Film Review: Love and Mercy

An effectively stylized glimpse into Beach Boys mastermind Brian Wilson’s troubled life composing what remains as the arguable pinnacle of the modern American popular music canon, in the brilliant Love and Mercy we find depicted his mid-1960s creative eruption as well as the sad, bizarre interlude twenty years later when the shattered Wilson, his work by then rightly venerated and admired, nevertheless found himself under the mental and […]

Spotlight: Julian Ryan And Workshop Theatre’s Lend Me A Tenor

By Haley Sprankle “Well at first I thought ‘this will be like a cakewalk,’ but then reality gave me a big ol’ slap across the head,” says Julian Ryan on his preparation for playing a lead in a nonmusical production for the first time. Ryan steps into the lead role of Max in Ken Ludwig’s […]

Review – Palmetto Opera’s La Boheme

By Kyle Petersen We tend to think of opera as high-brow entertainment, far removed from our modern culture by the passage of time as much as the language barriers which make the music sound alien and strange. But that really isn’t the right attitude. Yes, opera singers tend to be virtuosic, and the songs they […]

Review – Father and Son: The Legacy of Randy and Lyon Hill

By Kara Gunter Lyon Forrest Hill, who’s been with the Columbia Marionette Theatre for the better part of two decades, is well-known in Columbia as a maker and animator of puppets; but Hill is also a trained painter and printmaker, and son of the late artist Randy Lee Hill. Now until the end of February, […]

Columbia’s First Poet Laureate at Jasper Magazine Party

Review – In the Red & Brown Water at Trustus Theatre

By: Kyle Petersen In the Red & Brown Water isn’t like most plays. Written as part of a trilogy of works by playwright Tarrell Alvin McCraney, the play, directed by Chad Henderson and opening this past Friday at Trustus Theatre, opens with a whispered song, a ghostly invocation of an ancient Yoruban orisha, or spirit. […]

A Review of Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays

Words for Things: A Review of Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays In the opening scene of Standing on Ceremony: The Gay Marriage Plays, currently on stage in the Trustus Side Door Theatre (through January 11), two men in a swanky hotel dither over their wedding vows. One man, Wallace, is drafting vows based […]

Review – Jack Frost

“Jack Frost” – Melissa Swick Ellington reviews the world premiere of the new show at Columbia Children’s Theatre Columbia Children’s Theatre presents Jack Frost, a world premiere musical with book and lyrics by Crystal Aldamuy and music by Paul Lindley II, through Sunday, December 14. Here in Columbia, SC, we have plenty of reasons to […]

Review – ET Anderson, Et tu

Almost as soon as ET Anderson announced their formation, its recorded debut became one of the most anticipated local indie rock records of 2014. Band mastermind Tyler Morris did great work in the Pavement-esque Calculator prior to joining up with Raleigh’s Octopus Jones, where his slashing guitar work and dry, terse songwriting did wonders as […]

Book Review – The Angel of Mons: A World War I Legend by Jerred Metz

Not long after the Battle of Mons at the outset of WWI, an inspiring legend emerged, telling an unbelievable tale of angels appearing and protecting British soldiers. According to witnesses, St. George and an army of angels swirled onto the scene in a giant cloud and descended upon the advancing German troops, saving the lives of a British Vickers machine-gun crew. This fantastic story is the subject of Jerred Metz’s first novel, a work of historical fiction titled The Angel of Mons: A World War I Legend.