Shakespeare on Stratford to return to Ditmas Park
BY BEN VERDE
A Ditmas Park side street
will come alive with music
and poetry for the fi rst time in
two years this weekend.
Shakespeare on Stratford
will return to Stratford Road
on April 24, marking Brave
New World Repertory Theatre’s
fi rst in-person performance
since the coronavirus
shuttered performance venues
last March.
“It’s beyond thrilling,” said
artistic director Claire Beckman.
“I’ve been looking forward
to this since it was canceled
last April.”
The open-air performance
has taken place for years on
Stratford Road — named for
the bard’s birthplace of Stratford
upon-Avon in the United
Kingdom — where thespians
take advantage of the neighborhood’s
sizable porches and
tree-lined streets to mark
Shakespeare’s birth month of
THEATER
Shakespeare on Stratford
Spring Festival, April 24 at
3:30 pm — 5:30 pm on Stratford
Place and Matthews Court in
Ditmas Park. Reservations at
bravenewworldrep.org.
April.
COURIER L 36 IFE, APRIL 23-29, 2021
Road between Slocum
To simplify things and
comply with Centers for Disease
Control guidance, this
year’s spectacle will consist
of compact 20-minute bursts,
featuring sonnets, madrigals,
and a culminating musical
performance, said Beckman.
A total of 19 costumed
singers, actors, and dancers
will be stationed along eight
porches, while attendees are
guided in spaced out groups
from deck to deck to see performers
dance, and hear segments
of the playwright’s sonnets
and madrigals — musical
compositions sung by several
voices — as well as an instrumental
performance by Jennifer
Milich and The Lonesome
Sea, who will perform the traditional
piece, “The Cuckoo.”
“Spring is a huge part of
the sonnets, the theme of love
and rebirth and hope,” said
Beckman, who is co-directing
the performance alongside
Nancy Shankman and Sheila
Anozier, who are directing
the vocal and dance components,
respectively. “I think
this year it’s something much
deeper for all of us, it’s a very
hopeful time.”
The dance component features
a section composed by
Anozier, which starts out as
a traditional piece with renaissance
era undertones before
evolving into an energetic
fi nale that takes cues from
Afro-Haitian dances.
“It really just explodes with
a solo that’s just fabulous,”
said Beckman.
The performance is among
the fi rst to take advantage of
warmer temperatures as New
York inches toward a postpandemic
future, and theaters
plan for reopening. In the
meantime, Brave New World
has found itself uniquely positioned
for pandemic performances,
having long staged
outdoor productions.
“I do feel that our theater
company is uniquely situated
and qualifi ed for this sort of
thing because we’ve always
done site specifi c theatre, this
is our shtick,” said Beckman.
“To be one of the fi rst live performances
happening in the
city is a real honor, and really
exciting.”
BY BEN VERDE
A new record store in Industry
City promises to be a
haven for crate-digging Brooklynites.
HiFi Provisions, a passion
project from collector Matthew
Coluccio, opens its doors
in Industry City to wax-spinners
this week — making the
owner’s hobby offi cial, after 10
years of obsessive collecting.
“It was kind of a hobby
gone awry,” said Coluccio.
“Records are kind of like
cockroaches, more and more
of them just keep showing
up.”
Throughout his years of
collecting, Coluccio often sold
records and stereo equipment
at the yearly Carroll Park fl ea
market in Carroll Gardens,
but never had plans to open
up a brick-and-mortar store.
Yet, after a conversation at a
birthday party with an Industry
City executive, he decided
SHOPPING
to turn his side project into a
full-blown business.
Now, he’s set up a space in
the sprawling waterfront complex
and fi lled with records
and other collectibles, including
objects like a vintage fl yfi
shing rod and piles of old stereo
equipment.
The collector says he envisions
the shop fi lling to the
brim with records and other
items, creating a space where
collectors can dig for hours in
hopes of fi nding a hidden gem.
“I want this place to be
fl oor-to-ceiling records everywhere,”
he said. “I want records
to be everywhere so people
have that feeling like ‘I’m
going to fi nd a gem here somewhere.’”
Coluccio, who plans to continue
working in the advertising
and branding industry
during the week while
operating the shop Thursday
through Sunday, doesn’t fi t
the traditional mold of a record
store owner — as he lacks
an encyclopedic knowledge of
various studio musicians and
obscure recordings. Still, he
comes to the role as a conservator
of the physical records
themselves, and the personal
histories they carry over from
their former owners.
“I just love records, the
physical item, how they play
music, how they sound in the
stereos and how they work,
and how my brain can kind
of wrap around how they operate,”
he said. “I’m more of a
conservator of these things.”
He cites a recent purchase
he made of a record collection
of a man who recently
passed away which had been
gathering dust in a basement
for years. Among the records
were rock band posters,
newspaper clippings detailing
rock concerts, and correspondence
with the fan clubs
of bands like The Who and
Van Halen.
Looking through the records,
he found markings in
some of the liner notes of Pink
Floyd’s “The Wall” where the
lyrics were printed indicating
that the owner of the records
had sat with the lyrics sheets
while listening to the record,
and made markings where
the lyrics were incorrectly
printed.
“I fi nd that stuff super interesting,
and I see that stuff
all the time,” he said. “I really
enjoy sharing that with people.”
The world’s a stage
New vinyl shop opens in Industry City
BROOKLYN
For the records
HiFi Provisions, 274 36th
Street near Second Avenue
in Sunset Park (718 635-1119)
hifi provisions.com. Open 11
am — 7 pm Thursday through
Saturday, 11 am — 7 pm on
Sunday.
The cast of the most recent Shakespeare on Stratford performance in
2019. Photo by Jody Christopherson
Matthew Coluccio, owner of HiFi Provisions in Industry City.
Photo by Ben Verde
/bravenewworldrep.org
/provisions.com