Everyone’s favorite rock band is coming to the Eccles. That’s right: School of Rock – The Musical’s summer tour will be landing in Salt Lake City from May 28 to June 3, 2019. Sure, the group is sans frontman Jack Black, but they’re still ready to get out there and melt some faces.

Based on the hit 2003 movie, School of Rock–The Musical features all of the best songs from the movie, plus an original score by Andrew Lloyd Webber. What’s a better combo than that?

Cameron Trueblood in School of Rock Tour. Photo by Evan Zimmerman-MurphyMade

The musical was nominated for four 2016 Tonys and, according to Entertainment Weekly’s Jesse Oxfeld, it’s “an inspiring jolt of energy and mad skillz.” 

You won’t want to miss those skills. Get your tickets today, to see the best guitar shredding, rock-wannabe substitute teacher around teach his prodigies the true meaning of rock and roll.

Sami Bray in the School of Rock Tour. Photo by Evan Zimmerman-MurphyMade

School of Rock – The Musical at the Eccles Theater
May 28-June 3, 2019

• Matinee performances Saturday June 1 at 2 p.m. and Sunday June 2 at 1 p.m.
• Weeknight performances May 28-31.
  See artsaltlake.org for ticket sales and showtimes.

See more of Salt Lake magazine‘s arts
and theater coverage here! 

Ballet West held its Choreographic Festival this past week starting on May 8, 2019 with the Salt Lake Premiere of Danseur, a film from Scott Gormley that explores the gender inequality in Ballet. It was a very interesting film and so surprising how these men, known as danseurs, are treated. These danseurs are incredible athletes who train eight hours a day, and go to the gym three to four times a week for weight training. It’s hard to train your body to do the things they have them do. To pick up a ballerina and carry her across the stage requires great skill and strength. They work so hard and yet are judged so harshly. Many danseurs quit because the pressure is just too much.

Following the film was a panel of male Ballet West dancers to discuss what it is like to be a danseur. The discussion was led by dance journalist, Kate Mattingly. It was fascinating to hear the stories of Rex Tilton, Joshua Whitehead, Hadriel Diniz, Lucas Horns and Adam Sklute. Each dancer shared when they decided that dance was the direction they were going to take in life and the struggles then and now. They all agreed that you really must love to dance to make it your profession, of course. But it’s not all grim, the panel discussed the camaradarie among dancers and how that can often make up for the downsides. You can tell these people are not just “co-workers” but friends too. This comes through in their performances.

On display during the entire Festival was an artwork display of dance from Nathan Florence, Karen Horne and Beau Pearson. This was a wonderful addition to the Festival showing the beauty of dance in a different art form.

May 9 saw the the dance portion of the Festival began. For the first time this festival has gone international with a performance by the Scottish Ballet who is celebrating their 50^th year. The company present an interesting modern ballet piece called Sibilo which means whistle in Latin. The music by Alex Menzies begins with some classical whistling and then the dancing begins. According to the choreographer, “Sibilo is a series of vignettes, with miniature portraits of personalities within the company, with all their individuality.” The men’s blazers were used as costumes and props in unique ways. There was excellent use of light and shade, great turns with the feet of the partner flat on the ground and sliding and some very unusual lifts. Whistling for me is kind of irritating, but this totally worked for this piece and so very cool that we had the privilege to see the Scottish Ballet perform here in Salt Lake City.

The next piece was by Ballet West’s Principal Artist Emily Adams and called But A Dream. This was a modern ballet with interesting costumes that had a warrior/Alice in Wonderland feel to them. Emily describes this dance “But A Dream explores metaphors we have for life (life is a game, life is a race, life is a mystery, etc.) and how they might interact with each other in a surrealist world.” Emily had unique groupings of dancers, interesting and strong moves and totally fit the feel of the music by Michael Nyman and costumes were futuristic. This number showed the power and strength of the dancers. Life is after all “But A Dream”.

The next piece was by Ballet West’s First Soloist Katlyn Addison called Hidden Voices. Katlyn describes her piece as “Antonin Dvorak’s String Quartet No. 12 American, which has been inspired by African American spiritual music. Repeated humming of spiritual hymns throughout the ballet is an homage to the inspiration of the work.” Great costumes and loved the hair of the female dancers in ponytails, powerful dance moves throughout the piece but especially by the male dancers during the “Humming Section”. It was so great to see Allison DeBona back performing again after maternity leave. She looked great and very impressive that she was back in 4 months after having her baby.

The next number was called disquiet by Ballet West Demi-Soloist Trevor Naumann. This was the world premiere of this piece and it truly made you feel the disquiet that we can feel at times. Music was by Boaz Roberts, very futuristic. Costumes were simple but striking with black leather jackets. Interesting groupings and staging, power moves, lifts and very disquieting music. A bit disturbing but in a good way. We have some incredible dancers at Ballet West and to see their careers expand and grow is great to watch.

Finally, was Constant Light choreographed by Edwaard Liang a former dancer for the New York City Ballet and Nederlands Dans Theater. He has choreographed for many dance companies all around the world and is in very high demand. As an award-winning choreographer Ballet West was very fortunate to have him create this number for them. The costumes, music by Oliver Davis and dancing were perfection!

During the pas de deux with Christopher Rudd and Beckanne Sisk I found myself with tears in my eyes. First, because this would be the last time, I would see Christopher Rudd dance and second, because of the skill of the dancers, the tenderness in how Christopher partnered Beckanne he is one of the best in how he cares and watches his partners so closely. There was one move that was extremely difficult and Beckanne could have been hurt if it wasn’t pulled off without precision. Christopher watched over her and was so careful with her, it struck a chord in my heart.

Emily Adams and Chase O’Connell did a beautiful job in their pas de deux as well. Emily has always been a beautiful dancer with lots of expression, emotional connection to the audience and grace. It is great to see Chase progress and become a stronger dancer with each performance. I found myself holding my breath most of this number as it was like the perfect storm everything came together and made for one of the most beautiful dance pieces I have ever seen. My friend and I discussed this as we were heading home that we could watch that number repeatedly because it was so stunning. All the dancers did an incredible job. This was a perfect way to end the 2018/19 Ballet Season.

The upcoming 2019/20 season looks promising. Season and Individual Tickets are available now at balletwest.org

See all of our dance coverage here.

Keanu Reeves returns as the dog-loving titular character in John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum. Reeves brought his brooding, ex-assassin John Wick to the big screen the first time in 2014 to murder the bad guys who killed his dog — I swear; this was not only the likely elevator pitch but also the plot of a multi-million dollar motion picture.

But since violent John Wick made more than four times its $20 million dollar budget, we were graced with super-violent John Wick: Chapter 2 in 2017, in which Wick breaks the rules of some assassin’s code whilst repaying a debt, resulting in a sizable bounty placed on his head.

And since Chapter 2 made more than twice what the original did, that’s all you need to know to be caught up for super-duper violent John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum… except that dictionary.com defines “parabellum” as a noun — a type of German-made semiautomatic pistol or machine gun — with an origin from the early 20th century. It’s from the Latin para bellum (from para! ‘prepare!’ (imperative of parare ) + bellum ‘war’) in the phrase si vis pacem, para bellum ‘if you want peace, prepare for war’.

But John is unprepared for what awaits him in Parabellum, which picks up shortly after the bounty has been levied and he is disavowed from all the usual courtesies of support and safe houses he normally enjoys as a card-carrying member of assassins governed by a mysterious body known as The High Table. So now basically every assassin with student loans wants that cool $14 million in exchange for Wick’s head. Cue the ultra-violence!

Parabellum is not my cup of tea personally, but still, I admit that what it does it does well. It has more of everything from the first two: violence, fight sequences, all manner of bad-assery and dogs. It is so absolutely over the top and relentlessly violent it’s almost an art form. If you drank from the earlier mugs of Wick 1 and 2, Wick 3 is likely to be the hair of the dog that bit you.

But it’s also long in the tooth, with multiple repetitive fight sequences rather than inventive ones (like an early fight in a library in which a book is truly mightier than the sword), zero plot, rules that barely matter, and no stakes. And although John Wick never misses, his 2^nd sequel certainly does; blowing numerous opportunities for more humor, and more imaginative fight sequences.

Which is a shame since a nod to the camera while the arm is being broken is why you see a Wick flick. It needed more one-liners and winks because Parabellum works best when absurd and not taking itself too seriously… because you just can’t take it seriously.

But if an obscene amount of outlandish violence is your cup of tea… then John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum is probably your drink of choice even though it’s been better. But don’t worry; maybe it will get the mix just right in its 3^rd sequel.

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• John Wick: Chapter 3 – Parabellum
• Director: Chad Stahelski
• Distributor: Lionsgate/Summit
• Genre: Action
• Runtime: 2 hrs. 10 min.
• MPAA Rating: R for pervasive strong violence, and some language

See all of our film coverage here.

I first saw Director Penny Lane’s latest documentary Hail Satan? during Sundance 2019, and I knew immediately that it would get scooped up and make its way down the mountain for all to see despite (and possibly because of) its controversial subject matter. At once it’s both exactly what you think it is and not at all what you’re afraid it might be.

IMDB plainly describes it as “A look at the quick rise and influence of the controversial religious group known as The Satanic Temple,” and it is obviously that; but it’s also much more in Lane’s ever-capable hands, with that question mark in the title giving away its atypical nature.

I’ll admit I went in seeing Hail Satan? apprehensively, and there certainly are some disconcerting scenes, especially when a rogue Temple leader attempts to put her own overtly inflammatory and overly theatrical stamp upon the Temple as a whole. But rather than being in the movie merely to provoke the audience, these scenes illustrate that mainstream churches could learn a thing or two from Satanic Temple co-founder Lucien Greaves about properly managing PR issues and/or resolving internal conflicts. It’s a heckuva thing to see the Satanic Temple police its unruly people far more effectively than the Catholic Church has handled its pedophile priests. But it’s only one of the many instances wherein Temple members seem so much more rational, measured, and reasonable than their godly counterparts, to say nothing of the seven fundamental tenets of the Satanic Temple being morally superior to the Ten Commandments.

But then again, most of us could learn something from this doc; not only about its subject matter specifically but about religious freedom and filmmaking in general. Director Lane knows what she’s doing, and as with her past docs (I encourage you to see Our Nixon and Nuts!), she knows how to make an illuminating film entertaining, even with given its edgy topic.

So if you’re willing to check out a tight 95 minutes of R-rated documentary about something that is probably already pressing your buttons, you might be pleasantly surprised by Hail Satan?

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• Hail Satan?
• Director: Penny Lane
• Distributor: Magnolia
• Genre: Documentary
• Runtime: 1 hrs. 35 min.
• MPAA Rating: R for graphic nudity, and some language

See all of our film coverage here.