sold-out, standing-room-only audiences. He recently completed a workshop of the musical adaptation of the hit film 13 Going on 30 in London. Fickman also directed Reefer Madness: The Musical in both Los Angeles and New York, which won him Best Director awards at the Ovation Awards and Drama Critics Awards, then directed and produced the filmed version for Showtime.
Parents in Chains producer J. Todd Harris is the founder and president of Branded Pictures Entertainment based in Los Angeles. He has produced or executive produced over 50 films, including Oscar-nominated Trial of the Chicago 7 and The Kids Are All Right, along with five Sundance entries, including Bottle Shock. For stage, he produced Heathers The Musical and musical adaptations of Doctor Zhivago and American Psycho for Broadway. He’s currently co-producing Soul Train and Buena Vista Social Club. He is a lead producer on soon-to-be unveiled Phenomenal Woman Maya Angelou and Death at a Funeral. He’s a 25-year member of the Motion Picture Academy and was a Broadway League member from 2015-2018. Harris has taught at Chapman University and Syracuse University’s LA campus. He earned his BA and MBA from Stanford University.
PARENTS IN CHAINS will open on Wednesday, March 12 at 7:30pm and perform through Sunday, March 30 at 2pm.
Performances are Wednesdays at 2pm & 7:30pm, Thursdays at 7:30pm, Fridays at 8pm, Saturdays at 3pm & 8pm, Sundays at 2pm. There will be added performances on Tuesday, March 18 & Tuesday, March 25 at 7:30pm.
UCSB Arts & Lectures: An Evening with Tommy Orange
Building a Body of Native American Literature
By Kerry Methner / VOICE
Introducing a chorus of urban Native American voices in his two recent novels, Tommy Orange, a keen and articulate observer with a piercing intelligence, will take center stage at UCSB Campbell Hall on Wednesday, January 29th at 7:30pm in a UCSB Arts & Lectures presentation. His novels There There (2018) and Wandering Stars (2024), lay bare the multiple realities and complexity of contemporary indigenous people living in America.
In Wandering Stars, Orange conjures the ancestors of the family readers first fell in love with in There There, asking what it means to be the children and grandchildren of massacre. His work shows us violence and recovery, hope and loss, identity and power, dislocation and communion, and the beauty and despair woven into the history of a nation and its people. In An Evening with Tommy Orange he’ll speak frankly about his craft, the writing process, and Native American history and culture.
Orange graduated from the MFA program at the Institute of American Indian Arts, and was a 2014 MacDowell Fellow and a 2016 Writing by Writers Fellow. He is an enrolled member of the Cheyenne and Arapaho Tribes of Oklahoma, and was born and raised in Oakland, California. He now lives in Angels Camp, California, with his wife and son and teaches creative writing at the Institute of American Indian Arts.
“There’s a monolithic version of what a Native is supposed to be,” Orange noted in a Guardian interview with Hannah Beckerman. “Writing a polyphonic, multigenerational novel is resisting this one idea of what being Native is supposed to look like. If we all have to be historical, with a headdress, looking off into the distance, that’s hopeless as far as building a proper, complex, human identity.”
Beckerman continued her interview with, “The title is taken from a Gertrude Stein quote: ‘There is no there there.’ What’s the significance of that quote?”
Orange replied, “In Stein’s Everybody’s Autobiography, she talks about how someone was asking her what it’s like to come back to her childhood home in Oakland, where I also come from, and she says, ‘There is no there there.’ She was talking about how it had been developed over and was unrecognizable. I was using that as a parallel to Native experience and the ‘there there’ of the land before it was colonized, developed over and bordered.”
Orange’s novel, There There, was one of The New York Times Book Review’s 10 Best Books of the Year in 2018 and won the Center for Fiction’s First Novel Prize and the Pen/Hemingway Award. There There was also longlisted for the National Book Award and was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize.
Wandering Stars, published in February 2024, tells the story of epigenetic and generational trauma that traces the legacies of the Sand Creek Massacre of 1864 and the Carlisle Indian Industrial School through three generations of a family. This prequel/sequel to There There was longlisted for the Booker Prize.
“Orange’s ability to highlight the contradictory forces that coexist within friendships, familial relationships, and the characters themselves, who contend with holding private and public identities, makes Wandering Stars a towering achievement,” wrote Jonathan Escoffery of Wandering Stars in the New York Times.
Orange’s work as author and writing teacher is pivotal. As The Washington Post writes, he is “building a body of literature that reshapes the Native American story in the United States. Book by book, he’s correcting the death of Indian stories even while depicting the tragic cost of that silence.”
That newly emerging literature under Orange’s hand doesn’t flinch away from painful memories, despicable acts by individuals, or the government, such as the Sand Creek Massacre, or the numerous Indian Schools that ripped children from parents and their cultural homes. It looks carefully at the impact of history on individuals and our communities, and how it plays out on the stages of individual lives. His characters’ multi-layered motivations that they employ to get through their days are on display and may or may not convince the reader of good in their intentions. But Orange’s stories keep coming, and in the end the momentum toward the future and an evolving setting offers hope.
As Anthony Cummins writes in the Guardian, “Ultimately the turns their stories take… are about healing, not catastrophe; the same might be said of Wandering Stars, unlikely though it seems in the most harrowing moments of a novel marrying eye-opening historical re-creation with gritty social realism.”
An Evening with Tommy Orange is presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures in association with the following UCSB partners: American Indian and Indigenous Collective; Office of Diversity, Equity and Inclusion; and Department of American Indian and Indigenous Studies.
UCSB Arts & Lectures 2024-2025 Season Sponsor is Sara Miller McCune. The Natalie Orfalea Foundation & Lou Buglioli are Community Partners supporting the 2024-2025 season.
FREE copies of ‘Wandering Stars,’ will be available to pick up at event while supplies last (one per household).
For tickets ($20, Free for UCSB Students) visit artsandlectures.ucsb.edu or call 805-893-3535.
Ensemble Theatre Company
A New Revenge Noir: Hamlet
By Jesse Caverly / VOICE
Crackling with intrigue, Ensemble Theatre Company’s production of Hamlet promises an innovative new take on the world’s greatest play by the world’s greatest playwright. Timeless, an iconic tragedy of betrayal, vengeance, and madness, Hamlet remains forever the archetype of a gripping thriller.
Director and adapter Margaret Shigeko Starbuck brings both a passion for and notable experience in Shakespeare’s repertoire, having directed Henry IV Parts I and II, Measure for Measure, and Richard II. “What I love about these plays is that when they’re performed well, it’s completely clear, and the stories and the characters and some of the poetry is so relatable and so prescient and so sort of achingly familiar, I think, to us as a contemporary society, and a contemporary audience,” she shared in a telephone interview.
A collaboration between Starbuck and actor Will Block, who is playing Hamlet, this adaptation will be an ETC premier. The text will remain Shakespearean faithful, but Starbuck views the canon as mutable, and not enshrined above adaptation. “Whenever I direct Shakespeare, I approach it really collaboratively,” she explained. “You know, I hone what story I’m trying to tell with each production, and then I invite the cast and production team to also contribute, to the storytelling, and in the table work. I really approach it as a collaborative-like adaptation process with the cast, creative team, and the text.”
While the drama centers around a family, Hamlet draws from a world where political ambitions prey upon corruptible people—which gives it a relevancy and a sharpness that feels palpable. Set in what Starbuck is calling “Nordic noir,” (icy, dark, brooding, and brutalist) the royal family here is contemporary, very dysfunctional, and wrapped up in very high-stakes royal machinations. Power structures are rapidly changing around Hamlet, which makes grieving the death of his father more complicated—not to mention his father’s ghost, beseeching his son to avenge his murder.
Block, who has played a few other Shakespearean leading men (Romeo, Richard II), has found the appeal needed to bring Hamlet to today’s audience. “While the circumstances that Hamlet finds himself in are not universal, the questions that it sparks in Hamlet really are,” he said. He is excited to step into the Tragic Prince’s shoes.
“What’s really fascinating about Hamlet, even though it is a revenge thriller and a revenge drama, is the character himself, the questions and the conflict of the play have far less to do with whether or not Hamlet is going to avenge his father’s murder, and far more to do with his own central journey, far more to do with him just coming to terms with himself as as an adult.”
Starbuck concurred, “I think as you age and gain maturity, sometimes that anxiety lessens a little bit just because you have so much more life experience behind you that you have more reference points to look back on.”
Although a tragedy, she maintained that there is a sense of resolution in this adaptation, intent on reframing Hamlet with a new lens on the young man’s arc: from agony and anxiety to acceptance, from “To be or not to be” to “Let it be.”
When asked about the production at ETC, Starbuck said, “It’s been a wonderful experience. I think it’s been a great combination of feeling supported, but also feeling like I have a lot of creative agency. And the design team for our show is really fantastic, and the cast is, like incredible. So I’m really excited to be working with this team and this theater.”
Block added, “Santa Barbara’s got a really special theater. Artistically, I’m excited. And then also the community that’s at ETC, both in the admin offices and on stage and the backstage crew, they’re just some of the best people that I’ve ever worked with in my life.”
The rest of the cast, as Block put it, are “seven heavy hitters.” Jono Eiland (As You Like It at Santa Cruz Shakespeare) plays “Horatio,” Matt Foyer (The Comedy of Errors at Oregon Shakespeare Festival) plays “Polonius/Captain/Gravedigger,” and Rafael Goldstein (Julius Caesar and Henry V at A Noise Within ) plays “Laertes/First Player/Barnardo.” Sammy Linkowski (The Secret Garden at the Ahmanson) plays “Marcellus/Orsic/Guildenstern/Priest,” Corey Jones (The Book of Mormon on Broadway) plays “Claudius/Ghost,” Paige Lindsey White (Fallen Angels and Christmas at Pemberley at ETC) plays “Gertrude,” and Ana Nicolle Chavez (Under a Baseball Sky at The Old Globe) plays “Ophelia/Francisco.”
The “Nordic noir” production design team includes scenic design by Yuki Izumihara, lighting design by Michael Rathbun, sound design by John Zalewski, costume design by Denitsa Bliznakova, and properties design by Jenna Scordino. The dramaturg is Ward LeHardy and the production stage manager is Kristal Georgopoulos.
“As we bring Hamlet to life on our stage, we’re embracing the timeless power of Shakespeare’s words while exploring the depths of human ambition, betrayal, and resilience in our modern world,” said Scott DeVine, ETC’s executive artistic director. “This production is a bold, intimate journey into the heart of one of the greatest stories ever told.”
Producers for Hamlet are Frederic and Nancy Golden. Associate Producers are Scott and Edie DeVine, with Joan Rutowski and Simon and Euzetta Williams as Supporting Producers. Dana White is ETC’s Visionary Producer for the season.
Hamlet previews on Thursday, February 6th at 7:30pm and Friday, February 7th at 8pm; opens on Saturday, February 8th at 8pm and runs through Sunday, February 23rd, at 2pm at The New Vic.
Performances are Wednesdays and Thursdays at 7:30pm, Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm, and Sundays at 2pm; with added performances on Tuesday, February 11th at 7:30pm, Saturday, February 15th at 3pm, Wednesday, February 19th at 2pm and Saturday, February 22nd at 3pm.
For tickets ($25–$94) and times, visit etcsb.org
UCSB Arts & Lectures
The Future of Relationships, Love & Desire
– An evening with Esther Perel
Unafraid of honest emotions and communication, Esther Perel will take the Arlington’s stage in An Evening with Esther Perel: The Future of Relationships, Love & Desire presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures on Tuesday, January 14th at 7:30pm.
She’ll be asking questions to help the audience rethink how we connect, desire, and love. A seasoned relationship therapist, Perel will face the audience with her delightful wit and charm and talk about passion, heartbreak, sex, and other topics we usually only discuss with the lights off. Described by Nylon Magazine and The Today Show as an epic 2,000-person group date, this is your invitation to meet Perel in real life, explore the intricacies of modern love, and flirt with curiosity as the evening unfolds.
Fluent in nine languages, Perel’s TED talks have garnered more than 40 million views and her best-selling books have been translated into 31 languages. She is an executive producer and host of the award-winning podcast Where Should We Begin? Her new podcast How’s Work? focuses on workplace dynamics and can be enjoyed on Spotify or other podcast providers.
A New York Times bestselling author, Perel is recognized as one of today’s most insightful and original voices on modern relationships. As a psychotherapist, Perel has helmed a therapy practice in New York City for more than 35 years. In parallel, she serves as an organizational consultant for Fortune 500 companies around the world.
Esther Perel has devoted her entire professional life to helping people build thriving relationships. She believes that the quality of our relationships determines the quality of our lives. Since arriving as a graduate student in the United States, Perel has examined this concept from myriad angles: the nature of cultural and religious identity, the negotiation between tradition and modernity, the ebb and flow between individualism and collectivism. She observes interracial and interreligious couples, the cultural forces that affect gender roles, practices of childrearing, and ultimately, the tensions, obstacles, and anxieties that arise when our quest for love and security conflicts with our pursuit of adventure and freedom.
The wildly popular Where Should We Begin? offers a fascinating inside look at Perel’s sessions with real-life couples and has unlocked a deep-seated cultural interest in hashing these issues out openly in order to live better lives. Listeners can choose between podcasts on topics such as “Nobody’s f*cking anymore,” or “Bringing Desire Back,” “The Art of Erotic Communication,” or “The Arc of Love – All The Things We Never Said.”
Her experience has also unlocked within Perel the understanding that her years of study and practice go beyond the romantic, and that the lessons she has learned can be applied to relationships of all kinds, in all environments. The same principles used to create an open, balanced relationship with one’s significant other can be applied to our co-workers, our bosses and our world at large, and even to self-care.
Lead Sponsor for An Evening with Esther Perel: The Future of Relationships, Love & Desire, presented by UCSB Arts & Lectures is Heather & Tom Sturgess.
Sara Miller McCune is 2024-2025 Season Sponsor. Natalie Orfalea Foundation & Lou Buglioli are Community Partners of the 2024-2025 season.
For tickets ($47 – $157, $24.50 UCSB Students current ID) visit artsandlectures.ucsb.edu or call 805-893-3535 or visit AXS.com/TheArlingtonTheatre, 805-963-9580
Sullivan Goss: An American Gallery
The Power of Photography
By Kerry Methner / Voice
The complexities of human existence can fall away when a lens captures and embraces a moment, preserving it long enough for others to apprehend.
A series of such moments will be shared with visitors when Sullivan Goss, in collaboration with the Peter Fetterman Gallery, opens The Power of Photography on 1st Thursday, January 2nd, in an exhibition that will continue through January 27th.
Sullivan Goss’ first photographic exhibition in nearly 20 years, The Power of Photography promises moments of spontaneous joy, such as in The Circle by Todd Webb (above) and moments of shear beauty such as in Two Pears by Paul Caponigro (below).
“For this special occasion we have curated a show consisting of a diverse group of images from the collection of Peter Fetterman, one of LA’s most respected photography dealers,” the Sullivan Goss team explains. “From Peter’s extensive inventory, we have selected a group of photographs that share a singular powerful quality – to inspire joy.”
Fetterman, born in London, hails from a long career as collector of images. His current home base is Bergamot Station where he was one of the pioneer tenants of the Santa Monica Center of the Arts, when it opened in 1994.
“Everything I’ve learned about life, the world, history – basically everything, including about myself – I have really discovered from the power of a great image,” Fetterman noted in an email exchange about the exhibit. “I use the analogy of a great novel… You are one person before you experience it and a different person afterwards. I just want others to experience it too. This has been my motivation and why I feel the compulsion to continue to do it.”
Part of the inspiration for the exhibition was drawn from Fetterman’s recently published book The Power of Photography (2022).
The story goes that “during the COVID lockdown, with no way to bring collectors into his gallery, Fetterman ‘exhibited’ one photograph per day via his email list, usually accompanied by quotes from the artist and Peter’s personal anecdotes or explanations about why he found this particular image so compelling.”
While joy and the human spirit rise to the top as over arching themes, many of the images also bring into focus everyday moments that somehow offer a rich sense of history.
The Circle
Of Todd Webb’s The Circle, Fetterman wrote to his email list, “A scorching hot New York summer day. A hydrant goes off and all of a sudden a group of kids from all racial backgrounds join together in a circle in harmony and joy to embrace this gift. One of the greatest New York images ever in this collector’s humble opinion. A symbol of hope that only mostly children seem to possess.”
Webb’s words that were also shared by Fetterman were, “Creative photography does not have to have anything to do with location, project or causes as such yet it can involve anyone of them. It is a need to express something within the photographer. A creative photograph is one seen through the photographer. The reason for making the photograph is often unexplainable.”
Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, New York, 1948
Another everyday profound moment featured by Fetterman was captured by Herman Leonard in 1948: Ella Fitzgerald, Duke Ellington, Benny Goodman, New York, 1948. Fetterman’s abilities and history as a collector are reflected in it.
Fetterman shared that Leonard wrote of his work, “My parents loved classical music and all my childhood musical experiences had been traditional. Then when I heard Jazz, it was a whole new thing, like eating candy for the first time.” And this is an image of Ella Fitgerald!
Fetterman recalled, “This great Herman Leonard image has so much personal resonance for me. I grew up listening to Ella singing all the great American Songbook albums. They were my holy grail. In the 1960’s the great American Jazzpromoter, Norman Granz used to bring over all the great jazz musicians to London in his celebrated “Jazz at The Philharmonic“ series. As a skinny kid I used to slip backstage and collect jazz autographs. There was basically no security in those days. I met them all, including my beloved Ella. Herman was such a classy gentleman – and a really great photographer.”
Another strand of history is raised in Grace Robertson’s On the Caterpillar, Women’s Pub Outing, Clapham, England, 1956. Fetterman shared Robertson’s thoughts on her work, “I felt I was an observer of society. I never thought about my presence in it. My driving force in photographing women was to find out what makes them tick.”
On the Caterpillar, Women’s Pub Outing, Clapham, England, 1956
Robertson’s curiosity delivered a delightful image. Fetterman continues, “Whenever I need a pick me up I look at this hilarious photograph. It was taken by my friend, Grace Robertson. Grace was one of the pioneer women photojournalists who worked for Picture Post, the UK equivalent of Life Magazine. Her most beloved story was “Mother’s Day Outing” originally published by Picture Post and two years later re-commissioned by Life Magazine which follows a group of working-class women who were friends from a local pub. As the day progresses they become more and more tipsy and more and more uninhibited as only women in the company of women can do…Free from all their domestic responsibilities. As Grace says of the day, ‘I set off on the Saturday with the women in the coach. Their energy was awesome. These women were survivors. These were women in their fifties, sixties, and seventies and they had been through two world wars and the Great Depression in the middle. They were incredibly exuberant. And inspiring.’”
Fetterman also ventured into collecting some fabulous, historic photos of women in an entirely different sphere – fashion. This exhibition captures some of the excitement as the fashion world emerged in front of the photographer’s lens in the 50’s and 60’s.
Sabine Weiss, who wrote, “Photography gave me happiness. It’s a chance to talk to anybody, to travel, to meet different people. Photography opens so many doors,” was positioned at the center of the scene.
Yves Saint Laurent, Premiere Dior Collection
Fetterman wrote to his email list of her, when he shared her Yves Saint Laurent, Premiere Dior Collection, “Sabine is one of my favorite photographers. At 96 years old, she is still feisty and working on new projects and books. She is the last one left from that great generation of photographers that inspired my passion for the medium. Here is a rare gem from her archive. Yves St Laurent was the boy wonder of French fashion and was hand-picked by Christian Dior to be his successor at his own illustrious House of Fashion. Life Magazine asked Sabine to shoot his first fashion collection for Spring/Summer 1958. It seems from another era but still evokes all the elegance and beauty we associate with Haute Couture.”
The VOICE cover image by Ormond Gigli also speaks of fashion. Fetterman wrote, “Ormond Gigli’s greatest image, Models in the Windows, was taken on New York’s East 58th Street in 1960. It is widely considered one of the most famous fashion shots of the 1960s, and captures a slice of long-gone New York. It has such great energy… Here are Gigli’s own words: ‘In 1960, while a construction crew dismantled a row of brownstones right across from my own brownstone studio on East 58th Street, I was inspired to, somehow, immortalize those buildings…” Visit Sullivan Goss for the rest of the story.
Artists in the exhibition: Kristoffer Albrecht, Paul Caponigro, Georges Dambier, Martin Elkort, Elliott Erwitt, Ormond Gigli, Burt Glinn, Don Hunstein, Yale Joel, Michael Kenna, Andrew Kent, Herman Leonard, Grace Robertson, Willy Ronis, Pentti Sammallahti, George Tice, Todd Webb, and Sabine Weiss.
Lecture & Book Signing: Sullivan Goss will host a lively, informative lecture by Peter Fetterman, highlighting the collaborative exhibition inspired by his book The Power Of Photography on January 11th from 4 to 6pm. Copies of The Power of Photography will be for sale at the event. The lecture is free to attend but an RSVP is required.
Click here to register for the event and RSVP