New season boasts global array of superstars, emerging artists

By Cynthia Lee

After months of globetrotting from art festival to festival to sign up the “absolutely best work out in the world right now,” UCLA Live’s irrepressible impresario, David Sefton, declared himself pleased as he spoke to nearly 500 loyal subscribers, donors, supporters and media invited to his season preview party June 4 at Royce Hall.

Well, not just pleased, but “really, really, really … happy to get my season, but then,” said Sefton cockily, champagne glass in hand, “that’s why I got this job.”

For the last seven seasons, Sefton has also been making L.A. audiences happy by managing to craft each year an international, one-of-a-kind lineup of major superstars and emerging artists that has justifiably earned UCLA Live a reputation as “the region’s most multicultural arts institution” according to the Financial Times.

For the nine months running from Oct. 1 to June 20, 2009, a dizzying array of 51 boundary-breaking artists and performance groups are coming to campus from Argentina, Serbia, Ireland, China, Iran and other points beyond, many of them presenting work that has never been seen before on the West Coast or in the nation. For example, Sefton explained, five of the six productions in the Theatre Festival have never before been seen in the United States, and four are entirely exclusive to UCLA Live.

The cultural riches will span everything from organ music and spoken word to dance, theater and classical music.

The success of Sefton’s International Theatre Festival is especially sweet, he said, because there were plenty of naysayers six years ago who declared there was no audience for the kind of work from foreign lands that Sefton wanted to present.

“The Theatre Festival was definitely my baby, and I’m really pleased with how it’s being taken on by this community,” he said. While there’s a loyal audience out there for all the innovative programming UCLA Live has done, “I feel like for the theater festival, we created this audience.”

Last October, when UCLA Live snagged Ian McKellen and the Royal Shakespeare Company (RSC) in productions of “King Lear” and “The Seagull,” all the tickets were snapped up for the entire run. That’s when ticket prices for “Lear” hit the stratosphere on major online ticket services, commanding as much as $1,700 for a single orchestra seat.

“We notched it up with the RSC last year,” Sefton said. This year he’s aimed even higher with a number of international superstars. There is, for example, the U.S. debut of Australian-born writer-director Barrie Kosky in his powerful adaptation of Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Tell-Tale Heart.” “Barrie Kosky is one of the most sought-after opera directors on the planet,” Sefton enthused. “He’s never been to the United States.”

With visionary artistry, Kosky has transformed Poe’s macabre tale of murder and grisly retribution into a haunting theatrical and musical experience, relying on a riveting solo performance by Austrian actor/singer Martin Niedemair, a simple stage set, stark lighting and music that will be performed live by Kosky in the orchestra pit.

Coming back for only the second time to the U.S. and UCLA is Berlin’s Volksbühne Rosa-Luxemburg-Platz to do “Ivanov” (in German with English supertitles) by Anton Chekhov. “I’m so happy this is coming. I’m deeply grateful to the Goethe-Institute, and I really can’t tell you – just come.” Sefton gushed.

Another coup for next season is the rare appearance of two Pulitzer Prize-winning literary icons Edward Albee and John Updike, in two separate “Spoken Word” events. Albee will discuss the power of the arts as a catalyst for change, censorship of the arts, government repression and cultural literacy. Poet, novelist and critic, Updike will be coming to Royce Hall on the heels of the release of his latest book, “The Widows of Eastwick,” a sequel to his 1984 blockbuster novel, “The Witches of Eastwick.”

The diverse and dynamic global array of artists and performances for next season includes pianist Lang Lang; Ballet Preljocaj; Choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui’s new work, “Myth;” the Global Drum Project with Grateful Dead drummer Mickey Hart; the Kronos Quartet; Jackson Browne, Ricky Jay, Jennifer Warnes, David Lindley and many more artists celebrating the 50th anniversary of Santa Monica’s McCabe’s Guitar Shop; Branford Marsalis, Linda Ronstadt with Mariachi Los Camperos de Nati Cano; the Munich Symphony Orchestra; and UCLA’s own David Roussève, professor of world arts and cultures, with his dance company.

For details and a calendar of events, go to www.uclalive.org. Single ticket sales go on sale July 23.