OnlineSeats offers premium unique Def Poetry Jam tickets. Def Poetry Jam tickets may be purchased online through our guaranteed safe and secure server. For faster service please order tickets through our web site .
It's a party with words! Russell Simmons "Def Poetry Jam" is a lyrical, smart, hilarious and searingly honest new show that has become a true phenomenon on Broadway. This TonyŽ Award-winning show features nine gifted, young poets speaking from the heart about love, dreams, self-respect, politics and everything that makes today's world a fascinating, complex place.
Shows like John Leguizamo's "Freak" have made the leap from Broadway to cable quite frequently in recent years, but Russell Simmons' "Def Poetry Jam on Broadway" reverses the trend. Featuring nine young poets, including New York slam scene regulars Beau Sia, Steve Colman and Mayda del Valle, this program serves up the sharp, the funny, the shocking and the moving in nine distinct voices. As Staceyann Chin says: "Imagination is the bridge between/ the things we know for sure/and the things we need to believe/ when our world becomes unbearable."
One might blanch at the number of pieces listed in the program for each of the two acts, but Stan Lathan's smart, dynamic direction, along with DJ Tendaji's grooves, makes the night fly by and injects it with just enough showmanship to tie it all together. Lathan and Simmons let these artists shine with all their idiosyncrasies rather than homogenize them for the Great White Way.
The two men behind Def Poetry Jam on Broadway are dedicated to proving that poetry needn't be ancient or stodgy, but that it can still prove driving and inspiring to the current generation.
To get this message out and get it living onstage (after successfully promoting the concept on HBO), they have assembled a troupe of nine slam poets and one DJ intent on bringing their energy and enthusiasm to live audiences under Lathan's direction. But is Broadway ready for them? And are they ready for Broadway?
The audience at the performance I attended represented a healthy cross-section of the city - older and younger men and women of every racial and ethnic background imaginable. Bringing such disparate groups of people together under one roof is a big part of what Def Poetry Jam on Broadway is about. Like the audience, the cast is as diverse as New York (and America) itself. Beau Sia, Black Ice, Staceyann Chin, Steve Colman, Mayda Del Valle, Georgia Me, Suheir Hammad, Lemon, and Poetri share some traits: they all hail from vastly different backgrounds, they all have unique voices, and they're all enormously talented poets, capable of bringing new artistic and linguistic perspectives to a wide array of topics.
Artist Biography - Def Poetry Jam
The poets' recitations do tend to revolve around certain themes. The first set of poems is about identity, the second series finds each of the cast members paying tribute to a specific person or influence, and the third tackles love. The individual subject matter and presentation of the poems can vary greatly. Georgia Me discusses the difficulties in loving yourself despite your appetite in her moving "Full Figured Woman," while later on, Poetri tips his hat to his lover and tormentor, "Krispy Kreme." The poems are equally as likely to be humorous ("Shine," Lemon's recounting of the black stoker who escaped from the Titanic) as they are thoughtful ("She," Steve Colman's recounting of the life of a female rapper that instructs more about dreams lost and abandoned than it does about rap), as timeless (Poetri's "Money") as they are timely (Suheir's "Mike Check," about the horrors she faces when passing through airports).
The poets all make sure you learn something and are entertained from beginning to end, so on one level (perhaps the most important one), they're a great success. But, there's an underlying sense of uneasiness about the proceedings. A couple of problems prevent the sparks onstage from starting a fire.
First, though the show's DJ (Tendaji), at the beginning of the show, promises the audience a party, the music he's onstage to provide is used sparingly, only a few minutes as a warm-up at the beginning, a little at the start of the second act, and then snippets of songs in between the poets' presentations. The music doesn't detract from the poets, but it seldom supports them; it's a lot of trouble for little payoff.
More significantly, the lack of this kind of stage experience on the part of the performers, especially in this type of venue, doesn't help. None of the poets have the traditional theatre charisma needed to prevent their talent and energy from evaporating in the theatre atmosphere; what might work on television does not necessarily work onstage. The show's amplification further distances the performers' bodies from their voices, not helping them establish the emotional connection with their audience they might in a more intimate venue; that the poets are reduced to standing onstage in front of Bruce Ryan's cheesily colorful collection of walls and neighborhood stoops strikes a similarly untrue chord.
More often than not, the show doesn't work as both theatre and slam poetry. But when three poems near the middle of the first act are recited by multiple poets, it becomes clear that the forum may be used as theatre-style communication. This combination and contrast of voices keeps things fresh and surprising, and it's difficult not to wish the poets would interact with each other more often. The second act's first poem is recited by all the show's women, but the only comparable moment comes at the end when the poets all gather onstage to listen to, and applaud, everyone else's work and then assemble in a line to recite "I Write America," separately and together, the contribution each makes - or does not make - to the country in which they live. This cacophony of voices is what makes Def Poetry Jam most exciting, and when it breaks free of its traditional mold to embrace true theatrical communication, it doesn't happen a moment too soon.
Def Poetry Jam tickets may be purchased by following any of the links on this page. Onlineseats.com is a licensed ticket broker and onlineseats.com supplies the highest quality Def Poetry Jam tickets at the best price on the internet. Onlineseats.com is 100% determined on providing customers with unsurpassed customer service and the highest quality Def Poetry Jam tickets available.
Miscellaneous Information:
Please consider onlineseats.com for all of your other entertainment needs. Onlineseats.com also offers tickets for all major Def Poetry Jam events across the country. In addition to all mlb baseball tickets, we also provide concert tickets, nfl football tickets, nba basketball tickets, ncaa basketball tickets, pga golf, major tennis events, major boxing event tickets, music concert tickets, comedy show tickets, and theater tickets including but not limited to las vegas shows and broadway shows. Call onlineseats.com today for your Def Poetry Jam tickets and tomorrow for any of your other entertainment needs! we strive to give our customers the finest in quality service while maintaining the most competitive pricing. If there is an event that is not listed, please do not hesitate to contact us for any special requests/orders. We aim to please!
Shipping:
When you find Def Poetry Jam tickets that you would like to purchase,they can be purchased online via our encrypted safe and secure server.Or if you prefer,you may order by phone.for faster service, please order online.your Def Poetry Jam order will be fulfilled within 6-24 hours.All tickets will be sent via federal express.The shipping address must be the same as your billing address at which you receive your credit card statement.If this is not the case, we will need to obtain a fax written authorization from you.If you would like to do this, you should contact one of our ticket representatives.
Availability:
The ticket inventory is updated on a hourly basis.However,if the tickets you wish to purchase are no longer available, we will contact you immediately and you will be given other options or you may choose an alternative set of tickets that we wil try to offer similar to the price range of your original order.
The poets' recitations do tend to revolve around certain themes. The first set of poems is about identity, the second series finds each of the cast members paying tribute to a specific person or influence, and the third tackles love. The individual subject matter and presentation of the poems can vary greatly. Georgia Me discusses the difficulties in loving yourself despite your appetite in her moving "Full Figured Woman," while later on, Poetri tips his hat to his lover and tormentor, "Krispy Kreme." The poems are equally as likely to be humorous ("Shine," Lemon's recounting of the black stoker who escaped from the Titanic) as they are thoughtful ("She," Steve Colman's recounting of the life of a female rapper that instructs more about dreams lost and abandoned than it does about rap), as timeless (Poetri's "Money") as they are timely (Suheir's "Mike Check," about the horrors she faces when passing through airports).
