Some Magic Flute Reviews

Now, let me show you the reviews we got for The Magic Flute.

First, there's this one from The Bad Oracle, a Baltimore-local small theater reviewer. She starts the praise section with a ton of well-deserved compliments for my professional singing cast mates, so be sure to click and read about them below. But then take a look at what she wrote about me (it starts grounded in the reality that I'm not a pro like them, but it gets better):

Ishai Barnoy isn’t quite up to their level vocally, but what he lacks in that department he makes up for with about eighteen billion units of charm as Papageno. I always really enjoy Barnoy, especially when he’s doing his comic relief thing. He’s absolutely adorable here, winning and whining his way through a part that he definitely puts his unique spin on. He’s an instant audience favorite and it is well deserved.

And here's a link to the whole review: 

http://thebadoracle.com/2015/05/25/beans-beans-the-magical-flute/.

Second, there's one that came very late, from The Baltimore Sun. I guess this guy just wanted to give a realistic perspective to his wide audience. Take a look at what he said about me:

Ishai Barnoy has some charming moments as Papageno, the earthy bird-catcher who accompanies the prince, but more assertive acting and singing would be welcome.

Not much, I know. Still, it's good to get more far-ranging attention. And this one's also got a sweet picture taken from tech week by my Annex company mate, Dave Iden. I have to admit that tech week was a time when my costume was still fully intact and my mask annoyed me, a fact for which I must apologize to our wonderful costume designer Anna Tringali. Anyway, it was a great costume. Here's the picture:

Here's a link to this one: 

http://www.baltimoresun.com/entertainment/arts/artsmash/bal-mozarts-the-magic-flute-gets-novel-treatment-from-annex-theater-20150609-story.html.

Finally, here's the mostly critical review from The City Paper (it really doesn't say anything by way of describing any of the specific actors, though there are a few words about my cast mate Alli Clendaniel, and it includes a pretty sweet picture of her):

http://www.citypaper.com/arts/stage/bcpnews-correcting-mozart-annex-theatre-reinterprets-the-magic-flute-20150602,0,5704951.story.

From the Magic Flute

Well, I was in the Annex Theater's production of The Magic Flute. At this point, the show is over. But I thought, why not post some of the cool stuff from the show.

Let me show you a video posted to Facebook, a scrap from the "pa-pa" song, which is kind of the climax of my character's arc. Oh, right; I was Papageno. And for all those interested, the wonderful singer/actress opposite me as Papagena is Anais Naharro-Murphy, a young woman of fantastic talent. Stay on the lookout for this one.

A sneak peak...

Posted by The Annex Theater on Thursday, June 11, 2015

Three More Pictures from Plato's Symposium

I'll start with my favorite one from the show, which shows me patronizingly patting Nick Parlato's Aristophanes on the cheek, with Kat McKerrow as Agathon on the adjacent couch:

Photo credit: Crissy Abbot

This second one I also like, even though it only includes me in the background, listening across the couch to Stephanie Joyal's Socrates berate Kat McKerrow's Agathon (pictured above):

Photo credit: Crissy Abbot

And lastly, here's another one by Shaelyn Jae, which I like because it's such a good, if a bit dark, composition, with me and Jeff Tegeler, who plays Pausanius:

Photo credit: Shaelyn Jae

Last Two Reviews for the Symposium

Below are the last two reviews for Plato's Symposium. For certain reasons (which I feel like I can guess, but nevertheless I urge you to judge for yourself), these reviewers spent little time on actors' work in their comments. So I won't say much about them.

The first is in Baltimore's City Paper, written by Baynard Woods. He stresses an interesting historical and philosophical dimension that, largely because of the format of the performance, we didn't stress:
http://www.citypaper.com/arts/art-seen/bcp-conflicts-of-interest-you-me-and-alcibiades-20150210,0,6668251.story.

The second is a Bad Oracle review (if you're a Baltimore local, and a theater person no less, you'll know The Bad Oracle from their reviews of local theater here) -- and it's not an approving one:
http://thebadoracle.com/2015/02/11/the-symposium-sudden-satyrs-play-doh/.

BUT! Well... I'm mentioned positively, albeit briefly, in both of these. Soooo... Maybe I have little enough reason to care about bad praise, philosophical praise, or whatever.

Cheers folks! Thanks for loving me! My ego grows with every piece of flattery, but with every piece of insult ... well, with insult it also grows. It just grows and grows, that thing.

More Press for Plato's Symposium

So another bit of press came out about Plato's Symposium, with only a tiny bit of flattery to me:

Ishai Barnoy (Eryximachus) and Nicholas Parlato (Aristophanes) make able foils between the hesitation of the latter’s hiccups. Both have an excellent command of the text and their characters play well together. Equally pleasing is Kat McKerrow as Agathon.

Nevertheless, while very simple and direct, this is the truth. If you're coming to see the show, this review sort of prepares you in that simple way for what you're going to experience/enjoy.

(And oh, here's the link to the whole thing:
http://baltimorepostexaminer.com/symposium-sudden-satyrs-dish-love-libations-terrault-contemporary/2015/02/06.)

Scenes with Friends and Plato's Symposium

So I'm still acting, or trying to. In this regard, I was recently polishing a phrase I might use if asked the right question. I guess I just wasn't asked the right question yet. The phrase was something along the lines of "They sent a clown to do an actor's work" or vice-versa. Well, maybe I wouldn't be fair to myself if I called myself a clown, whether in the pejorative sense or in the casual sense, even the artistic sense -- and I'm certainly not that capable a clown, not in terms of technique at least.

Lately, I was involved in two performances that have been testing my relationship with ... being a clown. I guess that's one way to say it. The first of these, a casual, one-time home performance which was titled by the joint directors-performers "Scenes with Friends," pitted me in two scenes where I sort of had to resist my usual clowning style in favor of, in one scene, a totally deadpan british-esque kind of comedic acting (it was a Pinter scene), and in the other, I was Time, the Czech prostitute, in a short verse play I'd written in grad school and included in my MFA these (which is free and searchable online, to all those who are curious). The second performance is in Jeffrey Gangwisch and Stephanie Joyal's rendition of Plato's Symposium, where I play Eryximachus, a doctor so clinical that he's basically a clown too.

At any rate, the first, "Scenes with Friends," was a more-or-less private show. It went exceedingly well, but I'd rather not say more about it. If you were there, you were there, and you probably enjoyed yourself. But if you weren't, then whatever. There might be more of these kinds of things happening (so keep your eyes peeled).

The second, Plato's Symposium, is currently going on. It actually officially opens this Saturday and runs this weekend and next. And, for this one, I'll let the first reviewer of the show, Mandy Gunther, say all that needs to be said about the play, and my part of it.

Here's a link to Mandy's review:
http://www.theatrebloom.com/2015/02/review-the-symposium-at-sudden-satyrs/.

And if you'd like to skip ahead to the parts about me, here you go:

Stellar performances of note include Ishai Barnoy as the loquaciously pedantic Eryximachus, and Nicholas Parlato as Aristophanes. Dithering and bickering in a jovial nature these two take up a great deal of the conversation, particularly Barnoy’s character who takes on the laborious task of being an annoying and pontificating swot. There comes a point in Barnoy’s unending speech where the other characters begin pleading, albeit with humor, for his discourse to meet its end. Both Barnoy and Parlato are engaging and give compelling arguments that entreat the mind open for debate. They understand how to address their peers and make the conversation pit burble with good vibrations.

Pausanius, played by the fluid-tongued Jeff Teleger, has a flavored favoritism for what some might call polyamorous tastes. Teleger, with his burgundy open-chested shirt, has a fleeting flirtation with the notions of love, which makes for a delicious opposition against the way Barnoy’s character meticulously dissects the ideology of the god and its worth of praise. These three men, Parlato and his charm, Barnoy and his clinicality, and Teleger with his poeticism make for intriguing counterpoints throughout the performance that keep the conversation moving at an endurable and enjoyable pace.

And here's a picture that was taken of me, during my long speech:

That's me on the right, standing up
by the reclining Jeff Tegeler, in a photo
taken by Shaelyn Jae for Mandy's review.