Out and About for the Mid Coast Lakes Region of Maine Feb. 8-14

Out and About for the Bangor Lakes Regions of Maine Feb. 8-14
Out and About for the Bangor Lakes Regions of Maine Feb. 8-14
February 7, 2018
Out and About for the Belgrade Lakes Region of Maine Feb. 8-14
February 7, 2018

Out and About for the Mid Coast Lakes Region of Maine Feb. 8-14

“The Cashore Marionettes,”  Strand Theatre, Rockland

Feb. 8, Thursday, 7pm, “The Cashore Marionettes,” unmatched in artistry, grace and refinement of movement, the internationally acclaimed Cashore Marionettes redefine the art of puppetry. The moving and humorous performances have astounded audiences in Europe, the Far East and across North America including stops at the Kennedy Center, Annenberg Center, Kravis Center, and many others. In the performance Life in Motion, Joseph Cashore presents his collection of marionette masterworks. Characters of depth, integrity, and humanity are portrayed in a full evening unlike anything else in theater today. The performance is a series of scenes taken from everyday life and set to a beautiful music by composers such as Beethoven, Vivaldi, Strauss, and Copland. Through a combination of virtuoso manipulation, humor, pathos, classic music, and poetic insight, The Cashore Marionettes take the audience on a journey that celebrates the richness of life. Life in Motion is a powerful, entertaining, surprising, theatrically satisfying, one-of-a-kind evening for adults and young adults, $20/advance, $25/door, Strand Theatre, 345 Main Street, Rockland. FMI: 207-701-5053, www.rocklandstrand.com.

Feb. 8-11, Thursday-Sunday, 7:30pm/Thurs-Sat, 2pm/Sun, “The Picture of Dorian Gray,” by Oscar Wilde. Adapted by Merlin Holland and John O’Connor. Directed by Al Miller, featuring the Theater Project’s Professional Ensemble. Set in the decadent world of Victorian London, a beautiful young man called Dorian Gray becomes infatuated by the exquisite portrait that Basil Hallward has painted of him. He makes a Faustian pact that he will remain forever young while the picture grows old. Oscar Wilde’s only novel caused an immediate scandal when it was first published in 1890 and its themes of youth and decay, innocence and corruption, art and reality are even more relevant to us in the 21st century than in the 19th, Pay-what-you-can, The Theater Project, 14 School Street, Brunswick. FMI: 207-729-8584, www.theaterproject.com.
Feb. 9-11, Friday-Sunday, all-day events, “28th Annual U.S. National Toboggan Championships,” each year, up to 425 teams of racers gather to ride traditional wood toboggans down the country’s only remaining gravity-powered 440-foot-long wooden toboggan chute, originally built in 1936, which ends with a slide across frozen Hosmer Pond. Toboggan Nationals is the signature event of the 9-day Winterfest festival, see site for schedule of event, Camden Snow Bowl, 20 Barnestown Road, Camden. FMI: 207-236-3438, www.camdensnowbowl.com/toboggan.
Feb. 9, Friday, 7:30pm, “Funny for FebFest II,” Freeport Players laughs in the face of winter storms, darkness and cold! This double bill stars comedian Zachariah Stearn, whose new comedy set blends comedic stories with original music. Zac has been “doing comedy” since he was a teenager, performing all over the country. He had audiences in stiches as Truffaldino in last fall’s production of The Servant of Two Masters. The event also features Freeport Players’ improv troupe The F.P.I., who involve the audience in creating comedic sketches. This is a 21+ event, BYOB, $10, Freeport Community Center, 53 Depot Street, Freeport. FMI: www.fcponline.org.
Feb. 11, Sunday, 2pm, “Winter Garden Workshop-Why and How to Sow & Grow Native Plants,” the seeds of wild plants have a different set of needs than those of typically cultivated garden and vegetable species. Heather will describe the reproductive life cycle of different types of native plants and explain how we can change our landscape practices to help support wild plant reproduction, pollinators and other wildlife. Heather McCargo, Executive Director at the Wild Seed Project, will demystify native seed sowing and explain simple outdoor propagation techniques that anyone can do so that a wide range of individuals can help increase native plant populations. Growing native plants from seed is a different way to interact with our native flora and is an inexpensive way to produce a lot of plants, $5, St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 27 Pleasant Street, Brunswick. FMI: www.btlt.org/events/wgw-why-and-how.
Feb. 12, Monday, 7:30pm, “Ying Quartet Winter Concert,” the program begins with Beethoven’s Quartet Op. 74, composed amid the tumultuous invasion of Vienna by Napoleon’s army, and nicknamed the “Harp” after the frequent pizzicato figures bounced between the players. This is followed by Conference of the Birds, commissioned by the Ying Quartet with funds from the Institute of American Music and freshly composed by Christopher Theofanidis, who was nominated for a 2017 Grammy Award for Best Contemporary Classical Composition. The program closes with Dvořák’s String Quartet No. 11, a work commissioned by a Viennese ensemble in which Dvořák pays tribute to the quartet tradition of that city, but not without evoking his Czech heritage in the folk music gestures of the exuberant Finale, $45, Studzinski Recital Hall, Bowdoin College, 21 College Street, Brunswick. FMI: 207-373-1400, bowdoinfestival.org.
Feb. 14, Wednesday, 7pm, “Love Letters,” this romantic play by A. R. Gureny centers on two characters, Melissa Gardner and Andrew Makepeace Ladd III. Follow their love story told though written letters and performed by Phyllis and Jim Quaid, $10, Chocolate Church Arts Center, Curtis Room Annex, 798 Washington Street, Bath. FMI: 207-442-8455, www.chocolatechurcharts.org.

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