ON Culture | All ‘Emma’ All the Time + Broadway Divas, Artist Talks, and More

This edition of ON Culture was originally emailed to subscribers on July 29, 2023. To receive Leslie Dinaberg’s arts newsletter in your inbox on Fridays, sign up at independent.com/newsletters.

ON the Stage (Theater, Music, and More)

An incredible abundance of fabulous cultural events are coming our way, with Ensemble Theatre Company, UCSB Arts & Lectures, Theatre Group at SBCC, CAMA, Opera Santa Barbara (their 30th anniversary season features Carmen October 1; Il trovatore February 11, 2024; and Zorro April 21, 2024), and others announcing their upcoming seasons. 

You can click the links for many more details, but some of the theatrical things I’m particularly excited about are ETC’s new romantic comedy Alice, Formerly of Wonderland (May 30–June 16, 2024), Broadway divas Kristin Chenoweth (Nov. 5) and Audra McDonald (Nov. 30) courtesy of UCSB Arts & Lectures, the Theatre Group at SBCC’s adaptation of Emma (October 13-28) and, because for those of us who truly love Jane Austen and can never get enough of her, I’m also looking forward to seeing PCPA’s production of yet a different adaptation of Emma at the Solvang Festival Theater next week (that show runs through July 2). 

ON The Page

I really do LOVE Jane Austen. I’m currently reading Unmarriageable by Soniah Kamal, which is a retelling of Pride and Prejudice that takes place in the early 2000s in a Muslim community in Pakistan. And I would also highly recommend the entire Rajes series by Sonali Dev, whose four novels — Pride, Prejudice, and Other Flavors; Recipe for Persuasion; Incense and Sensibility; and The Emma Project — loosely follow their Austen namesakes but are set in the fascinating contemporary world of an immigrant Indian family descended from royalty, who have built their lives in San Francisco.