Seattle Blog

BREAKING NEWS: INTERN-A-PALOOZA 2013 has begun! This summer, TeenTix is thrilled to bring Kate L. and Quynh T. into the office to be a part of our work behind the scenes. That's right--there is now a full-fledged TEAM bringing you arts access for teens, and they are bringing the heat! (Also, they're crowding our teeny office. But we have to admit, we love it.) Leah, our Communications Associate, sat down with each of them for a closer look into the madness of Intern-A-Palooza:

Name: Kate L. Age: 17 years old From: Ballard, WA Name an artist that inspires you, and why: I really like Amanda Palmer. She's cool because she represents feminism--she doesn't care about others' expectations about her. Like, she doesn't shave her legs. She shaves off her eyebrows. She's totally original. Also, I like that she connects with her fans online through Twitter and Facebook. I think her intentions are really heartfelt and I respect that. What is your job at TeenTix and what do you like about it so far? My job is to create labels and mail passes every week for new users and teens who lost their passes, and I organize the blog and keep the calendar updated. I like working at TeenTix because they help give teens access to art, and helps them connect with new material. I also like looking at my work and saying, "Man, look at that. What an awesome calendar!" I love that TeenTix constantly works to keep things current for its users, and always adds new info while it works to reach as many teens as possible. What are some of your hobbies? Drama/Improv, swimming is a favorite activity of mine, and I love dogs. What kind of dogs do you have? I have two Corgis. They like sausages. What's a random fact about you? I once had a cat who lived to be 18 years old. His name was Henry.

Hey, TeenTixers!

Own a video camera or webcam? We want you to express your opinions on the world wide web!

With music ranging from classical Mozart to alternative, electronic, screamo duo F*ck Buttons, this year’s NEXT STEP performance at Pacific Northwest Ballet will invigorate McCaw hall with young dancers performing fresh, original works. I met with three performers in this upcoming show: the exceptional flutist, Benton Gordon (17), playing in the pit with the Seattle Youth Symphony Orchestra (SYSO – lovingly pronounced “Sigh-So”), and vibrant PNB professional division dancers Alex Hyman (19), and Jacqui Schiller (19).

NEXT STEP dancers watch musicians rehearse

We've been searching high and low for summer programs, classes, camps, and other opportunities for teens just like YOU! In this list, you'll be able to find everything under the sun happening in Seattle this summer. Stay cool and get your art on!

~D A N C E~

What a crazy show! I just got back from the Season Preview Party at Balagan Theatre, and boy am I speechless. The amount of talent in that room was simply unreal, and the dream experience of every theatre-goer. I mean, Alice Ripley and Jerick Hoffer (aka Jinkx Monsoon) on the same stage at the same time?! Unreal.

The house was packed tonight, explaining the endless line that curved around the side of the theatre. It was my first time watching a performance at The Moore, and it was definitely a great show to see for the first time there. The show started with a bang and a song from the upbeat Jerry Springer: The Opera, with the ensemble on stage. The rest of the night featured songs from the upcoming season and many different solo performances by fabulous singers including but not limited to Justin Huertas, Heath Saunders, Kristen DeLohr Helland, Ryan McCabe, Louis Hobson, Keaton Whittaker, and of course, our stars, Jerick Hoffer/Jinkx Monsoon and Alice Ripley. I was definitely looking forward to their performances since I checked Facebook and discovered this amazing concert. My hopes were definitely satisfied. Jinkx Monsoon sang an amazing rendition of I Will Survive (one of my favorites!), an interpretation that only she would be able to execute. Later, she came back to sing The Orgin of Love from Hedwig and The Angry Inch, amazing the audience with her charm. During Alice Ripley's performance, I particularly enjoyed her singing I Miss The Mountains, from the show Next To Normal that she starred in on Broadway, with her amazing, raw, distinct, unique voice that I can spot anywhere. It felt like a dream being able to listen to her sing live, and it's way better than listening to the Next To Normal original Broadway cast recording on shuffle.

Jackie Sumell is no stranger to making a scene – in 2001, she organized a march on Washington, carrying hundreds of women’s pubic hair in order to protest pro-life decisions made by George Bush. Long before that, she was the first girl in Long Island to play competitive tackle football. However, when she attended a conference and ended up getting in touch with Herman Wallace, a now 40-year prisoner in solitary confinement, she had no idea it would eventually become the project she is most recognized for.

Herman’s House, a film written and directed by Angad Singh Bhalla, follows the 12-year relationship between the two unlikely associates. The story begins when Sumell sends Wallace a letter consisting of pictures of what she happened to be doing every hour, so that he will know what is still happening in the world outside his 6 foot by 9 foot cell – a room smaller than the average parking space. They begin a game: if Wallace were able to have any house in the world, what would it look like? Their plans become more and more concrete, and Sumell creates a scale model of Wallace’s dream house, eventually displaying it in 12 exhibits around the world under the name The House that Herman Built. The project escalates, with the goal eventually changing into actually creating the house in New Orleans, so that it can be a community center for youth. However, the movie doesn’t try to shine a positive light on the ordeal the two have been through – it concludes with Wallace still in prison and Sumell stuck in a rut, unable to find a way to make Wallace’s dream a reality.

Sounds echo across the walls of Benaroya Hall. They bounce back and forth in the giant space, resounding in each audience’s ears. However, at Amy Tan’s Seattle Arts and Lecture visit on June 5th, 2013, there were more than just sounds echoing across Benaroya Hall: there were unbelievably inspiring, incredible ideas.

Tan has written many world-renowned novels, like the insanely popular The Joy Luck Club, which was turned into a successful movie in 1993 and has been translated in 35 languages to-date. Tan has many other popular and well-written novels, like The Kitchen God’s Wife, Saving Fish from Drowning, The Hundred Secret Senses,” and more.

Phew, we're ready to call it a night! Thanks to everyone involved in the extraordinary Preview Party for Balagan's 2013-14 Season. According to our Twitter, Facebook, and Blog, everybody there was feeling the love, the laughter, and even the feels. Special thanks to Balagan for showing off the talents of artistic director Louis Hobson, RuPaul's Drag Race Winner Jinkx Monsoon, and the ever-talented Broadway superstar Alice Ripley. Also thanks to our TeenTix Press Corps stars of the night: Sam H., Monet C., Isabella D., Kally P., and Jennie K.! You all did an amazing job! For cereal, we felt the love all the way through our computer screens.

Here's to next time! You never know when the Takeover will strike again... Dun, dun, dunnn!

Jinkx Monsoon looks so LOVELY tonight! She has such a great voice, and it's so fun to see a "different" kind of theater.

17 sold out shows in New York but Jinkx says she doesn't plan on moving to the east coast. "There's something special happening in the Northwest and Seattle's the epicenter of it."

Jinkx epitomizes the best of drag. Belting "Survivor," her incredible performance is in no way dependent on her being in drag. She's got the voice and charisma to be a great performer regardless of what she's wearing.

-Kally

The Balagan's funny and light previews didn't leave me at all prepared for Louis Hobson's heart-renching ballad. Singing "Bring Him Home"!from Les Miserables, Hobson's voice was nothing to laugh at. The previously chattery audience went absolutely silent after the first few notes.

-Kally

This theater's definitely interesting. They're partaking in a New Works Program where new shows are being developed constantly.

"Pump Up the Volume" is a rock theater show adapted from the movie with the same title. Great singing and covers a sensitive topic relatable for youth everywhere.

JERRY JERRY JERRY JERRY

We've all probably seen the TV series in one way or another. The distinctive chant is too memorable and the people's stories are so strange that we have to keep watching. The Balagan Theater's fourth show is Jerry Springer the Opera.

Jerry Springer and opera at first seemed a bit contradictory. I couldn't quite imagine heckling and fist fights to the sound of an orchestra. When Jerry Speinger emerged sporting a bow tie and sorrounded by a chorus, the show still wasn't screaming beer and riotous crowds. The lyrics are what reveal the show's genius satire. The tune may sound like a traditional broadway hit, but the content is anything but classical. Jerry Springer is Rent (in-your-face rock music) and The Book of Mormon's (satire) very lovable, if slightly disfunctional child. I can't wait to see it all grown up later this season.

-Kally P.

When I got here, the line went beyond the corner of the street. Moore Theater is packed today! The theater's absolutely beautiful and I'm so excited for the event to start.

Balagan Theatre, TeenTix partner and all-around awesome organization, is throwing a Preview Party for their 2013-14 season-- and they invited 5 members of our TeenTix Press Corps to attend! It's gonna feature a ton of performances by insanely talented folks like Jinkx Monsoon, winner of Season 5 of RuPaul's Drag Race, Alice Ripley, star of Next to Normal on B'way and Tony Award Winning Actress, as well as two other Broadway beauties, Kendra Kassebaum and Louis Hobson!

Sounds super great, right? Oh, wait, we forgot to mention: we are handing over the reins of our entire social media presence to those TeenTix Press Corps members. Yeah, you read that right. That means that starting at 7:30 tonight, June 10th, every post on our Facebook, Twitter, and Blog will be from teens, just like YOU.

PNB is closing out another season and by the looks of Director’s Choice they are quite intent on going out with a bang—a big, Balanchine-y, world-premiere-y bang. If you haven’t made it down to McCaw Hall to see Director’s Choice in years past, this is a good year to do it. The annual show of assorted pieces selected by PNB’s Artistic Director, Peter Boal, can range from feeling like Ballet Trail Mix—light, snacky, and a mix of flavors—to feeling like Very Serious Ballet With Capital Letters, Please Sit Up Straight. This year, though, PNB hits the nail on the head and has put together a show where you can feast your eyes and marvel at the crazy, beautiful things that a dancer can do.

The evening starts with Agon, a 1957 piece by American ballet great George Balanchine. As one might hope at a ballet show, it’s the dancing that’s impressive in Agon. The dancers move in strict Balanchine symmetry all over the stage—except when they don’t. The graceful, rigid ballet you’re used to suddenly becomes deliberately awkward. Limbs swing around like open doors, and the graceful music you were expecting becomes jarring and grating. As a non-old person, I can certify that the awkwardness here is the same awkwardness you felt/will feel in sophomore year of high school or at most of prom. What’s cool, though, is that the unexpected awkwardness forces you to actually focus on what the dancers are doing; when you appreciate the strength and the power there, that’s when the ballet becomes really impressive.

The blossoming musical era of Greenwich Village in the 1960s and '70s is a time long gone, before music was consumed largely by auto-tune and haphazardly recycled lyrics. Told through a series of interviews, photos, music clips, archival footage, and strung together by the narration of Susan Sarandon, in the documentary Greenwich Village: The Music That Defined a Generation, Greenwich Village’s past coalesces into a story of a time where youth and those who deviated from the mainstream could unite because they truly believed that they could change the world through a passion for music.

The film is presented like a series of vignettes interspersed with a mishmash of photos, videos, and music. It captures the feeling of the era and also allows the audience to experience the individual stories as told by musicians such as Pete Seeger, Judy Collins, and Oscar Brand. The grainy music videos are themselves a testament to the musical energy of the 20th century—the songs are performed with vivacity, the strings attacked with such ferocity that they produce a soul-shaking cacophony of sounds, yet are beautiful at the same time. In a way, the film romanticizes the decade, not often referring to important political issues or cultural changes the young musicians of Greenwich Village may have influenced, but focusing more on the nostalgic undertones.

Would you risk your life and freedom for a $100 bill? Probably not, but that is exactly what Victor, a 17-year old wheelbarrow porter in a busy Paraguayan market, does in the film 7 Cajas, or 7 Boxes. An entertaining comedy-thriller, 7 Boxes is well worth a watch. This South American film is a refreshing change of scenery and pace from typical thrillers.

The suspenseful mystery of the boxes’ contents consistently captures the audience’s attention while not slipping into an overly serious narrative. Instead, the film is a witty mix of miscommunications and dramatic irony that certainly provide an artistic escape from cookie-cutter Hollywood action films with predictable plotlines.

Ali is a grocery bagger who lives with her mother. She sells stolen booze to fat kids. Her best friend claims to have a gorgeous spouse from India. She is afraid of driving cars and falling in love with boys.

In other words, she is the average teenage girl. For those who watch Arrested Development, Ali is a lot like Maeby Bluth: often in rebellion simply for the sake of revolt. When fellow bagger and love interest Julio comes on the scene, she has to deal with all the classic dilemmas of young romance. The story is simple, but the script is witty enough to make the ride worthwhile.