Top 10 NJ Arts Events of Week: Bryan Adams + Dave Stewart, ‘A Trojan Woman’ etc.

by JAY LUSTIG
bryan adams nj preview

BRYAN ADAMS

Here is a roundup of arts events taking place around New Jersey, through March 20.

MUSIC

Bryan Adams — whose 22 Top 40 hits in the ’80s and ’90s included “Cuts Like a Knife,” “Summer of ’69,” “Run to You” and his duet with Tina Turner, “It’s Only Love” — will bring his So Happy It Hurts Tour, named after his upbeat 2022 album, to The Prudential Center in Newark, March 16 at 7:30 p.m.

Dave Stewart of Eurythmics will open the show under the name Dave Stewart’s Eurythmics Songbook, which he explains in the video below.

In a show that is being billed as his final Atlantic City appearance — and that will take place six days before the appearance that is being described as his final concert, ever, March 22 at The Mohegan Sun in Uncasville, Connecticut — Tony Orlando will perform at The Superstar Theater at Resorts in Atlantic City, March 16 at 8 p.m.

Orlando was most popular during the ’70s, when he worked with the backing vocalists Telma Hopkins and Joyce Vincent Wilson as Tony Orlando & Dawn. Under the group name Dawn, Dawn featuring Tony Orlando, or Tony Orlando & Dawn, Orlando had six Top 10 hits from 1970 to 1975: “Tie a Yellow Ribbon Round the Ole Oak Tree,” “Knock Three Times,” “Say, Has Anybody Seen My Sweet Gypsy Rose,” “Candida,” “He Don’t Love You (Like I Love You)” and “Steppin’ Out (Gonna Boogie Tonight).”

STANLEY JORDAN

The virtuosic, Grammy-nominated jazz guitarist Stanley Jordan‘s 7:30 p.m. March 16 concert at The Lizzie Rose Music Room in Tuckerton has sold out, but he has added a rare matinee show, at 3 p.m., as well.

Jeremy Dutcher — a Candian singer, pianist and composer who combines elements of contemporary music, classical music and the music of his Indigenous Canadian ancestors — will perform at The Berlind Theater at The McCarter Theatre Center in Princeton, March 16 at 8 p.m. Dutcher’s 2018 debut album, Wolastoqiyik Lintuwakonawa, won Canada’s Polaris Music Prize as well as a Juno Award for Indigenous Music Album of the Year. His second album, Motewolonuwok, came out last year.

Guitarist Reeves Gabrels — who worked with David Bowie from 1987 to 1999 as a member of the band Tin Machine and on solo Bowie projects, and is now a member of The Cure — will bring his improvisational trio Doom Dogs, also featuring drummer Jonathan Kane and bassist Jair-Rohm Parker Wells, to Debonair Music Hall in Teaneck, March 15 at 8 p.m.

Guitarist and composer Reg Bloor — who played in and served as concertmaster in her late husband Glenn Branca’s experimental Glenn Branca Ensemble — will open.

RICK WAKEMAN

Keyboard master Rick Wakeman is best known as a member of Yes during its period of greatest popularity, in the ’70s, though he has been involved in a number of other notable musical projects, as both a solo artist and a supporting musician, since 1969, when he played on David Bowie’s “Space Oddity.” He is bringing what he is calling his Final Solo Tour to The Wellmont Theater in Montclair, March 20 at 8 p.m.; The Scottish Rite Auditorium in Collingswood, March 23 at 8 p.m.; and The Vogel at The Count Basie Center for the Arts in Red Bank, March 26 at 7:30 p.m.

THEATER

Luna Stage in West Orange will present the United States premiere of “A Trojan Woman” — a one-woman adaptation of Euripides’ “The Trojan Women,” written by Sara Farrington and starring Drita Kabashi — March 15-18 and 21-24. Farrington has said that “The Trojan Women” was “the first ever anti-war play. Everything Euripides was protesting in 415 BC still needs protesting now.”

DANCE

The innovative, Chicago-based Trinity Irish Dance Company will perform at Prudential Hall at NJPAC in Newark at 7 p.m. March 17 — yes, that’s St. Patrick’s Day. The show will include two new works. “Taking the Mick” (co-choreographed by Trinity’s founding artistic director Mark Howard and associate artistic director Chelsea Hoy) has been described as “drawing upon the American Vaudeville era and its place in Irish dance history.” “P.O.V.” (choreographed by Harrison McEldowney) uses a camera attached to a dancer to show his point of view

Raquel Castro and Ben Affleck in “Jersey Girl.”

FILM

Kevin Smith will present an extended cut of the 2004 comedy-drama “Jersey Girl,” which he wrote and directed, at his SModcastle Cinemas in Atlantic Highlands, March 17 at 3 p.m., and participate in a question-and-answer session after the screening.

The film co-stars Ben Affleck and Raquel Castro — as a widower and his daughter — plus Liv Tyler, George Carlin, Jennifer Lopez and Jason Biggs.

WORDS

The Black Box Performing Arts Center will present “An Evening With Paul Schrader,” March 17 at 7:30 p.m. at Debonair Music Hall in Teaneck. Schrader is a playwright — Black Box PAC presented a production of his “The Cleopatra Club” in 2022 — though he is better known for his work in film, with his many credits including writing the screenplays for “Taxi Driver” and “The Last Temptation of Christ,” co-writing the screenplay for “Raging Bull,” and directing and writing (or co-writing) the screenplays for “Blue Collar,” “First Reformed,” “Affliction,” “American Gigolo” and “Hardcore.”

REVIEWS

“The Club,” presented by George Street Playhouse at New Brunswick Performing Arts Center. (Through March 17)

“Esspy” at New Jersey Repertory Company, Long Branch. (Through March 17)

“Dreamgirls” at McCarter Theatre Center, Princeton. (Through March 24)

“A Little Night Music,” presented by American Theater Group at Hamilton Stage at Union County Performing Arts Center, Rahway. (Through March 24)

“Sunday in the Park With George” at Axelrod Performing Arts Center, Deal. (Through March 24)

Edward Fausty: Refuge at Watchung Arts Center. (Through March 24)

“Rabbit Summer” at Mile Square Theatre, Hoboken. (Through March 30)

“Caroline Burton: Way Finding” at New Jersey State Museum, Trenton. (Through March 31)

“Night Forms” at Grounds for Sculpture, Hamilton. (Through April 7)

“George Inness: Visionary Landscapes” at Montclair Art Museum. (Through June 30)

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