The holiday weekend is not when most people think about theater-going, but I can recommend a good choice or two if you prefer being indoors to celebrating the kick-off of summer: The Cincinnati Playhouse's production of Marry Me a Little is a quick entertainment (only a bit more than an hour long), a good choice if you're busy with other things like Taste of Cincinnati.

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It is also, like that other Oktoberfest (which actually occurs in September), fun. No, it doesn’t have the World’s Largest Chicken Dance, but it may have come up with something even better in Contained: Gateway Arts Festival, which opened last Saturday and continues with limited hours through Nov. 3.

It was produced by the Requiem Project, which is managing and hoping to restore Over-the-Rhine’s Emery Theatre (where there is a Mike Disfarmer photo exhibit that I blogged about last week). Saturday’s opening was hampered by cold weather that kept attendance small on the grounds of Grammer’s in Over-the-Rhine. (Grammer’s is a place that’s probably seen quite a few Oktoberfests in its day.) But the weather didn’t dampen the creative imagination that went into the event.

Using 11 trailer-size steel shipping containers as gallery walls, artists displayed their photography and video-based work, some interactive, as visitors wandered in and out. The standards were quite high and one project — David Rosenthal’s “Everything at Home Depot (Series)’’ — struck me as outstanding.

Installed in vertical pieces on fiberboard along the interior sides of the container, the color heat-transfer prints set out to do what the title suggests. In this environment — with the container’s metal sides, the wood floor and glaring fluorescent lights – the whole project looked just right — a melding of the artistic and the industrial, the soulful and the soulless. If this is part of a larger series (as the title suggests), it deserves to be seen in total. But one hopes future showings will get an environment as cool as this.

In a corner of the grounds, behind one crate and out of direct view, a band played suitably spacey music. After awhile, musicians moved atop a crate to play music with a pronounced electronic component. Meanwhile, video projections were displayed high off the building’s sides — you could see the images when approaching the site and it was really exciting.

The whole festival, itself, worked as an art installation. It will be open again this Friday from 6-10 p.m. (it’s ideal at dark), 2-5 p.m. Saturday and Nov. 3 by appointment at info@emerytheatre.com. It’s definitely worth a visit, even if not that easy to get to.

Another show you need to see — partly because of its excellence and partly because it’s in a space rarely open to the public — is the Using Photography exhibit at downtown’s Michael Lowe Gallery. He is a private dealer, so it’s a treat to see his elegant, uncluttered two-floor gallery open to the public. Drawing on his own collection, he’s put together a show that works as both top-notch fine-art photography and as a historical exhibition.

In this case, the history that the show addresses is that of the conceptual/performance art world of the 1970s. Pivotal names in international contemporary art’s development are represented here — Marina Abramovic, Vito Acconci, Gerhard Richter, Michael Kelly, Ed Ruscha, Gilbert and George and many more.

With the richness of work represented, and it way it stretches our definition of photography and time-based art, it’s one of FotoFocus’ best shows. To just pick one piece, I was especially moved by Christian Boltanski’s five touched-up photographs comprising 1974’s “Anniversaire,” or “The Birthday.” I am used to the French artist’s solemn, sobering, heart-rending installations that use photography to remember the Holocaust. They are so strong you wonder if they must drain the artist of all joie de vivre. Yet here he is happy in this work, and the meaning of that happiness is revelatory if you know his history. Even if you don’t, it’s a generous and warm piece.

This show originally was going to be open just briefly, but Lowe has agreed to stay open noon-4 p.m. weekdays through the end of the month. His gallery is at 905 Vine St. Plan a downtown lunch trip around it.

Meanwhile, only up through this Thursday is Photogenus at the Reed Gallery inside University of Cincinnati’s College of Design, Art, Architecture & Planning. Put together by Jordan Tate, DAAP photography professor, and gallery director Aaron Cowan, this looks at how today’s international artists use photography in a digital age. 

It’s a nice companion to Lowe’s show, as one chronicles breakthroughs from the 1970s (some of which we’re still trying to understand) and one shows how today’s international artists are using photography to make new breakthroughs. Much of it is quite out-there and left me quizzical about individual work’s obscure intent and technique.  But some were very striking, like Anthony Lepore’s pairing of a photo (an archival ink print) of a salt field with a piece of carpet of roughly the same color.

I had written earlier about how eager I was to see Nancy Rexroth’s photographs at downtown’s YWCA Women’s Art Gallery as part of FotoFocus. The show consists of previously unprinted images from her influential Iowa project of the early 1970s — she used a toy camera to capture fleeting glimpses of everyday life in rural Ohio.

There was always the chance the black-and-white work had been left unprinted for a reason all these decades, but I’m happy to report it’s an excellent, evocative show — underscoring just how strong a body of work Iowa is. Besides the ghostly “Clara in the Closet, Carpenter, OH,” previously published in CityBeat, I also loved “House Vibration, Dayton, OH, 1976,” in which the blurry focus produces an unsteady image that makes one think an earthquake is occurring. It’s a great metaphor for the here-today-gone-tomorrow nature of life. This show will be up through Jan. 10 — Rexroth shares the space with Judi Parks and Jane Alden Stevens.

It's funny how one or two words can convey many different meanings. Take the word Mauritius. If you know your geography, it's an island in the Indian Ocean east of Africa. If you're a stamp collector, it's one of the first places in the world where postage stamps were issued — and it's where some of the rarest stamps originated, today worth millions of dollars.

If you're Cincinnati-born playwright Theresa Rebeck, it's an inspiration for an edgy comic drama about two half-sisters and some eager stamp experts fighting over a stamp collection. And if you're a theatergoer, Mauritius, the title of Rebeck's play, means you'll be lining up to see Ensemble Theatre's latest production. It's a great script, profane and funny, yet also insightful and sad about how human nature works — or doesn't.

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The Cincinnati Symphony Orchestra (CSO) launched its new seven-week initiative, “One City, One Symphony” earlier this month. The goal of the program is to get the CSO engaged with people of all walks of life through nine listening parties across the region. “One City, One Symphony” concludes with three concerts Nov. 15, 17 and 18 at Music Hall featuring A Survivor From Warsaw by Arnold Shoenburg and Beethoven’s Ninth Symphony. 

The Jewish Foundation of Cincinnati and The Carol Ann and Ralph V. Haile, Jr./U.S. Bank Foundation host the free listening parties across Greater Cincinnati and Northern Kentucky. These parties are a chance for the public to interact with CSO musicians and conductors while listening and discussing the music from Schoenburg and Beethoven.

“I already feel a strong connection with our audiences, the supportive community and of course the incredible musicians of the CSO, and I am looking forward to deepening this relationship in the coming months and years," Music Director Louis Langrée said in a press release.

If you haven’t attended a listening party yet, there are still several more chances to meet the players and discuss the music around town.

Tonight, Anderson High School welcomes CSO timpanist Patrick Schleker to host a listening party from 7-8:30 p.m.

To attend one of these performances or learn more about the CSO and One City, One Symphony, click here.

The rest of the listening parties are as scheduled:

Thursday, Nov. 1, 7-8:30 p.m. at the Xavier University’s Bellarmine Chapel. This performance is hosted by CSO violinist Sylvia Samis and XU Director of Interfaith Community Engagement Abie Ingber.

Thursday, Nov. 8, 6-7:30 p.m. at Coffee Emporium. Associate Conductor Robert Treviño hosts.

Tuesday, Nov. 13, 2-3:30 p.m. at Mayerson Jewish Community Center. Again hosted by Sylvia Samis and Abie Ingber.

Last night I attended Cincinnati Shakespeare Company’s production of The Grapes of Wrath, which opened a week ago and runs through April 29. It’s a powerful theatrical interpretation of John Steinbeck’s grim recounting of a Depression-era family of Oklahoma sharecroppers driven from home by ecological and economic disasters. They make an arduous trek to California in vain hope of employment and a better life. The show calls for an ensemble cast, and CSC uses more than 20 actors to pull it off convincingly. The first act revolves around the Joads’ agonizing trip in a dilapidated truck; the second act portrays the dismal conditions of unemployment and mistreatment once they arrive. It’s a sad reflection of life in the 1930s, as well as a powerful reminder that life has not improved for many Americans some 80 years later. The production is made all the more relevant by folksy musical interludes performed live by some of the actors. A downer of a story, but definitely worth seeing. Here's a link to my review. Box office: 513-381-2273, x1.

Know Theatre’s production of the recent off-Broadway and Broadway Rock musical hit, Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson, opened last Saturday. I haven’t seen it yet, but the production has a positive buzz. (It’s onstage through May 12.) Box office: 513-300-5669.

Thanks to spot-on casting of the four actors who bring Kim Rosenstock’s new play Tigers Be Still to life at the Cincinnati Playhouse, the show about people dealing with depression is charming, funny, optimistic and even heart-warming. It’s about a young woman with a recently earned degree in art therapy; she’s been down in the dumps about finding work, but not as much as her mom who’s gained weight and her sister who’s been dumped by her fiancé. She’s starting a new job thanks to her mom’s long-ago boyfriend, now a middle school principal. He has issues of his own — from a slacker son to anxiety about a tiger that’s escaped from the local zoo. Sound zany? Well, it is — as well as entertaining. The League of Cincinnati Theatres singled out this production’s sound design by Vincent Olivieri for an award. One panelist wrote, “On a very small stage, scenes took place in a school gym, drugstore, office, closet, outdoors and in the living spaces of two houses. Except for the main set, capturing the essence of these scenes was limited to a couple of props and pieces of furniture — and the sound!” Through April 15. Box office: 513-421-3888.

There’s nothing profound about The Addams Family, onstage at the Aronoff Center in downtown Cincinnati through a Sunday matinee. The touring musical is derived from a 1960s TV series (and subsequent movies), based on on droll, mordant cartoons by Charles Addams, originally in The New Yorker. The show is a faithful reproduction of a pop culture icon; in fact, it begins with the sprightly theme from the TV show, complete with finger-snaps. It has a silly story about willful love and romance, but the entertainment comes from seeing the familiar characters come to life. The new musical numbers are largely clever, and the cast — which includes 1999 CCM grad Sara Gettelfinger as Morticia — is top-notch. Here's a link to my recent review. Tickets: 800-982-2787.

Each week in Stage Door, Rick Pender offers theater tips for the weekend, often with a few pieces of theater news.

If you can get a ticket this weekend for Hair at UC's College-Conservatory of Music, that's the show to see this weekend. It's an intentional trip down memory lane — if your memory goes back 40 years. (The show that turned the world of Broadway upside down in the late 1960s is being presented as part of the celebration of the 40th anniversary of CCM's musical theater program.) If not, and you want a taste of what all the shouting was about in 1969, Corbett Auditorium is the place to be.

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I've been away for two weeks — including seeing some great theater in Denver — but it's good to be back in Cincinnati. There's lots of great theater going on for you to see. This is the final weekend for Ensemble Theatre's well-received production of August Wilson's Gem of the Ocean. (Read my review here.) A performance was added earlier this week to meet audience demand, but I suspect tickets are still scarce.

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The intense energy between Principal dancers Cervilio Amador and Janessa Touchet is so palpable you can feel it — even when their hands aren’t touching.

Their expressive duet in Heather Britt’s world premier “Opus 5.5” provided an inviting opening to Cincinnati Ballet’s annual Kaplan New Works season opener last Thursday evening.

The production offers a rare chance to see dance up close, as it takes place in the company’s home performance studio at the Cincinnati Ballet Center.

There’s nothing like watching live performance, but there’s something even more exciting and visceral about seeing the dancers glowing and their muscles flexing.

Full of emotion, Britt’s sweeping contemporary new work has the dancers really moving all over: across the stage in sculptural lifts, through the air in expansive leaps and extravagant extensions. But it’s really the rare moments of stillness and quiet that grab you and draw you in closer.

New Works’ stock in trade has always been pushing stylistic boundaries.

“It’s our R&D,” says Cincinnati Ballet CEO/Artistic Director Victoria Morgan. “We need to scare ourselves, to try things we’ve never done before.”

But this year is noteworthy for another reason: For the first time, all of the choreographers featured are female.

Dance-wise, the women also stand out in the spotlight this year more than usual. Though, as always, there are plenty of equally fine turns by the men as well.

Paige Cunningham Caldarella’s “Without Consideration,” the program’s most offbeat piece, presents a topsy-turvy look at social media and its pleasures and pitfalls.

Its five short sections comprise a modern dance piece cut with classical ballet. It’s by turns satirical, ominous and oddly compelling.

Clad in a lime green tee-shirt and a short, ruffled floral skirt, Corps de Ballet dancer Courtney Hellebuyck shines in her solo.

She attacks each movement with ferocious intensity. Her dramatic facial expressions and stage presence are spellbinding. She and the other four dancers appear equally comfortable switching between styles — instant, by instant — in this mash-up of ballet and modern. The women even manage to perform modern floor drops in pointe shoes.

A physical wall (think social media) covered in paper provides the backdrop and set piece. The dancers write on it, hurl themselves against it, and press into it. They connect and disconnect, or nearly connect with each other. But at times, they just miss, undulating away from each other. Individual gestures are repeated, such as one’s own hand suddenly turning the head and face away in a slo-mo sideways “slap.” It seems to suggest the struggle to turn one’s attention away from staying online all day.

Amy Seiwert, San Francisco-based Resident Choreographer for Smuin Ballet (where she was also a longtime dancer), has created a thoroughly delightful getaway world in her world premier modern ballet ,“Think of You Often.”

The weather is balmy. The light-colored clothing, designed by the Cincinnati Ballet Wardrobe Department, is carefree and casual. The women collectively become an ocean tide, even in their pointe shoes. Its feel-good soundtrack, music by the Swedish group Koop, delivers effusive swing and a touch of Latin flair.

Principal dancer Sarah Hairston warmly embraces her role, full of flirtation and feline sassiness. First two, then four men lift and sway her — and no doubt cater to her every need.

But don’t let the piece’s escapist playfulness belie its underlying choreographic sophistication. The partnering throughout is highly complex, original, and technically demanding.

In a most striking duet, Zach Grubbs and Jacqueline Damico make the most intricate sequences look as easy and natural as an ocean breeze.

Jessica Lang’s contemporary neoclassical work “La Belle Danse” (2007) presents a slightly quirky court dance of sorts. Set to a score of the likes of Handel and Mozart, it’s the sole work here that the Ballet has presented previously, in 2009.

It’s the most classical piece on the program — relatively speaking — yet unexpectedly it marks the only one where the women wear soft shoes.

Displaying a very different, more sacred type of passion in this role’s solo, Hairston demonstrates her versatility as  dancer, and a performer.

The large cast brims over with expressive dancing, filled with plenty of leaps, turns, waltzing… and conducting gestures.

Amador and Touchet rapid-fire their way through pirouettes and petit allegro galore. Although their style here sharply contrasts their opening duet, this superb pairing brings this production — one of the best New Works in recent years — full circle.

It's Free Dance Week at the Cincinnati Ballet. Get your groove on at The Otto M. Budig Academy in Over-the-Rhine or in Blue Ash. All classes are free: ballet, pointe, creative dance, jazz and Rhythm and Motion, a workout class.

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The beginning of this week was a slower pace for the World Choir Games in Cincinnati. At the halfway point, choirs visiting for the first week departed and new ones arrived, so there was very little activity on Monday. A festive, rambunctious parade from the Convention Center to Fountain Square too place 6 p.m. Tuesday, with dozens of choirs, many in traditional dress from their home countries and others in matching T-shirts that designated their team, nation and so on. Each choir was preceded by a WCG volunteer bearing their national flag, and the crowd — lined up five-to-six people deep along both sides of Fifth Street — cheered for each choir as strolled by. There were as many cameras in the parade as well among those watching: Everyone wanted to capture the fun to share later.

On Wednesday evening at the Aronoff Center, I went to the "Music of the World" Celebration Concert. Since two of the four performing groups were from the U.S., I guess this title referred more to the music than their origins, but each had something to offer. The opening set was by the Collegiate Honor Choir from regional universities near or in Cincinnati: CCM at UC, Xavier, Capital University (Columbus), Wright State (Dayton), Miami and NKU. They sang as a large ensemble at first, conducted by Earl Rivers from CCM (also one of the WCG's artistic directors) and then several groups were broken out for specific numbers, led by their own director. The most interesting number was "The Storm is Passing Over" by the singers from NKU: Amid some angsty singing, several performers spoke out lines of dismay about contemporary life or laughed maniacally. After several minutes of that, once a few singers collapsed from exhaustion, a spiritually inspired passage resolved the piece on an air of hope for the future. This segment also included a brief film tribute to esteemed American composer Morten Lauridsen (the full film is on view at various times at the Downtown Public Library during the WCG) and then a performance of two of his pieces, "Dirait-on" and "Sure on this Shining Morning," with Lauridsen accompanying the singers on the piano.

Up next was the University of Newcastle (Australia) Chamber Choir with 40 singers, male and female. I especially enjoyed their second number, "Birds," based on three traditional Australian Bush songs. It was full of whistles and shrieks, as well as choreographed hand motions that simulated the movements of various kinds of birds. It was an unusually delightful piece. More delight came from the Gema Sangkakala Choir from Manado, Indonesia. Another mixed group of approximately 40, its men were attired in black jackets with symmetrical yellow patterns (eight leaves about the size of a human hand is my best guess since my seat was far back from the stage) and the women wearing beautiful sparkling traditional dresses accented with scarves of primary colors tied around their waists. The group sang four numbers with lots of dance motion; in fact, each number concluded with a held pose — arms upraised, for instance — that became the initial pose of the following song. Their very coherent program was full of humor: One song appeared to be a flirtatious exchange between the men and the women, while another was a tongue-twisting piece full of what were probably nonsense works (my notes say "packa-packa-dum-dee-dum," a phrase and others like it were repeated at high speed). Neither the program, the emcees nor the directors offer any insights about the songs, so audiences are left to figure them out — I wish I'd known more about the substance of this Indonesian group's performance, but it was delightful from start to finish.

The final group was the Indianapolis Children's Choir, about 100 young adolescent girls and boys. They were wonderfully trained, and their program was a perfect selection of material for young performers, not too challenging but very appropriate for youngsters full of energy and expression. "Tell My Ma" (accompanied by an adult playing the spoons!) was a clever song about competition between groups of boys and girls; "Happy Together" (a Pop tune from the 1960s by the Turtles) was a great number for the kids to cut loose with their own swaying body and hand motions, not synchronized but each doing something that expressed their joy at young love. That approach typified this group's performance — carefully chosen numbers that fit the youthful nature of the performers. Everyone left the Aronoff smiling!

I have a "day pass" for Thursday, so I'll be wandering in and out of activities all over downtown. I'll report on that on Friday morning. There's only a few days left — WCG ends on Saturday evening. If you haven't attended anything yet, there's still time.