The Times It Is A-Pannin’

Judging from Ben Brantley’s NY Times review today of the Dylan/Tharp “The Times They Are A-Changin’,” I think CultureGrrl has found a new calling: reviewing Broadway musicals on the basis of their advance radio ads. (For an excerpt from Terry Teachout‘s similarly dismissive Wall Street Journal review, go here.)
It looks like the best Dylan show in New York is still at the Morgan. And, running through Jan. 6, it should still be open after the Broadway show folds.
Meanwhile, when it comes to my recent appraisal of the Museum of Modern Art’s Brice Marden show, Roberta Smith, in today’s NY Times, agrees with Lauren Hutton, not CultureGrrl. She calls the show “a quietly magnificent retrospective.” But she never mentions anything about the drawings, other than to say that they are “a medium integral to Mr. Marden’s development.” The extensive drawings display was a major (and to me, superior) part of the show. Did Roberta not find her way down to the drawing galleries on the third floor?
And if not, does that not say something about MoMA’s post-expansion penchant for inconveniently dividing up major shows between distant parts of the building? What happened to the museum’s previously stated intention to integrate media in the new facility, so that works on paper would not seem quite so marginalized?