Archives for December 2010

“Happy, happy Christmas, that can win us back to the delusions of our childish days; that can recall to the old man the pleasures of his youth; that can transport the sailor and the traveller, thousands of miles away, back to his own fire-side and his quiet home!”
Charles Dickens, The Pickwick Papers

Here’s my list of recommended Broadway, off-Broadway, and out-of-town shows, updated weekly. In all cases, I gave these shows favorable reviews (if sometimes qualifiedly so) in The Wall Street Journal when they opened. For more information, click on the title.

Warning: Broadway shows marked with an asterisk were sold out, or nearly so, last week.

BROADWAY:

• La Cage aux Folles (musical, PG-13, adult subject matter, reviewed here)

• Driving Miss Daisy * (drama, G, possible for smart children, closes Apr. 9, reviewed here)

• Lombardi (drama, G/PG-13, a modest amount of adult subject matter, reviewed here)

• The Merchant of Venice * (Shakespeare, PG-13, adult subject matter, on hiatus Jan. 9-31, then extended through Feb. 20, reviewed here)

• Million Dollar Quartet (jukebox musical, G, reviewed here)

OFF BROADWAY:

• Alfred Hitchcock’s The 39 Steps (comedy, G, suitable for bright children, closes Jan. 16, original Broadway production reviewed here)

• Angels in America (drama, PG-13/R, adult subject matter, extended through Mar. 27, reviewed here)

• Avenue Q (musical, R, adult subject matter and one show-stopping scene of puppet-on-puppet sex, reviewed here)

• The Fantasticks (musical, G, suitable for children capable of enjoying a love story, reviewed here)

• Play Dead (theatrical spook show, PG-13, utterly unsuitable for easily frightened children or adults, reviewed here)

CLOSING SOON ON BROADWAY:

• A Free Man of Color (epic comedy, PG-13/R, adult subject matter, closes Jan. 9, reviewed here)

CLOSING NEXT WEEK IN MADISON, N.J.:

• I Capture the Castle (comedy, G/PG-13, suitable for unusually precocious children, closes Jan. 2, reviewed here)

CLOSING NEXT WEEK IN WASHINGTON, D.C.:

• Oklahoma! (musical, G, suitable for children, closes Dec. 30, reviewed here)

CLOSING NEXT WEEK ON BROADWAY:

• Bloody Bloody Andrew Jackson (musical, PG-13/R, closes Jan. 2, reviewed here)

• Fela! (musical, PG-13, adult subject matter, closes Jan. 2, reviewed here)

• The Pee-wee Herman Show (comic revue, G/PG-13, heavily larded with double entendres, closes Jan. 2, reviewed here)

Mister Magoo’s Christmas Carol, directed by Abe Levitow with songs by Jule Styne and Bob Merrill, originally shown on NBC in 1962:

“I believe in the sweet spot, soft-core pornography, opening your presents Christmas morning rather than Christmas eve, and I believe in long, slow, deep, soft, wet kisses that last three days.”
Ron Shelton, screenplay for Bull Durham

The Choir of King’s College, Cambridge, sings Peter Warlock’s “Balulalow”:

(This is the latest in a weekly series of arts-related videos that appear in this space each Wednesday.)

“I hear that in many places something has happened to Christmas; that it is changing from a time of merriment and carefree gaiety to a holiday which is filled with tedium; that many people dread the day and the obligation to give Christmas presents is a nightmare to weary, bored souls; that the children of enlightened parents no longer believe in Santa Claus; that all in all, the effort to be happy and have pleasure makes many honest hearts grow dark with despair instead of beaming with good will and cheerfulness.”
Julia Peterkin, A Plantation Christmas

• Middle age isn’t all bad, but it’s still full of diminishments, one of which is that my ability to write for long stretches of time isn’t what it used to be. The end product, I trust, is still of passably high quality, but time was when I would routinely write two unrelated pieces in the course of a single day, then go out at night and see a show. Alas, I find it increasingly difficult to change hats: if I write a Wall Street Journal drama column from scratch in the morning, it’s all but impossible for me to knock out a chunk of, say, my Duke Ellington biography in the afternoon. I don’t know whether it’s a matter of flagging energy or lessened will, but one way or another, I seem to have lost some of my endurance.
Thus I rejoice to report what happened when I accompanied Mrs. T to the University of Connecticut Health Center last week for a day’s worth of visits to various and sundry doctors. Her appointments were non-consecutive, meaning that I had to spend some six-odd hours sitting in waiting rooms. Not wanting to fritter away a whole day reading or idly surfing the Web, I decided to write a “Sightings” column for next week’s Wall Street Journal. It came with unexpected ease and I sent it off to the paper. Then inspiration struck, and I started writing a second “Sightings” column, which I finished just as Mrs. T emerged from the day’s last appointment. I sent it in and we went home.
The best part of this story is that my editors at the Journal approved both pieces with nothing more than trivial queries, so they’ll be going into the paper just as I wrote them–back to back in the waiting room.
Forgive my vanity, but there’s life in the old boy yet!

Bing Crosby sings Irving Berlin’s “White Christmas” in Holiday Inn: