"Time to Leave," happenings

So, finals are over. Freedom has set over me.

This morning, I walked with Christina in Central Park. Then I hung out with Khiem, window shopping, eating at Spice, window shopping some more, eating at the bakery, visiting the Charmin Restrooms. It was quite a bit of fun. I need to make a return trip to Marc by Marc Jacobs.

Tonight I watched a depressing but wonderful movie, Time to Leave (Le Temps Qui Reste), a French movie directed by Francois Ozon about a gay photographer struck with terminal cancer and his methods of coping and subsequent death. It was one of the most beautiful movies about death I've ever seen and just a beautiful and thought-provoking movie overall. Melvil Poupaud was wonderful as Romain, the photographer, and Jeanne Moreau was also beautiful as his grandmother, Laura. I recommend the movie highly and will most definitely check out some more of Ozon's films soon.

The past week

So, this his been a fun and stressful week.

Midweek, Wednesday and Thursday, I had to write a humungous paper for my journalism class, but now I'm finally totally done with that junk.

Thursday night, I went to the opening night of The Apple Tree. I liked it a lot better the second time. Everyone was really "on" for opening night, and I sort of settled into the material in a way that I wasn't able to the first time I saw it. It was also good to see Ryan again for the first time in about a month.

Tonight (Friday), I went to see Spring Awakening for the third time. Jaron, John D. Carrion, and Malorie from the 12th floor last year were all there, so it was fun to see them. This time was my first time sitting in the mezzanine, and, though the seats up there were very, very cramped, it provided a unique perspective. I was able to notice how great the choreography by Bill T. Jones and lighting were. I also noticed a few little plot-related moments that I hadn't caught from the other perspectives from which I've seen the show (in the right orchestra, and sitting on stage left). There's also a new verse that the character of Ilse sings leading into the finale, "The Song of Purple Summer," that was pretty good. Spring Awakening is definitely my favorite current show. I think it's time to take a rest for a few weeks though. I also want to revisit Grey Gardens.

In comes mixed "Company"

On November 9, I saw the current Broadway revival of "Company" on Broadway. I withheld comment on the blog because I knew I'd have to write a more in-depth analysis as the second paper for my musical theatre class. Below, I'm reprinting that analysis, slightly revised, which is pretty much a straightforward review. To the right is my mock-up for an improved poster for the revival (as I promised I would do after my Apple Tree mock-up). Enjoy:


John Doyle’s latest actor-musician revival to hit Broadway, of Stephen Sondheim and George Furth’s 1970 musical Company, works. It works very hard. Whether or not it works well is a different question with no cut-and-dry answer.

Though John Doyle’s directorial style of choice, which utilizes the actors within a musical as the show’s orchestra, originally arose as a financial necessity, this concept was subsequently put to use as a way to shed new light on works of musical theatre that Doyle felt were worth revisiting.

His production of Sondheim’s masterpiece Sweeney Todd last season using the same technique was widely hailed by critics. This new production of Company cannot escape comparison with Sweeney, a juxtaposition which sheds light on Company’s weaknesses, though there are also some considerable assets to be considered.

Company, unlike Sweeney Todd, is most certainly a musical of its time. Though Sweeney has been at a remove from the time period in which it was set – London during the industrial revolution – since its first Broadway production in 1979, Company was created in 1970 as a comment on the current state of things, focusing on a group of Manhattan urbanites, and, more specifically, the relationships between a group of married friends and their bachelor friend Bobby.

Much like Rent will most likely lose its relevance over time as a comment on the AIDS epidemic and the 1990s over time, Company has lost something over the years, perhaps a reason for the limited success of other recent revivals of the show, like those at Donmar Warehouse in London and at Roundabout Theatre Company on Broadway, both in the mid-1990s.

While the show remains funny enough, its jokes land more for their kitschy remove from relevance than for their genuine punchiness. A scene about experimentation with pot between the characters of David, Jenny, and Bobby, which is by all means funny, doesn’t have the same impact that it must have had during the musical’s original 1970 run. Various other period references, as to phone answering services in “Another Hundred People,” leave the show firmly rooted in the past.

Though surely its themes of relationships and connectedness transcend its time period, an attempt to transport the show to a sort of ambiguously timeless setting through the use of barebones black costumes by Ann Hould-Ward are marred by the show’s book. Besides for being dated, the show is also loosely structured, with little in the way of conventional plot, fully fleshed-out characters replaced by stereotypical glimpses at 1970s urbanites.

The show’s drawbacks seem almost insurmountable, and surely the piece is so often revived because of the strength of its score rather than the contributions of George Furth, which serve merely as a frothy mortar for Sondheim’s often incisive musical comments on society.

Songs like “Ladies Who Lunch,” with its cutting criticism of society dames “clutching their copies of Life just to keep in touch,” as well as “Sorry Grateful,” “Another Hundred People,” and the most famous song of the score, “Being Alive,” are like little nuggets of Broadway gold. With effective lyrics that seem effortless in their quick wit and haunting and engaging melodies, it’s hard not to at least relish the chance to hear these songs presented on the Broadway stage, and at the very least I was thrilled to witness this production in order to hear these songs that I’ve grown to love. Energetic songs like “You Could Drive a Person Crazy” (pictured at left), “Side by Side by Side,” and “What Would We Do Without You?” make this one of Sondheim’s most varied and likeable scores, with plenty of variation between more subdued songs of yearning or regret, and angrier or more lively ones.

Conceptually, I enjoyed the use of pared-down orchestrations in last season’s production of Sweeney Todd much more so than in Company. Sarah Travis, the musical director of that production did wonderful work to the end of making the show seem frighteningly claustrophobic, strains of melody acting like haunting shimmers of light reflected and refracted by Sweeney’s razor.

Though Sweeney is better known than Company for the lushness of its sound, I thought that overall the reduction of its orchestrations was more successful. The bold, brassy sounds of Company with which I had become so familiar from repeated listens to the original cast album were sorely missed, the appropriately busy feeling of the music replaced by a duller, more string-influenced sound that seemed inappropriate within the hustle and bustle of the show’s direction.

In addition, the actor-musicians left much to be desired in comparison to those of Sweeney. Where Company got its musical concept right was in the decision to use orchestral pairings to set the various couplings of characters apart from the central character of Bobby, who restrains from joining the band until his triumphant final song, “Being Alive.” It was in the fleshing out of the relationships between characters (Johanna and Anthony as a couple of young string-playing lovers, Sweeney’s deliberate guitar like a conspiratorial whisper behind the tense duet of “Not While I’m Around” between Mrs. Lovett and Tobias) that I thought Sweeney was most successful in utilizing this construct, and this felt less affecting within the cacophonous company behind Company, with orchestrations and musical supervision provided by Mary-Mitchell Campbell this time around.

On the positive side, there are several winning elements to the credit of this production of Company. Most notable are the fine leading performance of Raul Esparza as the prolonged bachelor Bobby and some winning contributions on the part of the design team and director Doyle.

Like a diamond in the rough amongst an otherwise satisfactory if mostly unimpressionable cast, Raul Esparza (pictured at right) stands out as a charismatic and nuanced Bobby. He is able to keep the audience firmly on his side and in the palm of his hand while remaining at a measured distance from the company of the couples that he keeps at hand for dinner parties and other social functions.

My biggest disappointment in the cast was in Barbara Walsh’s one-note portrayal of Joanne. Standing in the daunting shoes of Elaine Stritch, who originated her role, Walsh (pictured at left) seems overwhelmed by the task of making her mark, and, in doing so, ends up just another voice in the crowd, failing even to land her biggest number, “The Ladies Who Lunch.”

Jane Pfitsch, who played Amy on the night I saw the show, on the other hand, stopped the show with her brilliant and manic performance of “Getting Married Today,” and Angel Desai was fine as Marta in her spirited rendition of “Another Hundred People,” oddly split into segments by book writer George Furth, which detracted from the full impact of the song’s build.

The design of the show and some of the elements of its staging were the most thrilling parts for me. Manhattan, the general setting of the show, can seem a cold and unforgiving place, and David Gallo’s set is brilliantly simplistic in its delivery of this impression. The bulk of the action takes place on a wood-paneled diamond set at center stage. Upstage left on this main platform stands a prominent white column atop a circular radiator, serving as a sort of arguably phallic presence looming over the proceedings.

Surrounding this main playing area is a field of black reflective marble, spare like the void of the city at night and capturing the flashes of light from the action on the main platform. At a remove from the central wooden playing are two matte black diamonds, one on either side of the stage, where Bobby can stand at a remove when necessary, as when he is encouraged by his male friends in “Have I Got a Girl For You.”

Behind all this sit a number of ice cube-like platforms serving as a sort of orchestra pit to which the musicians retreat when not involved in the proceedings. Reflected in the black of the stage floor, the cubes almost seem to take on the quality of half empty (or half full) glasses.

The sets work well with Doyle’s directorial style, allowing for divisions to be set between the characters. Sending actors in various processions around the outer edges of the center diamond, Doyle’s production pulses with an underlying collective energy much like that of the rhythms of a New York City street; his design team has most certainly aided in putting this across.

David Gallo's impressive minimalist set.

Another inventive choice in this production was the use of a single spotlight onstage by lighting designer Thomas Hase to serve as a symbolic birthday candle for Bobby. Serving as a beacon of isolation early in the piece, it is with the use of this device in the final birthday scene that Doyle strikes at the heart of the piece. After joining in on the collective orchestra of the production in the song “Being Alive,” the lights onstage fade to only that of the candle and an atmospheric blue on the looming pillar upstage. Bringing the show to a thrilling close, the lights fade to black just as Bobby steps in a new direction into the flickering spotlight and blows out his candle.

Though some of the urgency of the piece may have been lost over time and his assembled cast may not be ideal, Doyle makes an attempt to enliven and enrich Company through this current production. It’s possible to pinpoint successes and failures throughout this anticipated revival, which had the daunting challenge of living up to the success of Sweeney Todd. In the end, however, it was a more exhilarating experience, for me at least, to witness a revival that makes a daring attempt to reinvigorate a troubled show with mixed success than a cookie-cutter production of a show that makes little attempt to present anything new as food for thought for its audience. This may be a mixed Company, but what’s a party without its oddballs and mishaps?

"The Apple Tree"

Tonight I saw Roundabout's third show of the season (and first musical!), The Apple Tree, starring Kristin Chenoweth. I wasn't too familiar with the show before seeing it, but I had anticipated another chance to see Kristin on stage after having loved her performance as Glinda in Wicked. She most definitely sells the show to maximum effect.

It's a musical made up of three different movements (one-act musicals, essentially), each a different story about the roles of men and women.

The first part, "The Diary of Adam and Eve," is based on a story by Mark Twain. It chronicles the early struggles of Adam and Eve in a humorous way (naming animals, building shelter, discovering fire, etc.).

The second part, "The Lady or the Tiger?" is based on a story by Frank R. Stockton that tells of a woman's dilemma as she chooses whether to send her lover into the arms of another woman or the jaws of a tiger.

The third part, "Passionella," is based on a story by Jules Feiffer, and it tells the story of a nerdy chimney sweep who, during certain hours of the day, is transformed into a glamorous movie star.

Altogether, the throughline was cute but underwhelming, with a few running gags being the unifying thread between the various stories. It's mostly just a frothy excuse for a star vehicle for whatever excellent female performer is currently available for a Broadway engagement, and it's a decent one at that, written by the composing team of Bock and Harnick reponsible for Fiddler on the Roof, She Loves Me, and others.

The Broadway and film ingenue currently available for a Broadway production of The Apple Tree is Kristin Chenoweth, a versatile performer who was able to move between these different roles with ease. Known for winning the Tony for her role as Sally in You're a Good Man, Charlie Brown and her star turn as Glinda in Wicked, she's a spectacular performer and sure to create box office boffo, even if starring in The Phone Book the Musical. The men of the show, Brian D'Arcy James and Marc Kudisch (Chenoweth's ex-fiance) complemented her well.

Overall, the score is forgettable, though it's pretty enough so as to be listenable and has a few standouts though no showstoppers. The design of the show, which was relatively sparse, was effective.

For me, the standout piece was "Passionella," as Chenoweth really felt comfortable with the transition between geek and movie star. It was thrilling to watch her transformation -- less because of the thinly veiled physically transformative moment and more for the gifted acting skills that were employed. She is a woman of impeccable comic timing, with the ability to arouse a belly laugh from the littlest movement of her tiny body.

Kristin Chenoweth as Ella and Passionella in the "Passionella" segment of The Apple Tree

Overall, The Apple Tree makes for a fun evening at the theatre. I question why, of all musicals, this was the one considered most valuable for Roundabout to revive, but it's definitely a cute enough vehicle for Kristin Chenoweth, who is the main reason to see the show.

I'll be seeing it again on opening night (next Thursday), so if anything new occurs to me, I'll post it then. I predict the reviews will be favorable at least for Kristin.

On a completely different note, Emma and I visited the Charmin Restrooms (the holiday event of the year) before the show:

It's alarmin' how Charmin I feel.

"Spring Awakening" CD

So, today, the major task I gave myself was to go to the Eugene O'Neill Theatre today and pick up a copy of the Spring Awakening cast recording, which they're now selling at the theatre in advance of the official store release date of Tuesday, December 12.

So the show is pretty much my current favorite. I'm going for my third time next Friday, and I can't wait. I'll be seeing it from the mezzanine this time, so I'll have seen it from on the stage, in the orchestra, and in the mezzanine. The show opens tomorrow night, so we'll see how the reviews are and if the show takes off or gets any extra buzz.

Anyway, I pretty much couldn't have rushed home any faster after getting my hands on a copy of the CD, and I'm already obsessed. At least now I don't have to spend money just to hear the songs. I also think that the CD is going to spread a sort of grassroots movement for the show, as the music is pretty much the highlight of the overall experience. I think that the CDs for shows like Rent and Wicked made a big difference in getting the word out and filling seats. A CD makes a show accessible to people across the nation. The fact that Spring Awakening has songs like "The Bitch of Living" and "Totally Fucked" and even has a parental advisory notice will probably also help its appeal (even if those aren't necessarily the best songs in the show).

Anyway, what I've noticed from the CD is that, while it's great overall, the flimsiness of some of the lyrics is more obvious when you're not taking the music in along with the visuals and engaged in the moment. It's not a replacement for the live experience by any means, but it's a nice way to tide myself over between visits. And I'm sure it'll also be great for the walks to and from work.

Anyway, go out and get the CD as soon as possible (Tuesday in stores, now at the theatre). I guarantee if there's one theatre CD you must get this year, this is it, and you won't regret buying it. Christmas gifts, anyone? Then go out and see the show for yourself.

Also, on Wednesday, December 13 from 6 till 7:30, the cast and Duncan Sheik will be at the SoHo Apple Store for an in-store performance celebrating the CD release, so be there or be square!

In other news I went to see Merrily We Roll Along by Sondheim and George Furth at Columbia last night, which was a lot of fun. One of my friends from Summer Stage, Claire, played the lead role of Mary, and she was great. It's a show where the plot moves backwards, chronicalling the relationships between three best friends and their lovers. It's such a wonderful show; it manages to be depressing in that you see through the backwards movement of the plot that everyone ends up unhappy, yet that the show ends on a hopeful note with the beautiful song "Our Time." Anyway, Austin loved it too, which really surprised me.

Afterwards we hung out with Christina and Richard. Yay!

Tonight is The Apple Tree with Kristin Chenoweth with Emma, and tomorrow I'm probably going to see Cabaret at NYU. Yay!

"The Vertical Hour"

I can barely contain the joy I feel in response to this evening of theatre!

Having read a number of David Hare plays in recent weeks and seen Stuff Happens with Emma at the Public Theatre over the summer, I am most certainly a convert to Hare's theatrical congregation. He loves to throw out ideas and quotes with spitfire ease and to challenge his characters on both a personal and a social level, which I love. Needless to say, having been a student of his works mostly on the level of reading them and not seeing them, I was more than elated to see The Vertical Hour -- not only a new Hare play but the first to ever premiere in America before Britain.

Though its reviews were mixed, there was no way I could miss this play. I'm taking a class on Tom Stoppard, Caryl Churchill, and David Hare next semester, for one. Not having seen his most recent work would be almost criminal (at least to me personally), especially since I'm going to see each part of The Coast of Utopia by Tom Stoppard, which clocks in at over 8 hours.

This afternoon, I went to attempt to acquire a ticket. I figured I would be unlucky, but standing room tickets were readily available in the afternoon for the evening show.

Arriving around 7:45, I was ready for a long evening of standing and taking in the relatively dense dialogue that Hare is known for. A few minutes before the curtain rose, I reached down to make sure my cell phone was off, and when I turned back up and around, a middle aged man asked me (of all the people in standing room) if I'd trade places with him and let him stand, because he gets restless at the theatre.

The first thing that came to my mind (as if it should matter to me, as I was consigned to stand otherwise) was,"Where is your seat?"

"The second row," he replied. So, at the last minute, I'm rushed down to the second row, filling in a seat that neighbors had piled coats upon (I almost thought for a minute I'd been had by a scalper -- it was too good to be true).

And the experience was fantastic! The play is excellent, a study on the relationship between an American ex-journalist, Nadia Blye (Julianne Moore), her boyfriend Philip (the excellent Brit Andrew Scott), and his father, Oliver, played by the wonderful Bill Nighy. The play focuses on their views on the Iraq war and Nadia's feelings about her time as a journalist overseas. While Julianne certainly seemed uncomfortable being on stage during some parts, giving more than a handful of relatively awkward line readings, when she really dug deeply into the material and let herself soak into her dialogue, she did a fine job. There were several times when I felt genuinely involved in the life of her character, and those moments more than compensated for the times I felt detached because of some strange acting choices. Andrew Scott was also a standout -- he was very charismatic and natural as her boyfriend, with a winning charm that gave the play a much-needed lift at moments.

The chemistry between the actors in general felt a bit underdeveloped, but I was able to let that go because of the excellent quality of the writing and the redeeming acting of Bill Nighy, who really stole the show. He has a lanky, laid back, comfortable way about him, and he has great ease with words. His delivery always feels like natural speech even in the way he mutters or stutters during certain lines. Overall, he owned the show.

The music used for scene changes was also excellent, including the use of Bob Dylan ("Just Like a Woman") and playing "Both Sides Now" by Joni Mitchell as the curtain fell and as the audience exited.

Overall, it was a thrilling night of theatre. I was glad to know that Julianne had even attempted this piece (challenging for any actor) and that I had the chance to see it. It wouldn't be my top recommendation to a New York theatregoer, but neither would I discourage someone from going if the play picqued their interest. I think that sometimes critics can be so discouraging toward an attempt at acting for stage so as to scare screen actors and newcomers away. Julianne certainly seemed to be received well by the audience around me, and she deserves to be seen and to continue acting on the stage if she so desires. She hasn't been onstage in quite some time, and this was sort of her return to her roots. I'm sure she'll only improve if she continues to pursue acting for the stage. I know I'd be willing to see her again.

The thing that impressed me most about the technical elements, especially from the second row was the vast and beautiful set by Scott Pask. When the scene shifts from Nadia's office to Wales, the set opens up to reveal a huge open space with chairs and a picnic table and a huge, beautiful tree. I really felt overcome by the massive scrim of color that overtook almost my entire field of vision. It was a very simple design choice but it yielded a very beautiful set, and as the lights (by Brian MacDevitt) changed the setting from day to night, I was just enveloped by the sensation of the shift of moods and the coming on of the "vertical hour," when Nighy and Moore get to the heart of things. The design elements all came together beautifully.

All in all, Hare's script, Nighy's acting, and Scott Pask's sets were the winners of the evening. I recommend it to anyone who wants to see a great piece of writing put up formidably with a combination of star power and top-notch acting.

After the show, I decided I would wait (for the first time this year) at the stage door to try to get an autograph from Julianne and Bill Nighy. Shockingly, there were only about four or five other people waiting for them, and Julianne was one of the most absolutely gracious women I've ever met at any stage door. She borrowed my pen a couple of times and was just wonderfully patient about taking pictures and everything. I very rarely ask for a picture with an actor or actress, as they're almost always in a rush or mobbed with people, but this was just the opportune moment. The picture, as it turns out, came out very well:

Julianne and I

What a wonderful night! This theatre season will be hard to top.

Addendum

Charmin Restrooms...don't miss out on this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity.

Fun=

A little wiggle to the left
A little wiggle to the right
'Cause when I'm close to you
It’s a sheer delight
You’re the soft I seek
When we’re dancing cheek to cheek

Charmin, it's alarmin', Charmin, how charmin' you are
Charmin, Charmin -- OH! -- you're like my shinin' star

A little sa-sa-sachet
A little bump and grind
I hope you don’t mind
That’s how I express
Your special tenderness
Cha-Cha-Cha...Charmin

Since I been gone

An update on Ricky's life, in parts:

Part One: Turkey

Thanksgiving break went well. I visited plenty of family and ate. And played Cranium.

Part Two: Busy, Busy, Busy

Having returned, a harried week lay ahead. On Tuesday, I frantically wrote a paper for my journalism class. I also went to a DramaTalk about Spring Awakening held at Cantor Film Center featuring members of the cast and creative team, all but one of whom were associated with or went to NYU.

Part Three: Dressing for 'Spring'

On Tuesday night, Susan Hilferty, the costume designer for Spring Awakening, hinted that a change in costuming would occur on Wednesday. Curious, I went back for a return visit. This time, I got an onstage ticket. Due to the nature of the staging, the action occurs on a platform in the middle of the stage, with 2-3 rows of audience members to either side who sit alongside some of the performers and the ensemble, who are dressed in contemporary clothing and join the cast for certain songs as "back-up singers," per se. This is vaguely visible to the left of the picture below, though that picture is from the off-Broadway production, so it's a somewhat different arrangement for Broadway.

The experience sitting onstage was much different from seeing the show in the orchestra. Despite the fact that it was cool to be in the middle of the action and sitting next to a lot of the incredible performers, I preferred sitting in the audience. It didn't so much bother me that I saw some of the action from a side or back view, but it was much harder to hear the lyrics and dialogue because the performers were singing out toward the audience and I was sitting too close to the band (especially the drums). All in all, though, it was a worthwhile experience, especially since I was already aware of the plot.

The big costume change that was hinted as was that, during the finale ("The Song of Purple Summer"), the performers used to come out in their period costumes in keeping with the rest of the show, but instead the cast came out that night in contemporary dress to sort of provide a comment as to the relevance of the story to today's society. I wasn't sure (and still am not) what I thought about it -- whether it made the fact that the characters use rock music to express themselves in song more effective or whether I was too distracted by the disconnect between the characters I'd been watching for two and a half hours and these new contemporary cast members who were commenting at the end of the show. At the end of the show, I could see the creative team swarming together at the back of the theatre to discuss what they'd thought of it. I wonder if they'll keep that idea or not.

As a side note, the onstage seats (which formerly could only be purchased at the box office) are now on sale online. More information is available at the official website.

Part Four: Slow Woman Plodding

On Thursday night, I saw Two Trains Running by August Wilson at the Signature Theatre Company as part of my August Wilson class. The play was originally one of my least favorites to read, but it definitely has grown on me. Once you've read the entire 10-play cycle by Wilson, each of the plays feels like an essential piece of the puzzle at least in one way or another.

The production was mostly fine. Frankie Faison and the most of the cast really put in fine performances, but the pacing of the show, directed by Lou Bellamy was saggy. Clocking in at 3 hours and 10 minutes, the show's weak link was January Lavoy (pictured at left), who, playing the sole female role in the play, should be one of the strongest keystones of the cast. As it stands now, her acting choices are spotty at best. Though she is sometimes affecting toward the end of the second act as her character, waitress Risa, softens to some extent from her position as a hardened woman, so afraid of attention that she cuts her legs to make them unattractive, Lavoy makes the choice as an actress to spend the entire length of the play plodding across the stage blankly, click-clacking her heels in a slow and steady rhythm that nearly drove me mad, spitting out lines in a disaffecting manner that seemed more abrasive and harsh than wounded. Reading the play, I've always envisioned her character as undertaking a journey from broken woman to a place where she sees the beginning of the road ahead of her toward happiness, but Ms. Lavoy's interpretation left out the necessary warmth that is necessary to endear her character to an audience. This is most likely a choice that was made by Ms. Lavoy along with the director, so the blame shouldn't fall entirely on her, but I was baffled by how her character was able to bog down the entire show. If she had sped up the pace of her walk, at least 10 to 15 minutes of running time could have been trimmed.

Still, any Wilson play in New York is worthwhile fare, and at $15, you can't beat the price. There are a lot of juicy monologues in the play, and most of the cast was excellent, especially the aforementioned Frankie Faison in the role of restaurant owner Memphis, Arthur French as the wise old man Holloway, and Ron Cephas Jones (who was previously excellent in Satellites at the Public Theater) as numbers-runner Wolf.

Part Five: The Top 3 Artforms

Video games are not one of them. Period.

Part Six: High Octane 'Fidelity'

On Friday night, I went to see High Fidelity with Austin for free through Roundabout. I didn't really know what to expect since I hadn't seen the movie with John Cusack or read the book by Nick Hornby, but I had expected the music to be upbeat and the performances to be top-notch, and that's what I got.

Though in its style it's conspicuously similar to this past spring's The Wedding Singer (also an adaptation of a popular romantic comedy using a contemporary-ish score), I felt it was ultimately more successful. The book, by David Lindsay-Abaire, though sporting a few holes (Rob is hugely unlikeable -- at least in my opinion -- and his change at the end is abrupt and obvious), avoids some of the cloying cliches of The Wedding Singer, and the score, with music by Tom Kitt and lyrics by Amanda Green, manages to be more clever than The Wedding Singer's as well. Curiously, no song list was included in the Playbill, so I can't really expound too well about the various songs. There are also plenty of clever comedic sequences (including one triple-take trash talk sequence done in varying styles) that keep things fresh to the credit of director Walter Bobbie.

At its heart are the two leads -- Rob, played by young Broadway veteran Will Chase, and Laura, played by Jenn Colella (both pictured at right). The two manage to play their characters earnestly and engagingly, surpassing any potholes in the script. Will Chase was a favorite of mine last year in the short-lived Lennon, and here he proves that he can captivate an audience and provide a powerhouse star turn. The audience left mostly humming him, one man even naiively proclaiming that he was destined to win the Tony Award. Nonetheless, these two did a wonderful job selling the material, and Christian Anderson as Dick, Rob's record store pal, provided warm-hearted comedic relief as well in a series of clever little songs.

All in all it was a fun show. It should appeal to tourists and those who want to see a show where the husband/boyfriend can be just as entertained as the wife/girlfriend. Don't go in expecting high art and you should be fine.

Part Seven: A Parade of Plays

As part of an artistic vision she had a few years ago, Suzan-Lori Parks (pictured at left) set out to write 365 plays in 365 days, a goal that she accomplished within the allotted period of time. This year, a vast partnership of theatre companies across the country are banding together through regional centers to present the plays one week at a time. At the Public Theater, the NYC regional flagship company, the First Sundays series presents (on the first Sunday of each month) the previous month's plays performed by the respective theatre companies.

Having read a few of the plays, I wasn't expecting much, but the individual theatre companies were able to add their own touches and give the plays a new life through the tone and approach that isn't there when simply reading the plays on paper. That seems to be an inherent quality in Parks's work. Some of the plays are better than others and some of the theatre companies were better than others, but all in all, it was an interesting experiment in theatre, and, since the First Sunday presentations are free, they're worth checking out. Reservations can be made using the instructions at the Public Theater website. The next First Sunday is a presentation of the December plays on January 7th.

"Durango"

Tonight I saw Durango by Julia Cho at the Public Theater. I didn't really know what to expect, as I was unfamiliar with the play and the playwright, but I generally trust the Public Theater to present all-around solid productions. All of the the shows I've seen that were produced by the Public (Two Gentlemen ot Verona, Mother Courage, See What I Wanna See, Stuff Happens, Satellites, Wrecks) have been expertly designed and directed, and Durango was no different. The sets, which slid on and off neatly, really did a good job juxtaposing the closed spaces of a house with wide open desert spaces, and the underscoring was also wonderfully evocative, blending well with the original songs Cho has written for the character of Isaac.

James Saito as Boo-Seng in Durango.

The play follows a family -- an older Asian American man, Boo-Seng, and his two sons, Isaac and Jimmy -- and their revelatory roadtrip from Arizona to Durango, Colorado in the wake of Boo-Seng's losing his job to a layoff. It was a largely satisfying play, especially when the plot took wing in the second half, revealing the characters' failures, losses, and regrets in a mostly successful manner. The acting was top-notch, with veteran actor James Saito commanding fierce attention as Boo-Seng.

My only real problem with the play was that, in including two teenaged main characters, Cho sometimes allows the colloquialisms, overuse of expletives, and cultural references take over to too great of an extent. Obviously she's going for realism, but it almost felt forced, especially during a particularly awkward reference to X-Men. The actors in the roles of these sons do a wonderful job though, particularly Jon Norman Schneider, who really captivated me as Jimmy, the closted gay swimmer struggling to play fit into the roles of "good son" and "happy son" at the same time.

Overall, a fine production of a mostly successful play.

The "Awakening" of musical theatre

A totally original new musical is now on Broadway, leaving me infinitely excited for the future of musical theatre. Its name? Spring Awakening. With a driving rock roll score by singer/songwriter Duncan Sheik ("Barely Breathing" was his big hit) and Steven Sater that for once fulfills the promise of honestly sounding like it could be on the Billboard charts, Spring Awakening manages to chisel its own unique spot next to Rent as a musical addressing timely issues relevant to young people today.

Managing to cover the issues of pregnancy and abortion, homosexuality, masturbation, teen suicide, physical and sexual abuse, and blossoming sexuality within the confines of 2 hours and 25 minutes, the show also manages not to be cloying or overbearing in presenting its messages, instead presenting rather compelling and emotionally complex young characters who suffer terribly for the ignorance bestowed upon them by their overbearing and withholding parents.

Anyway, there's not very much I can say that's negative about the show. The performances by the young cast (some of whom are still in high school) were wonderful. The design was functional and evocative, utilizing exhilerating neon lights and a sparse but effective setting. Michael Mayer's direction was also quite creative, transitioning expertly between the historical setting of the action (1890s Germany) and the modernity that explodes out of their more angsty moments as characters pull microphones from their preppy school jackets and don the roll of inner rock star.

It was a breathtaking night of theatre that I hope as many as possible get to experience. The audience when I saw it gave it such a strong ovation that the cast was forced to return to appease the crowd, which had continued to clap to an empty stage for several minutes once the cast had taken its bows.

Do I smell a hit? I hope so.

"The Clean House," happenings.

Yesterday was a wonderful day.

I woke up late, as is typical for a Saturday. Around mid-afternoon, I went to Starbucks to read The Clean House and Late: A Cowboy Song by Sarah Ruhl. After a while, a homeless man started talking to me about how he had had to buy vodka to help ease the pain of his toothache. He was reading a book about a famous bank robber in Europe who hadn't yet been caught. Anyway, he was an interesting man. After eating dinner, I went to 12th Street Books and then went to head uptown to Lincoln Center to see The Clean House.

At the 1 stop at Christopher Street, there was apparently some sort of crime-related problem, and, in being confused, I sort of gestured to this other guy down near the turnstiles and asked what was going on. So, we struck up a little conversation and walked together to 14th Street. His name was Juan. I have to say it was one of the most affecting conversations I've ever had, and we didn't even really talk about all that much. I just hate people who are all crazily anti-immigration. Much of how our society is today is because of immigrants. New York is such a great city, because every day you meet someone or talk to someone or see something, and it can change your perspective on things in ways you've never thought possible.

Last night, I saw The Clean House at Lincoln Center Theater's Mitzi Newhouse Theater. It's a play by Sarah Ruhl that has caught on across the country and finally arrived in New York. The play was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize, and Sarah just recently recieved a McArthur Fellowship ("genius grant").

Anyway, that's besides the point. She has a very beautiful vision for writing plays. Though her dialogue is not always the best (and it's often wonderful), she clearly thinks out the structure of her plays and delivers symbolism like no other. She's able to construct symbolic moments in her writing that work so seamlessly theatrically. Rather than hitting you over the head with what you're supposed to think, they manage to be beautifully affecting.

The story concerns a maid, Matilde (pronounced "Ma-chill-gee") who doesn't like to clean; her doctor employer, Lane; Lane's sister, Virginia, who takes over for Matilde; and Lane's husband, who after finding his bashert, runs off with his beautiful cancer patient, Ana. It was a lovely story, melding the simple occurrences of life with moments of magic. I highly recommend the play to any imaginative theatregoer.

Encapsulation of the week thus far

So, it's been a few days since I posted.

Monday, I went to a reading by Sarah Arvio and Mark Strand at KGB Bar -- neither were particularly engaging, but it was still an entertaining enough night. I launched a companion blog to this one called RP Poetry where I'll be posting poems as I refine them.

On Tuesday, I worked tirelessly on a paper for journalism that was finished in the wee hours of the morning.

Wednesday was a day of relief and recovery from the paper-writing process. Patrick Healy, a leading political reporter for The New York Times, came to visit our class and had a lot of interesting things to say. While many of us in class had admired his writing from examples read in class, none of us had expected him to be so wonderfully attractive -- and gay. In fact, he was voted Hottest Gay Journalist in New York on the Left Behinds blog.

Wednesday evening I went to Lincoln Center to see a panel discussion with playwright Sarah Ruhl, a moderator (who, I believe, forgot to introduce herself), and actress Blair Brown (pictured, in that order, at right) about Ruhl's play The Clean House, which is currently playing at Lincoln Center Theater. It was a very interesting discussion about Ruhl's writing, and I bought her book and had her sign it. I'm going to see the play on Saturday, so I'll comment more when I have more to say.

After the discussion, I read Gem of the Ocean by August Wilson in Starbucks and then met up with my friend Ryan, to whom I gave my Suddenly Last Summer opening night ticket. We walked around after he got out of the show for a bit and talked, which was quite fun. On another related note, the show got relatively good reviews!

Today was course registration. I got into all of the classes I wanted besides for Creative Writing, for which I'm third on the waitlist. Those are:

• Major Playwrights: Caryl Churchill, David Hare, and Tom Stoppard
• Intermediate German II
• Conversations of the West: Antiquity and the 19th Century
• and Creative Writing

It seems like it should be a challenging and fun semester overall. I really hope I get into Creative Writing so I've at least got two elective classes that I'm genuinely passionate about.

After class and registration today, I went with Emma to a reading of Zorro, a new musical with music by The Gispy Kings. It was an insider reading, full of people in the theatre business -- the creative team, producers, and other theatre folk. I won a pair of tickets on Broadway.com's Stage Notes blog, so I was sort of excited about it. It seems like it could potentially make an interesting show.

Only not. Ugh, it was so very, very tedious. The music was very repetitious and simplistic. Many of the lyrics were in Spanish, which, though adding to the mood of the show, did nothing for my understanding, and, unlike the use of Italian language in The Light in the Piazza, did nothing to illuminate a language barrier or anything interesting like that. Eden Espinosa was fine as Luisa and Ivan Hernandez was quite good as Diego/Zorro, but the piece is just a hot mess. Characters are not established well enough early on. There is no solid opening number (it's in Spanish), the "I want" song driving the lead character(s) forward is far too late in the show and uninteresting. The show just needs a jolt of energy and craftsmanship. It admittedly got a little better as it went along, but never to a degree where I thought it would be ready for a Broadway stage any time soon. Ideally, it should be back to the books for the creative team of Zorro. Realistically, we'll probably see it treading the boards in the next year or so, another bombastic, underwritten, overproduced mess of shit.

What a week. And it's not even over yet.

"The Flood" and "Annie Hall"

It was a fun Sunday indeed.

I slept late and then went to see The Flood , an off-off-Broadway musical by young writers Peter Mills and Cara Reichel at Prospect Theatre Company's Chernuchin Theatre on W. 54th Street. I had read really, really good things about the score and was intrigued to see an original musical that hasn't yet been cut down and packaged for the masses. That's definitely what I got, a wonderfully theatrical and appropriately folksy score that was just infectious and effective.

A'lisa D. Miles as the River and Matt DeAngelis as Raleigh in The Flood.

On the whole, the book needed a bit of tightening and tweaking, with a few too many details for the audience to latch onto in order to take in the plot in its entirety, but that's pretty much part of the developmental process of a musical. It's all about finding what little brilliant bits need to go to make the work as a whole more succinct and effective.

It was a very interesting subject for a show -- a flood threatens to overtake a small town in Illinois, and, in the second act, does. The main focus of the show was on a middle-aged couple trying to find a way to see eye-to-eye on turning up the burner on their relationship and a young couple in the throes of new love. In Caroline, or Change anthropomorphic style, a black woman played the Mississippi River, historically suppressed and, in overtaking the town, cleaning its slate and showing what, of all our responsibilities and burdens, floats to the surface as truly significant. The cast was uniformly excellent, performing excellently despite the fact that the lighting of the show experienced technical difficulties during the first act, and the show had to eventually switch over to being performed without professional lighting, but, rather, in "work light" (flood lights). Oh, off-off-Broadway, how I wish thee were better funded.

Nonetheless, there were plenty of brilliant bits, especially those between the character of Rosemary (played by Jennifer Blood, pictured with A'lisa D. Miles at left) the mentally challenged sister of the young female love interest, and the River. Early on in the show, they do a sort of choreographed mirror sequence that's really very fascinating, and the flood scene where Rosemary is overtaken was very well done. The use of flapping fabrics to represent water is so often misused in theatre, but this was a case where it was really stunningly put to use.

Anyway, a very, very good day of theatre.

Afterwards, I studied for my midterm tomorrow and bought Annie Hall for $8 at Virgin Megastore, which I watched with Austin. I had pretty much forgotton everything about the movie, but it's really quite funny. It's nice as well that it has a realistic ending that doesn't feel sappy and saccharine. Bravo to Woody Allen!

Samuel Menashe, reading

Today was a pretty slow day. I had brunch and then went to see the poet Samuel Menashe read at Downeast Arts Center at 4. It was very fascinating to hear him read, because he basically just recounts stories from his life and inserts poems spontaneously, having memorized them all. Sometimes it's hard to tell whether he's begun or ended a poem because they blend so seamlessly into his speech.

After that, I bought two books at 12th Street Books, one of my favorite bookstores where used books are priced reasonably (most between $2 and $7): Six Degrees of Separation by John Guare and The Secret Rapture by David Hare. I then went to the Starbucks on Washington Square, got a gingerbread latte, and sat and read the Hare play for a few hours. It's one of the plays that's required reading for the Churchill, Hare, and Stoppard class I'm going to take at all costs next semester, and it was very fascinating and fast-paced. It had some of the in-yer-face elements of plays like Closer but with more realism and convention. It made me excited to try to see The Vertical Hour, Hare's current play on Broadway starring Julianne Moore and Bill Nighy.

I've pretty much decided recently that I want to be a poet and playwright (in addition to whatever I do to actually pay the bills, which will probably be some sort of more conventional theatre-related job). My ultimate artistic goals are to be a published poet who reads regularly and a playwright at least at an esteemed off-Broadway level and a participant in the O'Neill Center's National Playwright's Conference. I've got an idea for a play cooking, and I've been writing some new poems lately, so I'm thinking vaguely of starting to read at open mics in the near future. It's just all so intimidating, because it's hard to judge how your work stands up next to that of others. Poetry is just so subjective yet not.

A night in

Today was a long day. I worked from 10 till 6 with a hectic lunch break because of running to the post office for stamps for my boss. After work, I went to the Eugene O'Neill Theatre on 49th Street to get a $25 discount ticket to Spring Awakening on Broadway. The discount was provided to us by NYU because a lot of cast and crew members are affiliated with the university. On the walk home, I stopped into a few stores but didn't buy anything.

I kept thinking to myself, Ricky, you have nothing planned tonight. You have to do something!! That's the voice that speaks to me every time I have a free minute. The city is just so interesting and vibrant that it's hard to resist its call. Tonight, however, I did, and I had a wonderful time doing so.

Bursting with huswifery, I spent the entire evening cleaning my half of the room, which had gotten quite cluttered; doing laundry, which had been building up for several weaks; listening to Nellie McKay; and eating bread and bree from Trader Joe's. Anyway, tomorrow will likely be less blissful -- but that's the way life is.

The Roundabout art is in!

Spring 2007 sees the first Broadway revival of 110 in the Shade with Audra McDonald at Studio 54. This is one of the shows I'm most excited for this season, especially since I work at Roundabout, which is producing the show.

Anyway, the artwork for the show has just been released:

As an intern at Roundabout, I was used, along with my fellow interns, as a sort of a focus group in one of our intern meetings, so I got to see some of the preliminary designs for The Apple Tree and 110 in the Shade.

We saw a lot of early sketches for The Apple Tree using various clipart and people other than Kristin (mock-ups) leading up to the current art (pictured at right). I'm not a big fan of the Apple Tree art because it doesn't feel show-specific. It's Kristin eats an apple on a green background with an odd, generic font. I feel like perhaps a drawing or some sort of bigger concept would have worked better. Of course, at least it's simple and presents the idea of Kristin being in the show (and selling its tickets). When they tried to bring in snakes or trees, things started to get too busy.

After seeing the Apple Tree developing posters, we saw the final four choices for 110. It was down to the chosen design (pictured at top), another that we responded to pretty favorably(dour Audra in a yellow/orange poster with a farmhouse in the background with Audra's eyes closed), and then two more variations on the same themes. The mock-up of the poster seen at the top of this post originally used some concert art featuring Audra in a similar pose, and then they shot the specific photo that they used. That was the one we interns responded to most.

I'm happy that they went with it. I don't know the show too well, but it seems to go well with the theme of blossoming into one's womanhood. The drops of rain are also quite vivid. Also, the concept of the situation of the lettering was intended to brand the show in a way by making the title pop out in an advertisement. Anyway, I'm looking forward to the show a lot more now than I already was (it'll be the last show I experience as an intern there).

My mock-up poster for The Apple Tree.

I spent some time making my own mock-up poster (pictured above) for The Apple Tree in PhotoShop to see if I could do any better. I tried to tie in the titular tree (an image I found here on Google), the Chenoweth photo from the current poster, and the font used for Desperate Housewives (doesn't that picture remind you of Housewives anyway?). It's not much more show-specific, but at least it's a little more interesting without being distracting. Like it better? No? I'm thinking I may start doing this every once in a while when I don't really like a show's artwork.

"Pretty Little Head" by Nellie McKay

Last year, I was exposed in part to the talent that is 24-year-old singer-songwriter Nellie McKay.

I had heard a few of her songs before somehow or other on the internet, including one of her most popular songs, "David," but it wasn't till last year, when Nellie starred in The Threepenny Opera at Studio 54, that I really found out more about her. Having heard me talk about Nellie's starring in Threepenny, ex-roomie David exposed me to a variety of her wonderfully sardonic and catchy songs. I was amused and enjoyed her performance in Threepenny, but for the most part I didn't pursue her music actively.

Recently, that has been changing. I bought a copy of her first album, Get Away From Me at Tower Records for 20% off having spotted it during the closing sale at Tower, and today I bought her latest album, Pretty Little Head, the release of which was delayed because of a split between Nellie and her former record label, Sony, which caused this latest CD to be put out on her own label, Hungry Mouse. Both are tons of fun, and I'm pretty much addicted. She's able to master pop, rock, jazz, and bits and pieces of rap with equal flair. I've heard of her described as a mix between Doris Day and Eminem, which seems just about right, with splashes of Peggy Lee, Regina Spektor (particularly her tricks of vocal range and tone) and Audrey Hepburn as Holly Golightly in Breakfast at Tiffany's thrown in for good measure.

The fun thing about her music is that it manages to tackle activist issues without being bogged down in weightiness. She manages to present a fun listening experience that challenges the listener at the same time, and that's pretty cool.

Anyway, I highly recommend both albums, and Pretty Little Head is currently on sale for $10 at Virgin, so that's a good, cheap way to say howdy-do to one of music's up-and-coming label-turned-indie talents.

"Breakfast at Tiffany's," "Be Like Joe," "Suddenly Last Summer," weekend

So this was a pretty busy and interesting weekend.

On Friday night, Austin and I had originally been planning to see Borat, but we changed our minds and decided to accompany Jon to a student production at Columbia called Everyone's Different. Unfortunately, we took the wrong subway there (the 2 instead of the 1), and we ended up on the wrong side of Manhattan in Harlem. We missed the show, and we walked around in Harlem briefly, passing the Apollo Theatre, before we decided to head back downtown. By that time, of course, Borat was sold out, so we just hung out.

On Saturday I went to see a show called Be Like Joe that Frank Paiva, a friend of Austin's, was in at the Kraine Theatre on E. 4th Street. It was a surprisingly charming musical about a rock star who has taken a love potion that causes people to never tell him "no" and his clash with a fan who causes him to rethink his situation. After seeing the show, I had no idea what else to do and felt terribly bored, so I walked around SoHo and then sat in Starbucks briefly writing a little bit of a poem. I also had my first latte, which I quite enjoyed.

On Sunday I did several things. First I had breakfast at a place called Mimi's on E. 9th Street with Austin. We had French toast, fruit, and eggs, and it all came out to $4.50 each, which was wonderful. Of course, we had to argue about the price, because she attempted to overcharge us. Then we went to see Suddenly Last Summer. It was my second time and Austin's first. I liked it much more the second time. I think I understood it better, and the acting had also improved since I first saw it, particularly Blythe Danner's. Austin thought it was okay, but he had a few issues with the play and its effect on modern audiences that really made me rethink my own stance on the play. At the very least, I really enjoy the language, and the acting and sets were quite impressive.

Then Sunday night I watched Breakfast at Tiffany's for the first time ever after having heard so many things about the movie. I believe it was the first Audrey Hepburn movie I've watched in its entirety, though I've always thought she was quite glamorous looking. It was a very entertaining movie about two people, Holly Golightly and Paul Varjak, both of whom are dependent on others for their livelihoods and fall in love. It had a lot of really fun moments and had a really great 1960s style that I just loved. Now I've got to see some other Audrey Hepburn movies to catch up on what I've discovered I've been missing out on. George Peppard was very dashing and wonderful as Varjak, the perfect leading man for Audrey.

Anyway, I highly recommend the movie to anyone else who's been missing out on Breakfast at Tiffany's thus far in their lives.

"The Little Dog Laughed"

This has been such a great week of theatregoing. Yesterday was the delightful Mary Poppins, and tonight was The Little Dog Laughed, a new play by Douglas Carter Beane about a closeted gay actor who, while under pressure from his publicist to stay closeted while playing a gay role, falls in love.

The play stars Tom Everett Scott (That Thing You Do) as the movie star, Julie White as the publicist, Johnny Galecki (David on Roseanne) as the love interest, and Ari Graynor as the female complication to the story. It was a very entertaining play, so utterly non-stop that there wasn't really a moment to get bored. Julie White (pictured at right) was a standout in the hilarious role of the lesbian publicist who wants to make great things happen. She was the actor who really stole the show, however, the acting was great all around.

The set design by Allen Moyer (who also impressed me with his design for Grey Gardens) was also spectacular. Settings for the bedroom slid on and off, and panels in the wall slid open and shut to reveal characters who would deliver wonderfully funny monologues. Everything was very minimal and functional without being bare-bones. The underscore music by Lewis Flinn, beautiful costumes by Jeff Mahshie, and lighting by Donald Holder all came together with the other design elements to just make a very polished, wonderful production.

The play felt a lot like a movie in its pacing, yet it retained its theatricality in its gimmicky and ultimately entertaining use of direct address toward the audience and toward unseen characters. Though not the absolute best play I've seen so far this semester (I think that goes to Seven Guitars at Signature Theatre thus far), it was definitely the most entertaining. I recommend it to anyone with an open mind looking for a night of laughter and fine theatre.

Merry "Poppins"

So, tonight I saw Mary Poppins at the New Amsterdam Theatre on Broadway. I was expecting it to be fun and forgettable, but boy was it supercalifragilisticexpialidocious!

Besides for having such a lovely story with such upstanding moral values to present (respect the poor, make time for your children, understand your parents' hardships), the cast was wonderful, led by Ashley Brown as Mary Poppins and Gavin Lee (from the original London cast) as Bert.

The choreography, by Matthew Bourne, was breathtaking! I typically don't take much note of the dancing within a show, but it was simply magnificent. When someone was dancing, you simply couldn't take your eyes off of them. There were also a lot of wonderful special effects moments (dancing upside-down, a giant umbrella, plenty of flying, etc.). I have to say this is one of the first musicals I've seen in a while (along with Wicked) where I could really see where all the money had gone.

There were so many great moments and people, it's hard to mention them all. "Step in Time," "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious," and "Feed the Birds" were probably my favorite moments in the show. Cass Morgan, who played Bird Woman really did the role justice. That's pretty much always been my favorite moment in the movie and my favorite song, and it was really done very well on stage. The two child performers who played Jane and Michael were Kathryn Faughnan and Henry Hodges at the performance I saw, and they were extraordinarily talented and charistmatic. It's hard to believe kids at their ages can keep up with the intricate dances of the rest of the cast, but they can.

The design of the show was also very cool, and the sets moved pretty seamlessly on and off and up and down and in and out. The lighting always did a good job setting the scene and providing a mood for the scenes. Costumes were lovely and well done.

Anyway, it was a lovely show, and the entire audience (mainly made up of kids and gays) seemed to respond positively. I have such bitter feelings towards overly commercial overblown shows, but this one just seemed overblown in all the right places and had a heart to boot! I'm sure Mary Poppins will be running on Broadway still ten years down the line or longer, but it's definitely worth checking out.

CB I Hate Perfume

So, today I went with Austin to this cool little perfume store in Williamsburg, Brooklyn called CB I Hate Perfume. Austin had found out about it from a blog associated with GQ and was quite excited to go. They sell unisex perfumes in a variety of categories, like water, Earth, green, wood, flower, fruit, zest, smoke, skin, spice, food, sweet, clean, and chemical. The creator of CB, Christopher Brosius comments on the website: "While certain of my scents are more popular with one or the other, I do not define scent by gender. I prefer to let people choose for themselves.

He also comments (quite pretentiously, but wonderfully decadently): "Scent is the record of your own special life – it’s your experience. My mission is to capture that experience. I bottle it so you can have it, use it and love it whenever you wish. I can give you scent experiences you never dreamed possible. I create perfumes as unique & individual as those who wear them. And I use a great many scents never before thought of as 'perfume”.' But I know these are just the scents that really hit us where we live – they’re the ones we remember and love. These scents are life."

Anyway, the store was very sparse, two walls on either side of the front portion lined with bottles in categorized shelves. The top shelves had specialty blended "perfume" scents for more money, and the bottom shelves had individual "accord" scents for reasonable prices (most around $25, but some skewing slightly higher). There were some very odd scents, like Bazooka Joe bubble gum, doll head, dirt, gunsmoke, roast beef, dirt, rubber, crayon, and suntan lotion.

I was going back and forth between golden apple, Bartlett pear, black tea, and pomegranate seed, but I ultimately went with the pomegranate seed. Austin was between English novel and Russian leather, and he went with the Russian leather. They also had a really nice perfume called Russian caravan tea, which was very good.

Bag, scroll, and 15ml bottle from CB I Hate Perfume.

It was amazing how well CB was able to capture the scent of something in liquid form. Going there today made me really glad I didn't waste money on a high-end cologne when I was contemplating doing so, because going to a place like this allows you to make a much more personal decision about what you want to convey in your scent.

Anyway, it was a fun time. Tonight is Mary Poppins, which will warrant another post later tonight, I'm sure.

"I Could Go On Singing"

If only she could've...

At the suggestion of Bill Phair, who produces the wonderful podcast The Entertainment Beat with Frances Gumm, I rented I Could Go On Singing starring Judy Garland this week to study for my embodiment of her for Halloween. It turned out that the DVD came after our party, but I watched it anyway and had a mah-velous time doing so.

Judy at the height of her career in A Star is Born and on her way out in I Could Go On Singing

Between A Star is Born in 1954 and I Could Go On Singing in 1963 things had come full circle for Judy's roles in films. Going from playing the survivor wife of an alcoholic in Star, she gets to play the alcoholic survivor herself in Singing, and boy is she compelling. Knowing what Judy went through in her own personal life, struggling with addictions to pills and booze, one can't help but feel for Judy as she sings "It Never Was You" or "By Myself," songs with self-explanatory titles of longing and regret. Six years away from her death, this Judy is fierce and alive. It's both easy and difficult watching her performance to believe this was her last film role, but damn is it a good one. Sure the plot of the movie (fun and bitter incidents surrounding a custody battle set in London) verges on soap opera, but Judy is the rope that holds the soap together. And she sure doesn't drop it.

Christina Davis

So tonight I went to see Christina Davis and Tom Thompson read poems at KGB Bar. Going to these readings on Monday nights at 7:30 is becoming a tradition for me, and it's very fun, especially since I'm trying to hone my own poetic skills little by little.

Anyway, I thought Tom Thompson's poems were a little bit pretentious for my taste, but Christina Davis really impressed me. I bought her book, Forth A Raven, published by Alice James Books, after the reading. I suggest checking out excerpts from Forth A Raven here.

Next week at KGB Bar is an evening dedicated to The Oxford Book of American Poetry, edited by David Lehman, who was my Great Poems professor last year.

What a weekend, "subUrbia," "The Voyage of the Carcass."

So this was some weekend.

On Friday night I went to see subUrbia at Second Stage Theatre off-Broadway with my new friend Ryan Frisinger. The show was entertaining enough but not really "great theatre." It was the story of a group of kids who hung around a convenience store and what happens when one of their friends, who's "made it" as a rock star returns to town for a tour stop. The characters were largely unappealing, and the second act just made them even more so than I thought they were originally. Ryan and I had fun going to Starbucks afterwards and talking, and then we walked over to the Apple store in the rain, and he bought a new iPod. It was a lot of fun, and Ryan is a cool person to talk to.

Saturday was the Room 207 Halloween Party. It was fun at first but slowly deteriorated. I was proud of my costume (Judy Garland), which I worked pretty hard on, and it was good to see Christina and Richard again. We didn't get too much of any turnout though besides for Christina, Richard, and Olga.

Today, I went to see a play called The Voyage of the Carcass off-Broadway. The title itself is enough to turn me off to the play, but I went because the ticket was complimentary from Roundabout. The play was just about the most excrutiating thing I've seen in a long, long time. The action begins with an obnoxiously slapstick arctic adventure-themed play-within-a-play, and I was quite thankful to learn that that wasn't the actual point of the entire show later in the first act. Once the backstage story of the actors creating the play began, things got a little bit better. I was soooo, soooo tempted to leave at intermission (as I so rarely am), but I was ready to stick it out through the second act, which was supposed to be shorter than the first. However, due to an injury in the cast, the show was unable to proceed, and I was released back into the happy non-Carcass world guilt-free.

Alas, another week begins shortly. I'm seeing Mary Poppins and The Little Dog Laughed on Broadway this week, both of which I'm very excited for, and then I'm seeing Suddenly Last Summer again next weekend with Austin. Yay!

Venture into the vagina

As a gay man, I have such limited insight into the ways of the vagina.

I do not look at vaginas. I do not smell or taste vaginas. I do not have a vagina.

Is vagina a word that scares you? Should it be?

Vagina.

Eve Ensler made me indulge my inner vagina tonight while watching the HBO presentation of The Vagina Monologues with my vagina-loving roommate Austin.

CUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUNT. Hard "T."

End.

"The Daily Show," "Suddenly Last Summer"

So the past few days have been pretty busy. On Wednesday, Ashley came to visit, and we saw a taping of The Daily Show with Christina and Emma. The episode that we saw taped featured John Ashcroft, and we also got to see my favorite correspondent Samantha Bee tape her "This Week in God" segment.

Because Roundabout Theatre Company is so amazing, they invited all of the staff and a guest (in my case, Emma) to see the invited dress rehearsal of their second show of the season, Suddenly Last Summer by Tennessee Williams, which is playing at the Laura Pels Theate on West 46th Street. It was still a rehearsal, but I have to say it was quite an extraordinary production, and Blythe Danner and Carla Gugino give beautiful performances. I can't wait to see how it develops during previews. It's definitely worth checking out!

Next semester

So, first of all, I saw Lonny Price (director of Sweeney Todd concert DVD, star of Merrily We Roll Along and A Class Act on Broadway) at the office today.

I'm starting to plan for my classes for next semester. I think I'm going to take:

Intermediate German II
Major Playwrights: Caryl Churchill, David Hare, and Tom Stoppard
Con West: Antiquity and the 19th Century
and African American Drama

I'm so conflicted as to what I want to do about journalism. I'm not sure that I really want to major in it. I'm thinking maybe a minor would be a good thing though. Gahhh...the decisions!

"My Name Is Rachel Corrie," Great Read in the Park

So, today was quite a busy day.

After seeing Wrecks last night and noticing a flyer for My Name Is Rachel Corrie at the Public Theatre, I decided that today would be a good day to try and check that out. I read a little bit about the controversy surrounding the play, which chronicles, through the writings of 23-year-old Washington state native Rachel Corrie, the home life and eventual aid efforts in Palestine of an optimistic young activist who travels with a group of "internationals" seeking peace for those Palestineans she feels are unjustly targeted by the Israeli government. The end to Corrie's life is the end to the play: her being struck down by an Israeli bulldozer while struggling to save a Palestinean home from destruction. An audience will likely bring in their own preconceived judgments of her character.

Megan Dodds in the title role of My Name Is Rachel Corrie (photo by Sara Krulwich for The New York Times)

The play is comprised of the journal entries and emails of Rachel Corrie and was compiled by famed actor Alan Rickman and Katharine Viner. Alan Rickman directed the minimal staging, which is executed by Megan Dodds as Rachel Corrie. The play was originally presented by the Royal Court Theatre in London, which is famed for presenting exciting new words (like those of some of my favorites -- Sarah Kane, Mark Ravenhill, and others), which was one of the reasons I was excited to see the play. When the production at the Royal Court originally sought to transfer to New York, the New York Theatre Workshop, which initially committed to the production, backed out due to fears of controversy over the play's subject matter and the proximity of the production to the illness of Ariel Sharon.

Finally produced at the Minetta Lane Theatre in a commercial production (NYTW is a non-profit theatre), the show deserves to be heard. Dodds gives a commanding performance, though it takes about a third of the play for her acting to really soar and for her to come into her own as the play transitions from Rachel's life at home to her time in Palestine. At many times during the play, Corrie's language is poetic and soaring. The flaws in the work, for me, were in the editing of Rickman and Viner. In using only the words of Rachel Corrie, they leave out much of the context for the events of the play. Characters referred to are only vaguely introduced, and the motivations and nuances of events are often subjugated for the purpose of flashy dialogue in search of emotional response.

And emotional response was certainly visible. The audience members next to me were audibly crying, and I saw several other theatregoers with tears streaming down their cheeks as the exited their theatre. It's obviously a production that produces strong emotion on one side of the Israeli-Palestinean conflict or the other, and it's definitely a great thing that this production stirs up a debate. However, not enough is presented in the context of the play for those less familiar with the events in question to be moved one way or the other.

As a side note, I saw Alan Rickman outside of the theatre before the show with a lot of members of the press, and I also noticed a group of individuals handing out pro-Israeli notices about the events in the play. There seems to be quite a bit of buzz about the show, and security was noticeably heightened.

Earlier in the day, I went to the New York Times-sponsered "Great Reads in the Park" event at Bryant Park. I had been thinking of going before, and I went mostly to see my friend Antonio do poetry slam with the group Urban Word NYC. He was very good, and the group was very exciting. I also saw a very interesting interview with Eve Ensler, the author of The Vagina Monologues, The Good Body, and other works, who had a lot of very provocative and interesting things to say about the state of politics, security, and gender today. Hearing her made me really want to experience her work, so I'm thinking of checking out one of her plays or books.

Anyway, it was a busy and fun day. Now back to the busy week.

"Wrecks"

Ed Harris in Neil LaBute's Wrecks

So tonight I went to see Wrecks at the Public Theater with Emma. It's a monologue play written by Neil LaBute and starring Ed Harris as Edward Carr, a man addressing the audience as if in a private room at the viewing for his late wife, Mary Josephine ("Mary Jo"). It was a very thoughtful show that really made you think about a range of different issues, and the playwright was able to say things very touchingly while remaining true to the character, who is decidedly rough around the edges. There was something about his character that originally threw me off, his "Believe you me" gruff attitude that comes off as a little too haughty, but as the play went along I came to understand him as a character a lot better. Then, whoa, at the end of the play there's a huge revelation that just sends a blow to the audience and our ideas about Edward.

If you're planning on seeing the play, for your own enjoyment later on, don't read the following paragraph, which is written in white font and must be highlighted to be viewed:

(Highlight below)
Edward alluded to his wife's being 15 years older than he in the earlier scenes, but toward the end of the play, after describing his love of making love to her, he revealed that she told him a final secret while on her deathbed: she had been raped as a child and gave up her son for adoption. Edward then goes on to reveal the fact that he is her son and that he knew this all along and had pursued her knowing this. All along, she had no idea, and she was relieved to finally know that she had known her son (albeit as a lover/husband). He then goes on to say that all love that doesn't harm others is love (which is valid in most cases, but what about their children!?)
(Highlight above)

So, yeah. That pretty much took the audience off guard and opened up a whole mess of cans of worms to make us all question our perception of love, adoption, incest, and so on. And that's what good theatre is supposed to do, make you ask questions. So the play was successful.

As a side note, an interesting thing that was done to enhance the mood of the piece was to hand out prayer cards with the wife character's name on them and play crooner songs to get the audience into a funereal mood. The set helped evoke the feeling with its sterile look, a casket adorned with flowers and Edward's wife's picture out on a table.

Also, after the show, Emma and I saw Helen Mirren in the lobby of the theatre looking wonderful sporting her typical silver fox look. It was neat, because an ad for her current movie The Queen was in the Playbill. She was with her husband, Taylor Hackford (who directed Ray).