Performing Arts

Follows a class of six- and seven-year-olds through a six-week summer drama school at Philadelphia's Freedom Theatre, where intensive theater training provides the youngsters with valuable lessons of self-discipline and self-confidence.

A wacky, free-wheeling satire which examines key moments in the history of nuclear power, from the flowering of medieval alchemy in the 16th century, to the development of the atomic bomb, Hiroshima and its aftermath, and the cultural and political fallout of the Cold War '50s.

Robert Wilson is internationally regarded as one of the most significant and innovative theater artists working today. This behind-the-scenes video, drawing on rehearsal and performance footage, reveals how Wilson created his unique one-man performance of Hamlet and captures the rich texture of Wilson's multi-dimensional theatrical style.

The Bread and Puppet Theater has become famous in America over the last thirty years for its street theater and political satire utilizing giant papier-mâche puppets, masks and twelve foot high stilt walkers.

Portrays the life and career of this Italian husband and wife duo of actors and playwrights, who are best known for their satirical and politically radical theater presentations.

Examines the Communist Party's rigorously enforced art policies during China's Cultural Revolution from 1966-1976, when pictorial artists were given strict aesthetic guidelines for the production of works designed to promote the ideology and imagery of Mao Tse- tung's illusory new society.

Offers a fascinating overview of artistic activity in Croatia during the recent war in the former Yugoslavia, revealing the diversity and vitality of its artists as well as how their work was profoundly influenced by the conflict.

This music and dance spectacular, sung and danced by members of the award-winning Beija Flor Samba School and photographed during the Carnival in Rio de Janeiro, dramatizes the legend of genesis according to Yoruba mythology.

This cinema-verite documentary explores the realities of life as a classical musician through the story of Hexagon, a newly-formed chamber ensemble. The documentary chronicles their challenging first year and a half, from the group's seemingly casual first rehearsal to its high-pressure launching into the mainstream of the classical music scene.

Chronicles the 1987 U.S. tour by the National Symphony Orchestra of the People's Republic of China, including interviews with conductor Zuohuang Chen, a survivor of the Cultural Revolution who studied music in the U.S., Chen's mentor, Seiji Ozawa, director of the Boston Symphony, plus stirring performances of both Western and Chinese music.

This behind-the-scenes documentary chronicles the collaborative efforts of young composer Peter Lieberson, pianist Peter Serkin, and conductor Seiji Ozawa as they shape Lieberson's first orchestral piece for debut by the Boston Symphony Orchestra.

This contemporary portrait of folkloric traditions in Cuba, focusing on the everyday life of musicians and dancers.

This concert, performed at the elegant 18th-century Dublin residence of the American Ambassador to Ireland, Jean Kennedy Smith, features tenor James W. Flannery, accompanied by pianist William Ransom and harpist Cormac DeBarra, who perform a wide range of Irish favorites, including traditional melodies.

This video follows the world-famous Chicago Children's Choir on their 1996 tour of South Africa and shows how music can convey a message of peace.

This video, which documents one of the oldest cultural festivals in the Western Hemisphere, celebrates the vitality of calypso music today on the island of Barbados.

This video portrays the big-band era in American entertainment, profiling the Lee Williams Band which, from 1938 to 1952, barnstormed throughout the Midwest, bringing Swing music to rural America.

Under the stage name "Le Petomane," Joseph Pujol was the toast of turn-of-the-century Paris. Audiences at the Moulin Rouge where first shocked, then won over, by this tall, mustachioed man in a red velvet suit...a suite with a hole cut in the derriere to release his remarkable talent.

A high school teacher and one of his students don Elizabethan garb and travel back in time to London in 1609 to have lunch with William Shakespeare at the Mermaid Tavern.

Celebrates the traditional art of storytelling through profiles of three storytellers--Judith Black, whose stories explore the Jewish immigrant experience; Michael Cotter, a Minnesota farmer whose stories focus on the extraordinary qualities of ordinary people; and Rex Ellis, whose stories deal with the historical period of enslavement of Afro- Americans.

This video profiles five contemporary American performance poets who have taken their poetry and its celebration of language and creative expression into new public venues.