Archives for May 2018

Jack Benny appears as a guest on an undated 1971 episode of The Lawrence Welk Show:

(This is the latest in a series of arts- and history-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)

“I desire so to conduct the affairs of this administration that if at the end, when I come to lay down the reins of power, I have lost every other friend on earth, I shall at least have one friend left, and that friend shall be down inside of me.”

Abraham Lincoln, reply to the Missouri Committee of Seventy (September 30, 1864)

The latest episode of Three on the Aisle, the twice-monthly podcast in which Peter Marks, Elisabeth Vincentelli, and I talk about theater in America, is now available on line for listening or downloading.

Peter, alas, was unable to join us in the studio—he had to write a last-minute piece about the Tony nominations for the Washington Post—but Elisabeth and I held the fort, thanks to the presence of our scheduled guest:

This week’s guest is two-time Pulitzer Prize-winning playwright Lynn Nottage!

First she talks about her latest play, the much anticipated follow up to Sweat. Mlima’s Tale is told from the point of view of an elephant who’s killed for his tusks, which then travel around the world. It’s currently running at the Public Theater through June 3.

But she’s not here just to plug her play; she also has thoughts about this Broadway season and its lack of female representation. And she explains how to make a living as a playwright….

To listen, download the episode, read more about it, or subscribe to Three on the Aisle, go here.

In case you missed any previous episodes, you’ll find them all here.

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.

BROADWAY:
• Angels in America (two-part drama, R, alternating in repertory, extended through July 15, reviewed here)
• The Band’s Visit (musical, PG-13, most shows sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Dear Evan Hansen (musical, PG-13, all shows sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Hamilton (musical, PG-13, Broadway transfer of off-Broadway production, all shows sold out last week, reviewed here)
• The Iceman Cometh (drama, PG-13, all shows sold out last week, closes July 1, reviewed here)
• My Fair Lady (musical, G, all shows sold out last week, reviewed here)
• Saint Joan (drama, PG-13, closes June 10, reviewed here)
• Three Tall Women (drama, PG-13, all shows sold out last week, closes June 24, reviewed here)
• Travesties (serious comedy, PG-13, closes June 17, reviewed here)

IN CHICAGO:
• Macbeth (Shakespeare, PG-13, remounting of Two River Theater Company production, closes June 24, original production reviewed here)

OFF BROADWAY:
• The Seafarer (drama, PG-13, closes May 24, reviewed here)
• Symphonie Fantastique (abstract underwater puppet show, G, extended through July 15, reviewed here)

CLOSING SOON OFF BROADWAY:
• Miss You Like Hell (musical, PG-13, closes May 13, reviewed here)

CLOSING SOON ON BROADWAY:
• Lobby Hero (drama, PG-13, nearly all shows sold out last week, closes May 13, reviewed here)

“Military glory,—that attractive rainbow that rises in showers of blood.”

Abraham Lincoln, speech in the House of Representatives (January 12, 1848)

The Oscar Peterson Trio plays Duke Ellington’s “C Jam Blues” on Danish TV in 1964. Peterson is the pianist, Ray Brown the bassist, Ed Thigpen the drummer:

(This is the latest in a series of arts-related videos that appear in this space each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday)

“There are aphorisms that, like airplanes, stay up only while they are in motion.”

Vladimir Nabokov, The Gift

From 2008:

Two years ago I wrote a “Sightings” column for The Wall Street Journal in which I described Arnold Friedman, who died in near-obscurity in 1946, as “the greatest artist you’ve never heard of.” I’d been writing about Friedman at odd intervals since 2003, when I made mention in my old “Second City” column for the Washington Post of an exhibition of paintings from the collection of Tommy and Gill LiPuma that included several of his canvases.

One of them, “Still Life (Petunias),” was also included in the Friedman retrospective that was the occasion for my “Sightings” column. It impressed me as much in 2006 as it had three years earlier: “In the foreground is a vase of flowers whose vibrantly colored petals all but burst off the canvas….Hanging on the wall immediately behind the vase is the lower half of an abstract painting–Friedman’s way of underlining the subtle relationship between abstraction and representation. The juxtaposition of the two genres is both witty and thought-provoking, unveiling fresh layers of implication at every glance.”

So why haven’t you heard of Friedman?…

Read the whole thing here.