All the county’s a stage next week when a touring group of actors from Cambridge University arrives to perform Shakespeare’s “As You Like It” at Vero and Sebastian public high schools.
With performances Thursday, Sept. 8, at 7 p.m. at Vero Beach High School and Saturday, Sept. 10, at Sebastian River High School, the Cambridge University American Stage Tour – CAST for short – will be spending their off-stage time giving acting and playwriting workshops at both schools.
Shakespeare’s pastoral comedy, written in 1599, follows Rosalind as she flees the persecution of her uncle’s court and, dressing up as a boy, hides out in the Forest of Arden with her cousin Celia for company. There in the forest they meet a slew of country characters, including Jacques, the melancholic traveler who delivers some of Shakespeare’s choicest speeches, including “All the world’s a stage.” A tangle of romance ensues and sorts itself out with a big group wedding, after which they learn the grumpy uncle has decided to right his wrongs and they can all go home again.
The actors are here through the Laura Riding Jackson Foundation, Vero’s non-profit literary organization. From here they’ll take their production to a number of universities around the U.S. It’s thanks to Susan Lovelace, the A.P. coordinator at Sebastian who’s now on the board of Laura Riding Jackson, that CAST has been coming to town for the past nine years.
This is the last weekend to see the Vero Beach Museum of Arts’ exhibition from its collection, curated with the theme “From Exhibition to Collection,” meaning it features works of arts acquired from exhibitions over the years. Sunday is the exhibit’s last day – the museum is open from 1 p.m. to 4:30 p.m.
The other two exhibits currently on view also wrap up this month. Out of This World, the exhibition of 71 works of art in the collection of NASA, comes down Sept. 25; Masters of Studio Glass ends Sept. 11.
Friday night is the first Friday of the month, and the intrepid artists of the downtown Arts district are persevering with a September Art Stroll, banking on a big turnout because there isn’t much else going on. Flametree Clay Gallery will be featuring new works by its resident artists and still has a show in the back room of floral containers. Tiger Lily has some new paintings by Julia Carter inspired by her recent trip to Italy. There’s also Glenda Taylor’s commissioned mosaic, a 5×5-foot exterior panel for a barrier island home. And there’s a new series by Travis Blanton of female figures in clay.
And it’s the last chance to see Gallery 14’s exhibit of the photography of magazine photographer Greg Hill as well as the summer show of its resident artists. The gallery will be closed for the rest of September.
Terra Fermata in Stuart turns the sand into a dance floor Friday night with the Orlando party band Sweet Bea and the Boys doing covers of Daft Punk, Rihanna, Marvin Gaye – you get the idea. Beatrice Roberts, who founded the band, has a degree from UCF in Musical Theater performance and got her start singing jingles around Orlando as well as playing in musicals.
If you’re intrigued by unusual string instruments, you might want to catch Fort Lauderdale’s Flint Blade at Kilted Mermaid Sunday night playing the guitar-bass hybrid known as the Chapman Stick. Developed in the 1970s, the stick looks like a wider and longer guitar fretboard and is played by both hands tapping its 10 or 12 strings. As a result, it can sound many more simultaneous notes. Blade plays jazz and standards but with a slightly New Age, psychedelic sound. He also writes his own music.
If you’ve never been to the brick-walled, intimate bar called The Social in Orlando, here’s a reason to go: The exquisite alt-country singer/songwriter John Moreland is playing Friday night. A favorite of Stephen Colbert and Rachel Maddow, Moreland is not the kind of country artist who skips across stages. Instead, he is known for his deeply felt, poignant music.
Moreland made his television debut on Colbert’s show in February. His 2015 album “High on Tulsa Heat” was named to Rolling Stone’s list of best country albums for 2015. Saturday, Moreland heads to St. Augustine’s Sing Out Loud Festival; Sunday he’ll be at Loosey’s in Gainesville (tell your kids).
The Social is across Lake Eola from the Thornton Park District, a tiny old Orlando neighborhood worth at least a stroll-through, with brick streets, gorgeous old homes and massive live oaks, and plenty of bars and restaurants.
