Benjamin Franklin Finally Gets the Play He Deserves

April 1, 2014, 11:53 am

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When it comes to solo theater, I consider myself somewhat of a connoisseur. Besides my own piece Now That She's Gone, which I've performed all over the world, I've seen dozens of other one-person shows in a variety of locales, including Los Angeles, New York and Edinburgh. However, there is a marked disparity when it comes to how one-man shows and one-woman shows are perceived by both the public and reviewers. One-man shows are often viewed as vehicles for virtuoso acting, while one-woman shows are often viewed as an artistic "ghetto" for women over 35 who do not fit the impossible standards of a youth and male-obsessed culture.

You can't believe how many times I've been told by an audience member or the press, "I hate one-woman shows, but yours was great!" Invariably I discover the speaker had only seen one female solo show previously, and had quickly decided that all one-woman shows SUCK. Alas, it's not easy to be an actor anywhere, of any gender. That said, there are a flock of older male actors who also don't have a selection of great roles left for them, which may explain the trend of older actors taking on stories about revered public elders. And all of this brings me to... B. Franklin," written and performed eloquently by Robert Lesko. It is a piece of theater that is lovely on so many levels.

In the interest of full disclosure, I know Robert personally. If you think I might be biased because I know him, think again. It is often more difficult to see something a friend has done than to see theater from someone you don't know. It can be an excruciating experience to contemplate that the performance might be cringe-inducing, and then -- if it is -- what do you say when they ask how you liked it? "That was... really something!" "Oh yes, very interesting." "How did you remember all those lines?!" This has happened to me on several occasions, many of which the friend had requested (or even begged) me to attend, at which time I employ my Norwegian ability to avoid unpleasant topics. Anyway, back to Mr. Franklin.

Benjamin Franklin, the man and founding father, was a pain to many and a pleasure to more than a few. Lesko brought Franklin alive for me so much that I was able to forget that I was watching a play. Robert also accomplished something that many playwrights fail to do for male characters: I felt like I'd spent an evening with a friend rather than with an important historical figure. That is due to Robert's truly fine skills as an actor and performer. Huzzah!

Gross generalization alert! Many women's pieces tend to be personal. I believe that is partially because there are fewer historical women that people would even recognize, and that many of us gals are in the middle of making history ourselves. Men's shows tend to keep personal feelings hidden behind "real world" accomplishments. B. Franklin is a blend of both the personal and the political, the banner motto of second wave feminism. The balance Lesko has achieved, both as an actor and writer, is truly remarkable.

B. Franklin also manages to maintain the very real visibility and impact that women and family had on Franklin's life. He maintained the longest-standing correspondence with his beloved sister Jane, who is also the subject of a newly released biography called Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin by Jill LePore. Let's just say that Jane's having had 12 children certainly kept her busy. Benjamin was just as fertile, except his "fertility" was focused on an intellectual and public life. Amazingly, despite his love and respect for Jane as a person and as an intellectual equal, Ben didn't even mention Jane in his autobiography. Such was the time when the personal was not the political, and the spheres of feminine and masculine had very little overlap in the public discourse. Books were mostly part of the masculine world; thus Jane's many opinions and sharp mind didn't make it into her own brother's book about his life.

The play was particularly touching for me as I watched an octogenarian reflecting on what was really important to him: his accomplishments, his falling out with his beloved son, and yes... his errors. One would not expect anything less from Poor Richard, who besides his almanac was a man of distinction in science, philosophy and homilies.

The entire production is highly commendable. The direction by Bjorn Johnson is superb; the dramaturgy by Kathie Lesko, sublime; the scenic design by Stephanie Kerley Schwartz was spot-on; the lighting design by Stacey Abrams was both striking and nuanced; I was fascinated by the costuming by A. Jeffrey Schoenberg; the sound design by Corwin Evans was aurally delicious; Ina Russell and Bruce Dickinson's props were excellent; the wig and make-up by April Metcalf worked beautifully. In other words, every aspect was just right. Kudos to producer Laura Hill, who put together this wonderfully talented team of technicians and artists.

This is one show you've got to see before it closes!

Fridays and Saturdays at 8pm & Sundays at 2pm
At the Stephanie Feury Studio Theatre
5636 Melrose Ave. Los Angeles CA, 90038 (at Larchmont)
Running Through Sunday, April 27th
Tickets are $25 via BrownPaperTickets
The Production's Facebook page

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5 Questions for Poets: Part 1

April 1, 2014, 12:03 pm

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I have decided to celebrate National Poetry Month by submitting questions by readers of poetry to some of the top poets writing in America today. The following five questions come from a pool of over 30 questions offered to these magnificent authors.

1. Do the Internet and social media contribute to the well-being of poetry?

Alfred Corn (author of Unions, forthcoming in 2014)
Yes. By introducing poets to the audience and alerting participants to new publications and readings. Also, some of us on Facebook are engaged in a fairly constant discussion and debate of aesthetic issues, political concerns, and language usage. Come join in.

Naomi Shihab Nye (author of Tender Spot):
Yes! Students are able to punch in "William Stafford" and read William Stafford. They are able to access his entire archive via Lewis & Clark's digital library of all his work. They are able to look up contemporary Iranian poets and Palestinian poets, anything they like. BUT they have a bigger challenge too -- maintaining the slower, deeper attention streams which poetry invites and, in fact, requires. Good luck balancing it all.

Heather McHue (author of Upgraded to Serious):
Neither more nor less than do other media. The Internet -- starting with two computers in conversation, and then comprehending the network of computers, and profiting from the increasing speed with which signals pass along the netting, ultimately disregarding geophysical boundaries -- is a pseudo-neurological instrument and repository. It brings with it its own compositional (and conceptual) possibilities. For a lively editorial acumen, the internet is rich both in meanings and in means. (Almost not a day goes by when I don't consult the anagram generator. My oracle.)

2. What do most poorly-written poems have in common?

Adam Fitzgerald (author of The Late Parade):
Their certainty.

Matthew Zapruder (author of Sun Bear):
Inattention.

Matthea Harvey (author of Modern Life):
Boring titles and a lack of specificity. Poets should spend at least as much time on their titles as they do on their hair.


Laura Kasischke (author of Space in Chains):
A poorly-written poem is one a poet decides to write for the wrong reasons -- to be published, or to experiment, or to impress someone -- and the poet knows that he or she has cheated, and the reader senses that it's not authentic, the impulse out of which the poem arose. A poorly-written poem is a marriage of convenience, and it might look even better than a towering passion, on the surface, but we all sense there's something fundamentally messy and crucial missing.

3. What do most well-written poems have in common?

Adam Fitzgerald:
Their certainty.

Paul Legault (author of The Emily Dickinson Reader):
I like it when they wink at you. When they ask you to ask: what the hell is this?

Matthew Zapruder:
A beauty that obliterates all consideration.

Henri Cole (author of Touch):
A truth-seeking flame. Aesthetic dignity.

Matthea Harvey:
Well-written poems can be deadly, if they're just good from a craft point of view--who wants a perfectly formed fish lying dead on the page? Great poems are unpredictable, imaginative and a bit alarming, like a consortium of octopuses escaping through a one-inch hole.

Laura Kasischke:
They, as has been said, arose from necessity. The subject matter of the poem matters. The sound and the imagery and the line breaks all serve that important subject matter. Often, such a poem is written, it seems from what poets' tell us, in a semi-conscous state, and the fact that it all falls into place is as haphazard as it is attributable to the talent or genius or learning of the poet. Something has taken place at a deeper than conscious level for the poet, and this is brought to the surface for the reader, who has a similar experience reading the poem.

4. How important is accessibility of meaning? Should one have to work hard to "solve" the poem?


Nick Courtright (author of Let There Be Light):
I think a poem should be a gift that keeps on giving. In other words, I think something rewarding should be present on the very first read that the poem shouldn't be so inscrutable or filled with obscurities and allusions from deep in the stacks of history that it cannot be enjoyed on an initial encounter, especially if it's encountered aloud. But I also don't want a poem so "simple" that it doesn't offer much on subsequent readings. To me, the perfect balance is a poem that is friendly, but thought-provoking, which, like an individual, can be a tough thing to find, but worth searching for.

Robert Pinsky (author of Selected Poems):
The words "accessibility" and "solve" don't seem useful to me in relation to poetry. Other people may like them, and I can respect that: the terms just don't correspond to my actual experience as a reader or a writer.

Henri Cole:
Difficulty isn't reason enough not to read a poem. Accessibility can be over-rated.

Matthew Zapruder:
Probably the biggest misconceptions among the general public about poetry is that the poem is a riddle that hides what the poet is "really" saying. Despite what we might have been taught in school, great poems are never, ever written that way. If you are trying to "solve" the poem you are reading in the wrong way. And if you are writing poems that need to be solved, or in any way hiding what you are saying behind decorative language and imagery, please stop. If a poem is difficult, and they often are, it must be because the poem is approaching what is impossible to say in any other way.

Laura Kasischke:
What I want to hear about a poem with which I've engaged, but found no answers in, from the poet is "I was trying to figure out what this poem was about as I was writing it, but I still don't know." But there's a thin line between mystery and obscurity. Mystery leaves the door open to many possibilities. Obscurity leaves the door firmly shut. If I'm not going to leave a poem knowing exactly what it meant, I want to leave the poem wondering, worried, intrigued, bothered, pestered by it for life.

Richard Siken (author of War of Foxes, forthcoming in 2015):
If there was a scale from 1 to 100 -- from pure clarity to absolute incomprehensibility -- I would want each and every number within that range to be represented. There are, and there should be, as many kinds of poetry as there are genres of music, architecture, painting, sculpture. I think we're so impoverished in our thinking, so frugal in our experiences, that we believe we always know what we want and we should get that every time.

5. What book are you reading right now?

Adam Fitzgerald:
Einstein: A Biography, by Jürgen Neffe, translated by Shelley Frisch.

Henri Cole:
The Journals of Sylvia Plath.

Matthea Harvey:
Boy, Snow, Bird by Helen Oyeyemi.

Cyrus Cassells (Author of Crossed-Out Swastika):
Right now I'm reading The Earth Avails by Mark Wunderlich.

Heather McHugh:
Joe Wenderoth's If I Don't Breathe, How Do I Sleep.

Robert Pinsky:
The Roots of Romanticism by Isaiah Berlin. Also, Welcome to Dingburg, by Bill Griffith.

David Lehman (author of New and Selected Poems):
Exit Ghost by Philip Roth.

Alfred Corn:
An early novel of Marguerite Yourcenar's, titled Coup de grâce. I don't believe it has been translated yet.

ONE ON ONE: 5 Minutes With John Forte On What A 14-Year Prison Sentence Taught Him

April 1, 2014, 12:11 pm

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John Forte is a highly acclaimed hip-hop writer, producer and performer who has released four solo albums and worked with the Fugees, Wyclef Jean and Herbie Hancock. Forte co-wrote and produced two songs on the enormously successful Fugees' album The Score, which won Best Rap Album at the 1997 Grammy Awards. A year later, Forte released his own critically acclaimed debut album, Poly Sci, which was produced by Wyclef Jean. In addition to rap and hip-hop, Forte is also classically trained, having studied violin at the prestigious Phillips Exeter Academy in New Hampshire.

Forte is also a convicted criminal, who served eight years in federal prison after he was found guilty of drug trafficking in 2001. He released his second album, the confessional I, John, in 2002 while serving time at Pennsylvania's Lorreto Federal Penitentiary. President George W. Bush later pardoned Forte's 14-year sentence in 2008. Since his release from prison, Forte has become an activist for criminal justice reform, and is particularly passionate about America's juvenile justice system.

"I saw the worst reflection of our society as evidenced in our prison system," he says. "We are hemorrhaging right now."

Forte openly admits he did the wrong thing involving himself in criminal enterprise, but says he shares his story in the hope of affecting positive change in the lives of other young people who may also be susceptible to such a path.

"My activism towards criminal justice reform and towards juvenile justice is very, very personal," he says. "I do it by telling my narrative as opposed to trying to preach to people. I think that as an artist, it's my responsibility, self imposed or otherwise, to tell my story as honestly as I possibly can."

The U.S. has the highest documented incarceration rate in the world. About 1 in 35 adults were supervised by the adult correctional systems at the end of 2012, according to the U.S. Bureau of Justice Statistics. Those same statistics showed that black males ages 18 to 19 were almost 9.5 times more likely than white males of the same age group to be in prison and overall, black males were 6 times and Hispanic males 2.5 times more likely to be imprisoned than white males in 2012.

Forte's activism in this area manifests as wanting to see the nation pay more attention to the issues surrounding incarceration; youth mental health, education and how, in his words, "we're failing our kids."

"I don't want to play the race card, but I would be a fool to say I did not notice a disproportionate number of children of color in the juvenile criminal justice system," he says. "How are we failing these kids, and what can we do to make it better?"

Forte's compulsion to try and bring attention to the issue stems from his own experience; for him, the personal is political.

"When I was away, there was a number of guys I served time with who said, 'The first thing I'm going to do when I get out of here is forget this ever happened,' and for me, that wasn't an option," says Forte. "I don't have the luxury of being able to forget about my past, for better or worse."

Theater: Heathers The Musical? What's Their Damage?

April 1, 2014, 12:16 pm

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HEATHERS THE MUSICAL * 1/2 out of ****
RED VELVET *** out of ****


HEATHERS THE MUSICAL * 1/2 out of ****
NEW WORLD STAGES

If you sort of winced at the title Heathers The Musical, detecting a distinct lack of imagination -- well, you're right. The black comedy was one of my favorite films of 1989 and a brief scan of the films above Heathers shows a lot of other properties that will probably get musicalized some day soon, if they haven't already: The War Of The Roses, Field Of Dreams, Say Anything, Dead Poets Society, Scandal (whoops, Andrew Lloyd Webber just bombed in London tackling that same story) and in the spirit of Heathers we might get Bill & Ted's Excellent Adventure. Whoah, dude!

It's not just that Heathers feels like a property rather than a passion. The more you think about it, the trickier such a project proves. Heathers was an outrageous satire with two career-defining roles for Winona Ryder and Christian Slater, who both immediately became much much cooler thanks to this film. More tricky, the film includes a homicidal student offing classmates for bullying and then threatening to blow the entire school sky high with explosives. This was silly, even though Slater made it sexily appealing. When our heroine joked her teen angst had a body count, it was funny, not intended as a harbinger of things to come. It's the cool loner who is supposed to rescue us from conformity. But in the case of Heathers, the cool loner proves a lunatic even scarier than a head cheerleader.

So Heathers The Musical must give juicy roles to two leads who can step out of the shadows of those memorable performances, navigate material about school shootings now far too believable and write a clutch of catchy songs. It doesn't succeed.

The scenic design of Timothy R. Mackabee is nonexistent but the costumes of Amy Clark pay suitable homage to the movie and get the show off to a colorful start with "Beautiful," a generic but somewhat catchy number that introduces the main characters and sets up the treacherous waters of high school where cliques are everything. The book, music and lyrics are by the team of Kevin Murphy (Reefer Madness) and Laurence O'Keefe (Legally Blonde, the beloved Bat Boy).

We meet Veronica (Barrett Wilbert Weed), the smart girl who decides to get in with the "Heathers" so she can survive school, never imagining they'll take her under their wings. Looking on with disapproval is the cool loner J.D. (Ryan McCartan), who dons a trench coat in an appropriate but still uncomfortable reminder of Columbine. To go along with her new friends (led ably by the standout Heather of Jessica Keenan Wynn), Veronica allows them to taunt her former best friend Martha (Katie Ladner). Still, J.D. quotes poetry and is super cool and Veronica beds him, only to find that when they accidentally kill one Heather, he thinks that's an excellent idea and begins to off anyone that annoys him. As in the film, it climaxes with J.D. threatening to blow up the entire school with a bomb and Veronica desperately trying to stop him



Problems abound, starting with the songs. "Freeze Your Brain," an ode to 7-Eleven and Slurpees (the home away from home for the itinerant J.D.) is alright and a few others are ok. But songs about being horny, about partying the night away and a tune of defiance ("Dead Girl Walking") all blend together. The closest they get to a proper tune revealing character and pushing the story forward is the act two number "Seventeen" in which Heather rather plaintively wishes she could just be 17 for a while, a piece that might work in years to come for anyone who can identify with growing up too fast.

But vocally, the cast isn't up to the raucous demands of the melodies. When asked to sing in a regular singing voice, Weed, McMartan and the rest do fine. But often the numbers push things to a rock and roll decibel and the result is truly akin more to screeching as these theater babies try to find their inner Janis Joplin, especially Weed on "Dead Girl Walking" and Michelle Duffy as the hippie teacher/counselor Ms. Fleming on "Shine A Light." Either hire different singers or adjust the songs to suit their voices.

Crucially, the musical fails to understand the black humor that runs throughout the film and undercut their own tale time and again. Notably, some of the best dialogue from the film is peppered throughout the play, but they whiz by and barely register, except for the classic line about chainsaws that here is delivered in telegraphed, get-ready-to-applaud style.

More fundamentally, they missed the joke: in Heathers, when the lead Heather dies and it's seen as a suicide, offing yourself suddenly seems like the coolest thing in town. So when Martha tries to kill herself and fails, she's mocked for trying to be cool but failing even at suicide. (The play ignores that mostly.) Another Heather confesses her fears anonymously on the radio, but here that's turned into her becoming a TV news whore, offering up her story to anyone with a camera. In the movie, when her confession of fear is "outed," she too is mocked because killing yourself is cool but whimpering about your insecurity is not. In the movie, that Heather then really does try to kill herself but Veronica stops her. It's brutal, funny and real because nothing has actually changed except what constitutes "cool."

The irony piles up with the murder of two bullying jocks that J.D. frames as a gay suicide pact. It prompts one of the funniest lines in the movie: the loutish dad of one of the boys (a father who has been shown to be as much of a knuckle-dragger as his kid) is moved to hysteria, throws himself on the coffin and shouts out, "I love my dead gay son." This is completely ruined in the musical because in a lame attempt to up the ante, the two dads admit at the funeral that they've fooled around before and start making out. Of course, if they're gay, then it's not really funny anymore that they've become sensitized to gay issues; it's just sad that it took the death/suicide of their sons to get them to admit it. And if they're gay, maybe their brutish, date-rapey kids really were gay too and just over-compensating. All the nasty black humor is leached out of it. See how the problems compound when you randomly switch things around?

Finally, Veronica is softened up way too much. In the film, she's more deeply implicated in the murder of the jocks, albeit unwittingly, which makes it easier to understand why she doesn't turn in J.D. or back off sooner. Her final showdown with J.D. is more hilariously bad-ass cinematically, with the blast that kills him lighting Veronica's cigarette, signaling her complete transformation. In the musical, it's far more anguished and wimpy, with lessons to be learned and hugs to be shared.

Other than the costumes, little can be highlighted, including the anonymous direction of Andy Fickman and choreography of Marguerite Derricks. They try to give Ladner a solo highlight with "Kindergarten Boyfriend," but she can only do so much with a modest number. The rest, from "Prom Or Hell?" to "My Dead Gay Son" and "Shine A Light," simply leave no impression. You can't adapt a black comedy by trying to lighten it up; that just turns everything grey. So Heathers The Musical is not very, not very at all.


RED VELVET *** out of ****
ST. ANN'S WAREHOUSE

Red Velvet is an intriguing experience. The inspiration for playwright Lolita Chokrabarti is the life of actor Ira Aldridge, an African American artist who enjoyed major acclaim in Europe as a Shakespearean actor in the 1800s. Like many blacks in the 20th century who found refuge from racism on the Continent, Aldridge left America to work first as a dresser in the UK, then worked his way onto the stage in small demonstrations and ultimately major roles including Othello (of course) and Shylock and the title role in Richard III.

It's a rich life story and Chokrabarti was clearly overwhelmed with the possibilities: racism in the theater and the world in the 19th century, changing styles in acting, an aging artist at the end of his days, the passing of the torch from one bright light (Edmund Kean) to another, friendship among outcasts and more all offer strands for this drama. And there's the rub. Chokrabarti has assembled ideas for several different plays and strung them together. It's an unsatisfying work, but is presented with such skill and precision by director Indhu Rubasingham and the entire cast (especially Adrian Lester as Aldridge) that the evening itself is satisfying nonetheless.

Here's a trailer from the UK run:



It begins with the actors on stage, all facing makeup mirrors on either side, preparing for the show. At times throughout the night, they sit quietly or watch the proceedings of each other onstage with varying degrees of intensity and reaction. This isn't a full-proof device but it's often effective and here it's done with nuance and precision.

Then comes a framing device that would be unnecessary if Lester weren't so commanding as the elderly Aldridge. A female Polish journalist (Rachel Finnegan, good in multiple roles) is trying to break down barriers herself by snagging an interview with the legendary actor. (Aldridge was especially popular in Russia and Eastern Europe.) The lion in winter growls and snaps but doesn't bite and soon agrees to answer a few of her questions, invariably with a dismissive comment about how foolish those questions are or complaints about the journalist not having her facts right. Lester is magnetic here, sagging in weariness but immediately conveying the demanding majesty of a star of the theater. But even he can't keep us from seeing this device as merely decoration, especially when it wastes time at the end of the show by delving into the journalist's travails (we don't care any more than Aldridge does).

Happily, this is finally ended and we get to the heart of the matter by jumping back decades in time. The great Edmund Kean is ill and his theater company is at loose ends for that evening's performance of Othello. It's just the opportunity the French manager Pierre (Eugene O'Hare) has been waiting for. Despite Kean's son Charles (Oliver Ryan) expecting to take over the lead role and everyone else to "move up," (that is, take the next role up in importance), Pierre says everyone will remain as they are and the unknown Ira Aldridge will play the Moor. That's a ticklish proposition even before most of them find out Aldridge is black and will be wooing and killing the paramour of Charles, leading lady Ellen Tree (an excellent Charlotte Lucas).

It's not just Aldridge's skin that rankles some, for he also proposes a more modern style of acting. This is the heart of the show and where it truly delivers. The rehearsal scenes are funny and fascinating. Aldridge isn't Brando -- he's still assuming the awfully mannered poses of his fellow cast members. But he's also driven by an intellectual desire to appear more natural onstage and politely but firmly suggests Tree actually look at him when he has arrived as Othello and they're saying hello. It's a revolutionary idea to the others, in a way, but Tree takes to it like a duck to water and has suggestions of her own to offer, like mildly suggesting he change how to pronounce the word "content."

This creative banter is good but almost nothing compared to the remarkable effect when we get a glimpse of that evening's Othello performance in progress. Somehow, Lester and Lucas manage to embody the mannered acting style of an earlier era. Without anachronism or suddenly seeming "modern" a la Shakespeare In Love, they breathe life into their parts and show both how that earlier style could transfix audiences and how Aldridge and others were dragging it into a new immediacy. When he demands she produce the ill-fated handkerchief and she can't, Lester as Aldridge as Othello emits a passionate exhalation of breath that sounds like the rousing anger of a dragon. It's positively magnetic. (The excellent sound is by Paul Arditti.)

If only the show had spent more time on this creative process with the irony that critics would dismiss Aldridge out of hand for racist reasons serving as the denouement. One fellow cast member defends him against hateful slurs by deliciously saying he thought Aldridge's pronunciation was very good..."for an American." That right there is the rich vein Chokrabarti should have mined further.

Instead, this highlight is followed by a knock-down drag out fight between Aldridge and Pierre. It has little import because until they begin fighting, their relationship hasn't been made clear in the least. Was Aldridge his servant as some actors think? It's clearly implied that Pierre is gay and that Aldridge stood by him during some earlier crisis; fair enough but how much support could a black American actor who hasn't had his big break truly offer? It sounds like Pierre fought for Aldridge every step of the way, so is it wrong for him to feel so betrayed?

They then hint that Pierre might have underlying prejudices of his own, when perhaps it might have been better to present their parry and thrust in more ironic terms rather than as revelation. In any case, when we haven't the slightest idea how important the relationship is between these two friends and what it's based on, it's hard to know what's at stake when they fight.

Unfortunately, this fight is the climax of the play, followed by a return to the aging Aldridge and the uninteresting plight of a Polish woman who wants to make it as a journalist.

With all these flaws in the dramatic structure, it's a testament to the excellent cast, all the technical elements and Rubasingham's steady hand that Red Velvet is as enjoyable as it is. We'll never get to study the acting style of the 19 century the way we can observe early silent movies. But for a few brief, marvelous moments, Lester and Lucas and the others take us back in time.


THEATER OF 2014

Beautiful: The Carole King Musical ***
Rodney King ***
Hard Times ** 1/2
Rosencrantz And Guildenstern Are Dead **
I Could Say More *
The Loneliness Of The Long Distance Runner **
Machinal ***
Outside Mullingar ***
A Man's A Man * 1/2
The Tribute Artist ** 1/2
Transport **
Prince Igor at the Met **
The Bridges Of Madison County ** 1/2
Kung Fu (at Signature) **
Stage Kiss ***
Satchmo At The Waldorf ***
Antony and Cleopatra at the Public **
All The Way ** 1/2
The Open House (Will Eno at Signature) ** 1/2
Wozzeck (at Met w Deborah Voigt and Thomas Hampson and Simon O'Neill)
Hand To God ***
Tales From Red Vienna **
Appropriate (at Signature) *
Rocky * 1/2
Aladdin ***
Mothers And Sons **
Les Miserables *** 1/2
Breathing Time * 1/2
Cirque Du Soleil's Amaluna * 1/2
Heathers The Musical * 1/2
Red Velvet at St. Ann's Warehouse ***
Broadway By The Year 1940-1964 *** 1/2
A Second Chance **

Thanks for reading. Michael Giltz is the founder and CEO of the forthcoming websiteBookFilter, a book lover's best friend. It's a website that lets you browse for books online the way you do in a physical bookstore, provides comprehensive info on new releases every week in every category and offers passionate personal recommendations every step of the way. It's like a fall book preview or holiday gift guide -- but every week in every category. He's also the cohost of Showbiz Sandbox, a weekly pop culture podcast that reveals the industry take on entertainment news of the day and features top journalists and opinion makers as guests. It's available for free on iTunes. Visit Michael Giltz at his website and his daily blog. Download his podcast of celebrity interviews and his radio show, also called Popsurfing and also available for free on iTunes.

Note: Michael Giltz is provided with free tickets to shows with the understanding that he will be writing a review. All productions are in New York City unless otherwise indicated.

A Big Spring for Tony Classics

April 1, 2014, 12:42 pm

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I write about the Tony Awards a lot. I admit it. A couple of weeks ago, The New York Post's Michael Riedel wrote about Cabaret's potential eligibility and I felt the need to respond. Now I feel equally compelled to talk about another big issue facing the Tony Awards Administration Committee: the numerous "classics" present this season. This spring will feature the Broadway debut of four shows that will likely be considered revivals.

As you may know, the Tony Awards have a rule that makes plays and musicals eligible in the revival category even if they have never been on Broadway before. The rule was enacted in fall 2002, the season after Fortune's Fool was eligible in the Best Play category. (It came just in time to prevent Frankie and Johnny in the Clair de Lune and Little Shop of Horrors from being deemed "new.") The rule states as follows:

A play or musical that is determined by the Tony Awards Administration Committee (in its sole discretion) to be a "classic" or in the historical or popular repertoire shall not be eligible for an Award in the Best Play or Best Musical category but may be eligible in the appropriate Best Revival category, if any, provided it meets all other eligibility requirements set forth in these Rules.

Last year, the committee made Cinderella a revival, even though a strong argument could be made that this Cinderella was new. It had a brand new book and four additional songs from the Rodgers & Hammerstein catalog. Nevertheless it was deemed a revival. And, so, we see the Administration Committee may favor treating things as revivals. There is a strong public policy purpose behind that. The American Theatre Wing and the Broadway League, the two organizations who jointly administer the Tony Awards, want writers to keep creating new work. That is how theater grows. The organizations want to incentivize new work by honoring more of it. That is easier to do if new work is not up against old work. It's as simple as that.

The four shows that this rule may very well impact this spring are Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill, Violet, The Cripple of Inishmaan and Hedwig and the Angry Inch. I think all of them will be deemed revivals.

Lanie Robertson's Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill (not to be confused with the Lady Day that ran off-Broadway last year) premiered at Atlanta's Alliance Theatre in 1986 before moving off-Broadway. It is frequently performed at regional theaters and seemingly in the popular repertoire. The show actually has its fate in the hands of the Tony Administration Committee in more than one regard. The committee may also need to bless that it is a play, not a musical. Marlene was a musical, End of the Rainbow a play. The IBDB page for Lady Day at Emerson's Bar & Grill originally called it a musical, but it has since been changed. A production spokesperson told me that it is a "play with music," not a "musical." Strategy-wise this is a good call for the production. Leading lady Audra McDonald has a better shot at a Tony if the production is considered a play. While the move into the play world means she won't automatically get to perform on the broadcast, End of the Rainbow's Tracie Bennett did get a telecast slot. I suspect the Tony folks won't turn down the offer of an Audra performance.

Violet is a less well-known title. The musical had a short run at Playwrights Horizons in 1997. It doesn't boast a famous subject. It isn't a show most theatergoers would recognize. However the Brian Crawley/Jeanine Tesori musical has a cult following. It has been performed extensively regionally. The show was highly regarded enough to get a sold-out Encores! Off-Center staging last year. It is far from a new musical.

The Cripple of Inishmaan has already had two off-Broadway engagements, a short run in 1998 at the Public and a longer run at the Atlantic from December 2008-March 2009. Those runs alone probably sink its chances of being considered in the Best Play category. Let alone all the other productions of the play that have taken place (two of which I've even seen).

Hedwig and the Angry Inch seems even more obvious than the rest. First, it ran off-Broadway for two-years-plus almost a decade-and-a-half ago. Then there is the movie and all the regional and international mountings. Best Revival of a Musical category. So that means (assuming Lady Day is considered a play and Cabaret is not eligible) two of the three shows eligible in that category are "classics" in the Tony-sense: Violet and Hedwig. (Les Miz would be referred to as a classic in another sense.)

And so it goes, the classics rule is tested once again. If I'm wrong on any of the above, stay tuned for yet another column on this topic.

Tomfoolery Is Afoot: A New Blog Is Mocking 'Honest Slogans'

April 1, 2014, 1:23 pm

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As some of you may know, I created the website Honest Slogans wherein I construct and write slogans for brands and what people really think of them. I've published three installments on The Huffington Post thus far (Part 1, Part 2, and Part 3), and they've been shared on many other online mediums as well.

After being tipped off by a subscriber to my Honest Slogans site, it appears that someone has made a counterblog entitled Dishonest Slogans that takes slogans from my site and makes them, well, dishonest as opposed to truthful. Below I have posted a few of the ones they've added to the site.

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Jeremy Jordan Can't 'Let It Go' and Zosia Mamet Joins the Newsies at Miscast

April 1, 2014, 1:41 pm

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Zosia Mamet performs a number from Newsies at Miscast. (Photo by Dooleyvision/Fotobuddy©2014)

Jeremy Jordan is having a hard time getting over what happened last year. You see, at the annual Miscast Gala in 2013, which is presented by MCC Theater, Jordan sang the Smash hit "Let Me Be Your Star," when Jonathan Groff came onstage and stole his thunder. (Both men also sported blonde wigs so the gag was supposedly planned.)

However at this year's event, which was held on Monday night at the Hammerstein Ballroom, Jordan sought revenge. He recalled how he and Groff audition for many of the same projects, including the animated film Frozen, in which Groff voiced the part of Kristoff. "I could do Jonathan's big song from Frozen!" Jordan exclaimed. "Oh wait, he didn't get a big song." So Jordan performed "the next best thing,"Let It Go." Mimicking Princess Elsa's snow-making powers with his hands, Jordan nailed every note.

The gimmick behind the Miscast gala is actors perform numbers that they are totally wrong for. Men can play women, women can play men; anything is game. Sasha Allen, who appeared in Hair on Broadway and in the cult-favorite film Camp, opened the show with the Four Seasons' "Can't Take My Eyes Off You." "I will never be a Jersey Boy," Allen joked. "I'm a black female."

Steven Pasquale, currently starring on in The Bridges of Madison County, performed from Carousel, "which I will never be cast in." While Pasquale might be right for some of the male characters in the show, he performed Nettie Fowler's big song "You'll Never Walk Alone" in some of the sweetest dulcet tenor tones around. As the event wrapped up, buzzing about Pasquale's performance could be heard throughout the ballroom.

All the men continued the theme of playing female roles. Lin-Manuel Miranda and Raúl Esparza played Anita and Maria respectively in the duet "A Boy Like That" from West Side Story, while the evening also boasted two Fanny Brices: Esparza also sang "My Man" and Joey Taranto did "Let Me Be Your Star," both from Funny Girl. "Hey mom, I'm not in the bathroom anymore!" Taranto exclaimed, after recalling his young years pretending to be Barbra Streisand in front of the mirror.

Marc Kudisch, who just concluded his run in Hand to God at MCC, brought up his friend and 9 to 5 co-star Allison Janney, who was honored at the event, for his number "Popular" from Wicked. Janney sat center stage while Kudisch paraded around her, and finished the number in an (impressive) full split.

"My whole life has been a miscast," Tony winner Billy Porter said, explaining his early years in musical theater in Pittsburg playing roles like Fagin in Oliver. Porter took on Mama Rose, singing "Everything's Coming Up Roses" from Gypsy. Porter is currently on Broadway in the role that won him a Tony in Kinky Boots.


Jeremy Jordan performs at Miscast. (Photo by Dooleyvision/Fotobuddy©2014)

And the women decided to do some cross-dressing as well. Nicole Parker, a Miscast mainstay who regularly performs at the gala, sang "I Believe," Elder Price's big number from The Book of Mormon, and later on, she shared some of her signature impressions of Ellen DeGeneres, Celine Dion, Zooey Deschanel, Lena Dunham, Patti LuPone and Pink while singing "Neverland" from Peter Pan. (She did the number as a sort of joke try-out for these celebrities for the upcoming live broadcast of Peter Pan on NBC.) Allen also performed Jean Valjean's second act ballad "Bring Him Home" from Les Misérables, while Girls star Zosia Mamet had perhaps one of the most memorable numbers of the evening. Mamet, who appeared in her first play Really Really with MCC, wore coveralls to rehearsal one day, and a photo of her outfit was shared with casting director and MCC co-artistic director Bernard Telsey. "Well, she has to do Newsies," Mamet remembers of Telsey's reaction. So Mamet donned a newsboy cap and joined former Newsies cast members in "Seize the Day" from the Tony-winning musical. (She even learned and performed much of the number's original choreography.)

Jordan concluded the evening's presentation, still jokingly harping on some of his bitterness toward Groff, and delivered a mash-up of "Over the Rainbow" from The Wizard of Oz and "Home" from The Wiz. Nailing it again, Jordan certainly had the last laugh.

The Art of Death

April 1, 2014, 2:03 pm

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The question I am asked the most in my line of work is "what is art?" Is it limited to paintings or drawings? Is it defined by a certain medium? What if I can't figure out what the artist was thinking when he created it?

Those are all great questions. If you look up the word "art" in the dictionary, the definition states: The expression or application of human creative skill and imagination, typically in a visual form such as painting or sculpture, producing works to be appreciated primarily for their beauty or emotional power.

I think that definition sums it up quite well and I would add "Art is open to interpretation."




(Rights of Spring - Photo Credit: Wayne Gilbert)



A few months ago I received a call from a film producer friend. He was interested in making a documentary about Wayne Gilbert, a contemporary artist from Houston. His name I didn't recognize. Since finding investors or a distributor for a film about a relatively unknown artist is near impossible, I wondered why the interest? It turns out he works in a very interesting medium.

"He uses dead people," said the producer.

I wondered if I'd heard him correctly. "Dead people?" I said. "Meaning?"

His explanation was quite unexpected. "The ashes of the deceased," he replied.

I have long had issues with death. I don't know what it is about death that disturbs me so, but it's something I have never come to terms with. And I wondered what kind of person would make art out of the ashes of dead people? Isn't that sacrilegious? Or at least in bad taste?




(End is the Beginning...Beginning is the End Photo Credit: Wayne Gilbert)



Over the next hour I would learn more about the artist, how he came to choose that medium, and where he gets his "supplies" from.

Every day thousands of people around the world who are homeless or have no next of kin die. Often, their remains are sent to a morgue and no one claims them. Eventually they are cremated, and are bagged and tagged as "Unknown." After a period of time, the remains are thrown away. My heart sank at the thought of this.

Gilbert takes a somber situation and breathes new life into it. He puts a face to that unknown name. His art however does not memorialize the person. He knows nothing about them. Not what they looked like, where they are from, what they did in life, etc. Occasionally there is a name, but nothing more.

I took a tour of his gallery. As I sat in my car outside waiting to go in, I wondered just how I would feel looking at his work knowing my issues with death. As I walked in the studio I was greeted by a smiling face, not the Grimm Reaper you might suspect. I was given the grand tour and was blown away at the very powerful messages each of his picture told. My questions were few, but I was curious where his inspiration comes from. He told me he doesn't wake up in the morning knowing what he is going to paint. He walks up to the canvas, and it just happens.




(Solitary Journey Photo Credit: Wayne Gilbert)



Gilbert has been an artist since the '80s. It wasn't long before he realized how difficult it was to sell contemporary art. Many artists at the time were exploring different mediums. Determined to find his own unique style, he came upon the idea of working with ashes and so became his "signature" ever since. How has his work been received over the years? It depends on who you ask.

"Only in America do we have this thing about death," he stated. "We sweep it under the rug and don't talk about it."

Other countries celebrate death. He has been asked many times in the past to commission a work memorializing the death of someone's loved ones, to which he has refused.

"I could have made a lot of money saying yes," claimed Gilbert. "It's just not what I do."

When Gilbert started down this path he asked himself this question: "What is Art?"

So I ask you the same. What do you think?

The images here are just a few I thought were quite thought provoking. Alas, I suggest you visit his studio if in the Houston area, or check out his website at http://www.waynegilbert.com/

---

César Chávez: An American Legend Remembered

April 1, 2014, 3:35 pm

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"We need a leader, not a martyr!" pleads the brother of beloved labor leader César Chávez in a memorable scene from the film of the same name. The farmworker movement, largely attributed to Chávez and the United Farmworkers Union (UFW), was at a critical juncture in its development when, in 1988, the leader goes on a 36-day fast to call attention to deplorable working conditions and to emphasize the importance of non-violent tactics.

César Chávez, directed by Diego Luna, opened in major theaters on March 28th.

Leader or martyr? Many of us believe César Chávez to be both, which has elevated him to iconic status. He was also a visionary, humble servant and, as the film portrays in a compelling subplot, a caring father. As a Chicano activist, who spent many hours in the early '70s manning picket lines in support of the UFW's boycott of non-union grapes and lettuce, and who also welcomed Chávez into his home, the man looms larger than life in mine. And, yet, we know that biographic films can prove troublesome because they sometimes tend to glorify the subject in ways that are schmaltzy and sometimes error-prone. I think the film got it mostly right. I found it to be a well-crafted, straightforward account of his life's work.

However, there is one aspect that troubled me. We know that Filipino farmworkers were the first to organize, and that Chávez really depended on them to start and build the UFW. Without Filipino audacity and commitment, some argue, Chávez would not have been successful. And, while there is a role for Larry Itliong, one of the most prominent Filipino UFW leaders (played by Darion Basco), the film simply doesn't do justice to the Filipino role in the farmworker movement, nor do we get a feel for how they lived side-by-side with Mexican and Chicano farmworkers. Notably, the film doesn't mention Philip Vera Cruz, another Filipino leader who was a Vice President of the UFW, but resigned when Chávez accepted, for unfathomable reasons, an invitation to visit the Philippines by the detested and widely condemned dictator Ferdinand Marcos. I have a portrait of Vera Cruz hanging in my home, so I can't hide my disappointment. Like Chávez, filmmaker Luna made some mistakes.

"We don't negotiate with children," snipes the scion of the Bogdonovitch family, during a dinner meeting with other big growers, emphatically disagreeing with the proposal to bargain with the UFW. Played elegantly by John Malkovich, the senior Bogdonovitch represents the kind of racist-inspired and mean-spirited corporate avarice that would eventually backfire and force a key cadre of growers to negotiate a settlement with the UFW. While it is important to celebrate just labor victories, it is also critical to recognize that Bognonovitch represents a previous incarnation of today's corporate archetype who too often colludes with others to export jobs, secure lower labor costs, oppose labor organizing, and otherwise ensure worker exploitation and higher profits. The film depicts a gleeful Chávez tossing a box of Bogdonovitch grapes into the River Thames after he successfully wins British labor union support for the UFW's cause, precipitating colluding California farmers to finally sit down at the bargaining table, much to the chagrin of then-Governor, Ronald Reagan, who is interviewed in the film, calling the UFW huelga (strike) "immoral."

And, the struggle continues. An article in The New York Times, published the same weekend as the film's release, details California growers' boiling impatience with Congress' failure to pass comprehensive immigration reform. They are concerned not because they have suddenly become bleeding heart liberals -- on the contrary -- most are died-in-the-wool conservative Republicans. They are up in arms because reform is necessary to secure a consistent labor pool, which is critical to achieving their profit margins. As reported, powerful grower associations are actually threatening to withhold financial support for key Republican candidates unless they change their tunes. We'll see how effective this strategy is in turning the political tide.

The film produces plenty of emotional swings -- for me -- no more heartfelt than the series of interactions with his eldest son, who bears the brunt of high school harassment, attributable to his father's high profile and demonization by the controlling powers that be. He is also resentful of his father's long absences and apparent indifference. Despite Chávez's concerted efforts, estrangement occurs, but one, especially a father of grown children like me, is left hopeful, and a tearful mess, when we see the son reading a thoughtful and soulful letter of amends from his hero father. It is this depiction of Chávez as a fallible human figure that makes the film all the more powerful and successful.

Several years ago, the U.S. Postal Service produced a commemorative César Chávez stamp. I think I cleaned out my local post office of this stamp issue on more than one occasion. I also regularly wear a lapel pin bearing the same likeness of the dear and modestly powerful man who inspired a generation. I am thankful to all who have now brought this important American story to local movie screens, thankful that they have reminded us of the endearing importance of just causes and of our responsibility to do our best to support them.

César Chávez is a must-see experience.

Mike Kelley: The Sacred and the Profane

April 1, 2014, 3:54 pm

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Huge, sprawling exhibition devoted to the art of one of the best-known LA artists, Mike Kelley (1954 - 2012), just opened at the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA. With 250 artworks in different media, this retrospective traces three decades of Kelley's exceptionally prolific career. And it's important to notice the particular elegance and grace with which this complex exhibition is designed and presented by MOCA curator, Bennett Simpson.



I had the good fortune to see the version of this exhibition last summer at the Pompidou Centre in Paris. There, it was less than half of the current exhibition at MOCA, and somehow it came across as a dramatic, even overwhelming story of the troubled artist and of his art as a diary of his tortured soul.



Born in Detroit, Kelley spent most of his adult life here in LA. After graduating from CalArts, he quickly gained a reputation not only as an artist but also as a teacher, collaborator, and performer. If you've ever seen his work before, you might be somewhat prepared for the inevitable sense of shock that you will experience in this exhibition as you immerse yourself into the sacred and profane world of Mike Kelley. Sex, violence, childhood innocence, torture, frustration, religious longing; it's all there -- and much more.



Ann Goldstein, former director of the Stedelijk Museum in Amsterdam, where this exhibition originated, had this to say about Kelley: "Nothing is sacrosanct in his work -- not so-called high culture, history, literature, music, philosophy, psychology, religion, or education. In brining together his interest in so-called low culture -- from crafts to comic strips -- with a reconsideration of identity and sexuality, he was nothing less than revelatory."



The terrible news of the artist's suicide came just a few months before this retrospective was scheduled to open in Stedelijk Museum in 2012. People who were close to Kelley were crushed by his death but, knowing the numerous demons that haunted him throughout his life, they were not entirely surprised. In a strange coincidence, another internationally celebrated cultural figure, fashion guru Alexander McQueen, committed suicide a few months before his groundbreaking exhibition opened at the Metropolitan Museum, New York in 2011.



From what I have read and heard from a number of artists honored with a mid-career museum retrospective, I understand that such an experience can be overwhelming and, on occasion, can even temporarily block their creative flow. Compare it with your experience going to a high school or college reunion after not seeing your former friends for maybe 20 or 30 years. It's rather unsettling and even troubling to see and realize how much you have changed and how many of these people, once close, are now total strangers.



Recently, visiting the studio of one of LA's artists, I asked him how he feels about the potential of confronting all his past works at once. He said, "No way." Then, he continued by saying that, for him, making a new piece is like having a fight, a good fight, but when it's over, it's over. To confront it again would be unsettling and painful. He doesn't want to see the work, think about it, or talk about it; it's done. The relationship is over.



Lucky for us who are not artists, just mere mortals, we can experience the artists' work and be inspired, challenged, and even unsettled. But hopefully without the danger of being crushed.


P.S. If you want to learn about Edward's Fine Art of Art Collecting Classes, please visit his website here. You can also read The New York Times article about his classes here.


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Edward Goldman is an art critic and the host of Art Talk, a program on art and culture for NPR affiliate KCRW 89.9 FM. To listen to the complete show and hear Edward's charming Russian accent, click here.

As Light Is Said to Do

April 2, 2014, 7:36 am

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A light has gone away. The painter Melissa Carroll died March 31, 2014. She had Ewing's sarcoma, a vicious cancer that jumped to new parts of her body even as her doctors got its existing sites under control. Melissa was 31.

I wrote about her show "Recurrence" at Andrea Rosen Gallery 2 last year, and I'd like to share some more thoughts about her work and life with you today. I did not know her well. I only met her five times. This is a photograph of the first -- a show we were both in at Gitana Rosa Gallery, in Brooklyn, in 2010. She stands in profile foreground left. Her painting is on the back wall, and mine is on the left. The cancer was already in her foot, I think, but nobody knew.



I followed her work from then on, and when she got sick, I followed that too. We corresponded a bit. I was blown away by "Recurrence," her body of work depicting herself and her friends at various stages in their struggle with cancer. I wrote at the time, and I'll repeat now, that she made the kind of breakthrough in "Recurrence" that artists ordinarily take another 10 or 15 years of practice, experiments, and creative leaps to achieve: she went from flexing her talent and following the work of others, to creating her own unique and mature art. She didn't have any time to waste. The second time I met her was at the opening of the show, in 2013.



You can see me sweating; the room was packed and horribly hot. There were many beautiful people I didn't know, and many who knew Melissa and had more claim on her attention than I did. Salman Rushdie was there; the remarkable Ricardo Kugelmas, her friend and guardian angel in the art world, was there. I met her mother, Cecelia, who was as simultaneously proud and frightened as you would imagine. I didn't know what to say to Melissa, and she didn't know what to say to me. I think we were mutually happy to see one another. I didn't appreciate how tremendous a special effect her attendance at that opening was. They let her out of chemo for the week, and she was wired to half a dozen hidden devices and drips the entire evening, enabling her to stand, and talk, and withstand the pain.

The third time I met her I ran into her on the street in Williamsburg. She was back from her hospital universe, walking around and enjoying a pleasant Brooklyn afternoon. The fourth time I met her was at a craft fair. These two chance meetings are small demonstrations of a characteristic of hers -- to the extent she could go on living life, she did. She went to India. She fired a rifle. She had adventures.

The last time I met her I went by her apartment in Greenpoint to take some pictures of her for a portrait. I like to paint my creative friends, and I wanted to paint her. I was glad to see her. As usual, we struggled to make conversation. We were all right in writing but did not know one another well in person. She showed me what she was working on, and some of the keepsakes of her travels. I took a few pictures and made my goodbyes. I never saw her again.



This was in December. Sometime after that, she made her final breakthrough as an artist, and that's what I really want to talk with you about today. We're here to consider her last three paintings (that I know of), and to mull them over in light of two categories of art: final bodies of work, and late bodies of work. All sufficiently late work is final, but not all final work is late -- Egon Schiele, for instance, had no idea he was going to drop dead from the flu at 28. He was just starting to get the body he craved into his dessicated oil paint surfaces. Whether this would have been better or worse than his early work, we can't say. It was promising, but it was cut short. It was final work, but not late work.


Egon Schiele, The Family, 1918, 60"x64", oil on canvas

Contrarily, consider Titian, 1490-1576. He began as a master of clarity, color, movement, and the dramas of men and gods. Here is a late self-portrait, painted between 1565 and 1570.


Titian, Self Portrait, c. 1565-70, 34"x26", oil on canvas

It partakes of one of the great privileges of age: cutting through the bullshit. The hand grows weak, eyesight fails. He paints simply, painting only what is needed, but that part that is needed, he paints with force and confidence. Considerations of being in and out of the zone are far behind him. He has fused entirely with his identity as a painter. He is always in the zone. He brings to mind the famous quotation from Hokusai:

From the age of 6 I had a mania for drawing the shapes of things. When I was 50 I had published a universe of designs. But all I have done before the the age of 70 is not worth bothering with. At 75 I'll have learned something of the pattern of nature, of animals, of plants, of trees, birds, fish and insects. When I am 80 you will see real progress. At 90 I shall have cut my way deeply into the mystery of life itself. At 100, I shall be a marvelous artist. At 110, everything I create - a dot, a line - will jump to life as never before. To all of you who are going to live as long as I do, I promise to keep my word. I am writing this in my old age. I used to call myself Hokusai, but today I sign myself 'The Old Man Mad About Drawing.'

Or let us turn to Picasso, who drew this less than a year before the end of his very long life:


Pablo Picasso, Self Portrait Facing Death, 1972, 26"x20", pencil and crayon on paper

Picasso draws here his own unweaving. His face grows gaunt and stubbled, his eyes frightened and unfocused. A triangular wound opens his cheek on the left, and his blood pours out unchecked, the last blood he will ever have, leaving his skin cadaverous and greenish-grey. He is at the end of the long corridor, staring at the black wall at last. There is no way through it, it is the end. He addresses death and fear of death here, and not just any death, but his own. This is what we mean by late work.

Carroll painted this in 2013 for "Recurrence," depicting her own illness:


Melissa Carroll, Sick and Tired of Being Sick and Tired, 2013,15"x11", watercolor on paper

It is one of the pieces that struck me so strongly at the time. It still does. In this same pictorial paradigm, she groped toward a model of hopefulness in What Would I Do Without You:


Melissa Carroll, What Would I Do Without You, 2013,15"x11", watercolor on paper

This is middle-period work.

Here is something Carroll painted in March. As I said, to my knowledge it is one of her last three paintings. I don't know its size or title, or if it even has one. It is watercolor on paper, the only paint nontoxic enough for her to use:


Melissa Carroll, 2014

The figure is submerged here in a vaginal sequence of arcs of bloody energy, nearly vanishing, as the image nearly vanishes. As in the case of the aged Titian, the hand and eye weaken, and the interest in effects evaporates. There are only resources to paint what is needed, and the wisdom and insight to use the resources correctly. As with Picasso, there is almost no image, and death is the subject.


Melissa Carroll, 2014

Carroll draws close here to the very heart of things. Her vision of human being dissolves into a vivid and vital universe which precedes and follows and surrounds it. In the hand of this awakened reality, what is important about a life, any life, persists, because it is only borrowed a little while from an eternal and active wonder. She reaches here, in her own way, the same conclusion Harold Brodkey reached when he too neared the end of his illness: "It is death that goes down to the center of the earth, the great burial church the earth is, and then to the curved ends of the universe, as light is said to do."


Melissa Carroll, 2014

This is not only final work, it is late work. It is late work because she knew she was dying. Schiele was around her age, but he thought he had all the time in the world. Carroll knew her time was almost up, and this turned her thoughts not only to the subject of death, but her hand and eye and vision to the mastery needed to complete her work. Her life was short, but her work is not incomplete. She made the complete cycle of work of an organism designed to persist only 31 years. We are not missing the rest of her work, because that would have been the work of a fundamentally different Carroll. This is all of the work of the Carroll that was.

I knew her. Not as much as I would have liked, but more than most, and I count myself lucky for it. She looked like just another talented Brooklyn hipster when I met her. It would have taken her much longer to mature if her body hadn't betrayed her. Her disease gave her a binary choice: go over it or go under. She chose to go over it. The cancer kept getting taller, and she got taller to match it.

She was loved by her family and friends, and inspired in words and deeds many people who were suffering as she suffered. She lived fully. She became unbending of will and great of heart. She made the life she had make sense, but that speaks for her, not for me. For my part, I am so sad that she's gone.

--

All Melissa Carroll paintings courtesy of the artist and her family
Schiele and Titian via wikimedia commons, Picasso via artchive.com

Toygodd Attends Monsterpalooza

April 2, 2014, 9:11 am

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Are you a fan of horror? Have you wanted to attend a convention where that's the focus? Well Monsterpalooza is where you want to go! Twice a year this awesome convention is held in Burbank, CA.



Enjoy the photos and if you want to see more than 400 more photos click on through to AFTimes!





























Thanks for reading!

Toygodd

How an Interdisciplinary Transmedia Project Can Address Mental Illness Stigma

April 2, 2014, 9:21 am

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Co-authored by Doris C. Rusch, PhD, Assistant Professor for Game Design, and Anuradha Rana, MFA, MA, Instructor in Digital Cinema at DePaul University

Interdisciplinary research is all the rage in higher education. Faculty members are encouraged to conduct research with interdisciplinary teams. These interdisciplinary teams and the research that comes from them are thought to solve societal problems more effectively than if the studies were conducted from one disciplinary focus or "silo."

These interdisciplinary teams may be more homogenous than different, such as interdisciplinary teams that are comprised of individuals who are from the social and behavioral sciences (e.g., sociology, psychology and social work) or team members who all come from the visual and performing arts (e.g., dance, music and film).

But what if the disciplines were as heterogeneous as science and art? Would science and the research that it produces translate more easily and quickly to practice and the real world? If it not only was found in our academic articles, but also was out in the world in art or other creative expressions? Could it make a greater difference to society?

The three of us sought to answer that question. In our case, one of us is a nurse and human/social scientist, one of us is a game designer, and the other, a filmmaker. None of us were new to interdisciplinary work -- we believe that good work can be done with persons from different disciplinary perspectives but we also believe in the importance of individual disciplines.

How does one go about an interdisciplinary project spanning art and science? How might this look?

The three of us began working together after we serendipitously met at the university where we all work. We discovered that we had overlapping interests from our seemingly disparate disciplines.

One of us (Shattell) was working on a study of the experience of psychosis and other unusual experiences and found out that the other (Rusch) had made games about mental illness in the past -- Elude, a game about depression, and Akrasia, a game about substance abuse. Both were interested in exploring how art and research could come together. Eager to tap the potentials of transmedia to provide more entry points for a wider audience and to create a more multi-faceted experience, Rusch brought in Rana, a documentary filmmaker and the three of us started our new adventure.

We were interested in stigma and discrimination against persons who are different. We chose mental illness and we set out to explore how mental health advocacy, video game design, and documentary filmmaking could come together to enhance understanding and fight stigma about mental illness.

How did we use games and film, and why? Games provide experiential perspectives that are inaccessible through other media. It is the complementary use of different media, however, that we believe bears the biggest potential to promote deep understandings in others. Each medium has its particular strengths that can be leveraged to create a coherent whole with different entry points. Thus, For the Records, which is our transmedia project that includes short films, interviews, photo essays and animation, all focus on communicating the experience of four different mental illnesses common in young adults -- obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD), attention deficit disorder (ADD), eating disorder and bipolar disorder. All pieces have been developed in close collaboration or even under the lead of persons with these experiences -- young adults with OCD, ADD, eating disorder or bipolar disorder. Namely, college aged adults.

While the power of documentary to provide insight into other people's lives and increase our understanding about social issues has become widely known and accepted, the benefits of using games for similar purposes is still relatively new.

In For the Records, all pieces provide context to each other, allowing for an intuitive, artistic approach rather than an overly educational one. While they can be engaged in individually, it is in the way films, games, photo essays are intertwined that the multiple facets of mental health issues become tangible.

To be sure, we are not the only interdisciplinary team that blends art and science. There is the Art|Science Initiative at the University of Chicago, and the HuffPost Science Meets Art are just two initiatives and outlets for art and science. However, using research and first person experience and transmedia (games, documentary film) to decrease stigma is new and has the potential to have a positive impact.

Perhaps by expressing science through art, by interdisciplinary teams of artists and human/social scientists like ours, we can help people increase embodied understandings of mental illness, and the maybe decrease stigma. It's at least possible.

Got a Little Free Time This Spring? Maybe Go Check Out Pittsburgh (Yes, Really)

April 2, 2014, 9:32 am

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There are many ways in which Pittsburgh is not like other cities -- let's start with the grand entrance. Whether you're coming in from the Pennsylvania Turnpike and through the Squirrel Hill Tunnel, or shooting under Mount Washington on their way in from the airport, you can't help but notice: Here is a city with a lot going on in the looks department.

The setting, along those famous three rivers (Ohio, Allegheny, Monongahela) at the foot of those dramatic hills, is pretty great. That impressive skyline is a constant reminder of a time when Pittsburgh was one of the world's most important industrial capitals.

Of course, today's Pittsburgh is slightly less mighty. Still, of all the faded rust belt cities, none come even close to wearing diminished status quite so well. Pittsburgh is the master of keeping up appearances. The downtown, or, as it's called around here, the Golden Triangle, remains one of the most walkable and appealing city centers in the country, offering one pleasant streetscape after another.

In some ways, it's like a little slice of Manhattan, streets filled with people on sunny weekdays, pouring off buses (and even a subway!) in the mornings and back on again at night. Pittsburgh feels busy, it feels alive. Industry has given way to research, health care, education and the arts. Smart people are moving in, or simply moving home. The city feels young again, promising, like a place that has a future, one brighter than just about any of its contemporaries.

It is spring, now -- a good time to go take a look. Here are just a few reasons why. (Also: Here are the best airfares to PIT, available right now.)


Photo courtesy of David Landsel

#1 It's kind of..all over the place.
The 'Burgh's bizarre topography -- San Francisco appears almost orderly by comparison at times -- makes for close-knit neighborhoods that often function almost as if they were their own cities. To really get to know Pittsburgh, you've got to hustle a bit. It's worth it, though. Go see the bustling South Side, with its wide selection of bars along jammed East Carson Street, the Brooklyn-ish scene up the Allegheny in Lawrenceville, the small-town-at-the-top-of-the-world vibe in Mt. Washington. There are many Pittsburghs, all in very close proximity to each other, but each their own universe. East Liberty, for years one of the city's trouble spots and all but abandoned by the end, is a major happening these days, with tons of shopping and other developments that include a Google campus.


Photo courtesy of Andy Warhol Museum
#2 There's a lot of art. Like, a lot.
From big-ticket shows at the Carnegie or the Frick to the avant-garde at the North Side's Mattress Factory, a site for unusual installations created by resident artists since the '70s, Pittsburgh knows from art. Just as it knows from music, theatre, opera, dance and pretty much any other cultural indulgence you can name. If you just want to stare at canvases, you need more than a weekend to see everything worth seeing here -- the Carnegie is a good place to start, functioning as sort of a mini-Met, with its Roman and Chinese artifacts, its Degases and Monetses. (Like your art a little less...traditional? Check this place out.)


Photo courtesy of Tripadvisor
#3 The food is terrific.
To some, Pittsburgh dining means overstuffed sandwiches topped with french fries and coleslaw. You can eat that sort of thing, if you must, but save an appetite for the city's quickly evolving culinary scene, from little neighborhood bistros to buzz-garnering fine dining. Justin Severino is the guy everyone talks about these days. He's the chef at Cure, a charcuterie-focused spot on Butler Street that attracts all kinds of national attention for good reason.


Photo courtesy of Tripadvisor

#4 The one-of-a-kind Strip District is the coolest.
Imagine if there was enough space in Manhattan's gentrified Meatpacking District for all that new stuff as well as the original businesses that gave the neighborhood its character -- that pretty much describes the Strip District, a sprawling, 24-hour jumble of discount produce, late-night dance clubs, vintage Italian cheesemongers, third-wave coffee joints and trucker bars, abandoned warehouses and upmarket apartments. Easily walkable from the downtown area, the Strip gets its share of tourists, and as such, sustains its share of tourist dreck. Step into the growing Pittsburgh Public Market for a glimpse of what's now, what's good and what's local.


Photo courtesy of David Landsel

#5 The outdoors are truly great.
As complicated as Pittsburgh can be to navigate, there's still plenty of it that's easy to figure out on foot, from the museums and sports stadiums of the North Side to the bars and restaurants of the South Side, all the way out the Strip District and, of course, right downtown. When the weather's nice, there's nothing better than exploring on two feet -- particularly along the increasingly developed riverfront. The Three Rivers Heritage Trail is a many-segmented and growing trail network that covers an impressive 21 miles; pretty much any direction you want to go from the center of town, there's a path for that. If you prefer an upper-body workout, Kayak Pittsburgh, which reopens May 1 for the summer season, provides affordable rentals in its downtown location under the Sixth Street Bridge.


#6 And so are the indoors.
Spring not moving forward fast enough for you? Get a jumpstart on summer indoors at the gorgeous Phipps Conservatory up in Oakland, where 19 indoor and outdoor gardens, representative of many different types of habitats, have been thrilling Pittsburghers for more than a century. While it takes a little less than two hours to do the site justice, stick around for lunch in the airy café. If you get in to town early enough on a Friday, note that the gardens are open all the way up until 10 p.m. An easy hike from most Downtown hotels, the surprising National Aviary, an all-bird zoo that features 600 winged-things from the world over in a lush indoor garden setting, is an only-in-Pittsburgh must. (They have pink flamingos -- how cool is that.)


Photo courtesy of David Landsel

#7 Wait. You've never been to Fallingwater?
It must be said that few of the museums in Pittsburgh can quite compete with Frank Lloyd Wright's Fallingwater, one of the most iconic residences in the free world, located just an hour or so from town, in the heart of Western Pennsylvania's beautiful Laurel Highlands. Designed as a weekend spot for the Kaufmann family, local luminaries who most famously owned that big department store downtown that is now a Macy's, Fallingwater is reason enough to make the trek to this part of the world.


Other stories you might like:

24 ways to have the best day ever in Los Angeles

9 essential travel products for Spring

Photos: David Landsel (1, 5, 6, 7) Tripadvisor (3, 4) Andy Warhol Museum (2)

Making Onstage Chemistry: A Chat With the Stars of Goodman's Venus in Fur

April 2, 2014, 10:55 am

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In Goodman Theatre's intense production of David Ives' hit play, Venus in Fur, palpable onstage chemistry is critical (read my review here). It's what elevates this two-person dark comedy from a tawdry romp into a thrilling exploration of dominance and power.

In Goodman's production, Rufus Collins and Amanda Drinkall embody Thomas and Vanda, the writer/director of the play-within-the-play and the unexpected actress who isn't exactly who she seems. I had the chance to chat with both actors to get their viewpoints on establishing authentic onstage chemistry.

So you've just completed a Saturday matinee of the show. Do matinee audiences differ from evening audiences -- particularly given the scandalous subject matter? Are they more vocal?

Rufus Collins (RC): Well, matinee audiences typically are more quiet and reserved, which, honestly, does make it more difficult to perform this play. But this particular audience was pretty engaged, which was nice.

Amanda Drinkall (AD): Yes, but those matinee ladies really do love this show. It's great. I'm sure Shades of Grey has something to do with it.

How aware were you of this play before the audition process? Did you know what you were getting yourself into?

RC: I had read the play and seen a regional production, but honestly didn't know how I felt about it. It wasn't until we started rehearsal and dug our feet in that I really understood what made this play so fascinating, and I feel that comes across in this production.

AD: Same with me. I had also read the play when I heard it was coming to the Goodman about a year ago, and wasn't sure what to think of it. Working with [our director] Joanie [Schultz] really helped us unlock this play. Her deep understanding and passion for the material helped us gain a better understanding into the themes of gender, dominance and submission.

Did you audition together? When did you meet?

RC: We actually auditioned separately and met on the first day of rehearsal.

Really? So how did you move from the table read to "hey, I'm going to straddle you shirtless now."

RC: Well, on the first day, Amanda really broke the ice by running up to me, leaping in the air and wrapping her legs and arms around my torso.

AD: [Laughing] Rufus is saying I hugged him.

RC: We didn't have much time to get this show up and ready for an audience, so we just had to quickly gain trust in each other and be ready for anything.

AD: And each day in rehearsal it's, "Ok, I'm going to do this scene without a shirt today, and now, without pants."  

In addition to the themes of dominance and power, the play has some pointed things to say about the artifice of theatre.

AD: Yes, I think audiences really like getting that "behind the scenes" look at what goes into the rehearsal process, which this play offers.

RC: The play switches tones so quickly, given that we keep dipping back into the play-within-the-play, and we worked hard at ensuring the audience could follow us. For example, we carefully considered the correct accent our characters should use when in the play-within-the-play to help indicate where we were.

Amanda: The physicality of this play is pretty remarkable. How do you prepare for it?

AD: I've been working out! I have a personal trainer. Something about being onstage in your underwear for 95 percent of the show makes you really focus on being in shape. We also worked really closely with our fight choreographer, David Woolley, to make sure those more physical scenes are exciting but also safe.

Is there anything you've learned from this experience that you'll take with you?

RC: As with any part, it's given me some distinct experiences that I know I'll draw on throughout my career.

AD: Don't show up in your underwear for an audition. Unless you are more than confident it will get you the role.

[Interview edited and condensed for publication]


Amanda Drinkall and Rufus Collins in Goodman's Venus in Fur, now playing through April 13. More info here >

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In the Age of #CancelColbert, The Show Must Go On

April 2, 2014, 10:55 am

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Nothing says Americana quite like musical theater.

Despite rampant stereotypes, it's still one of the most popular entertainment venues in the country. (Just ask anyone who has stood in line at the TKTS booth in Times Square.) Many shows take place in another era, so exaggerated characters are often overlooked or snickered at by theatergoers. Others aren't so forgiving. To make outdated musicals more palatable, some groups are going so far as to 'sanitize' them. But doing so washes away all sense of history and context, not to mention artistic integrity. Altering scripts can also be downright futile. After all, how is it possible to change one character to another without offending someone else? When does sensitivity become censorship?

The Gershwin brothers are rolling over in their graves.

"Bess, you are my woman now. You are! You are! And you must laugh and sing and dance... no wrinkle on your brow... the sorrow of the past is all done. The real happiness has just begun."

Somehow, Porgy's lines just don't have the same ring to them.

A Boston area production of "Thoroughly Modern Millie" has generated quite a buzz for a high school musical that didn't even star Zac Efron. A TV program, community newspapers, blogs and several stories in the Boston Globe featured the production. One Globe article landed on the front page! Letters to the editor and online comments keep rolling in.

Any theater publicist would be jumping for joy. Except that all this 'ink' has had quite the opposite effect. Instead of showcasing the talent and dedication of the cast and crew, it has focused on Asian stereotypes. But, unlike "The Colbert Report," "Thoroughly Modern Millie" takes place nearly 100 years ago.



Negative rumblings in the community about an upcoming production would make most theater directors simply move on and pick another show. Happily, for the dozens of young thespians involved, good sense trumped sensitivity. The musical was performed for three nights at Theater Ink, Newton North High School's teaching and working theater. At least one of the events was sold out.

Going on with the show was the right thing to do. Here's why:

#1. Discussions began even before the first rehearsal.The school worked with the office of human rights and other groups to come up with a way to maintain the integrity of the production, while addressing concerns. Workshops about stereotypes and their impact were held throughout production. Most importantly, Newton North had faith in its students, who were considered mature enough to interpret outdated images. Not to mention how much fun they would have with the show. A large number of kids could participate, as "Millie" has a large cast to support many lines of comedic dialog and entertaining musical numbers. The musical is one of the most popular high school productions in the country and has been a community theater staple for more than 30 years.

#2. Before each performance, the director alerted the audience to an extensive production note in the program. It read, in part:

"Without question, 'Thoroughly Modern Millie' contains extreme negative stereotypes and offensive attitudes... the opinions expressed in this musical do not necessarily reflect the views of Newton North High School..."

#3. After the show's run, the school issued an extensive letter to the community. Following is a brief excerpt:

"It is our sincere hope that this production is one of both artistic integrity and one where significant learning has occurred. It certainly was never and is never our intent to offend members of our school or Newton community. The process of producing this show, and the thoughtful and sometimes challenging dialogue it has generated among staff, students, and the broader Newton community, exemplifies the program's commitment to explore, critique, and interpret how the human experience is conveyed through the arts. As the curtain went up this past weekend, we brought the constructive conversation and learning process that our school community has engaged in over these past few months to an audience of students, parents, and community members. We hope that you will choose to participate in it with the same appetite for learning that we have seen in our students - a genuine desire to understand our differences, our history, and ourselves..."

#4. The school held a public forum attended by members of the school's administration, parents and students. During the meeting, the school apologized for offending anyone in the community.

Newton, Mass., is a standard bearer of political correctness. (This is a city where schools promote a "Respecting Human Differences" campaign, hold LGBT assemblies and ban Halloween.) So the extra effort made to address concerns is not surprising for those who live there. Expected or not, the "Millie" community outreach model is public relations at its finest.

Like New Orleans Jazz and baseball, many theater productions of yesteryear help define America, although they are far from politically correct by today's standards. Some of the best loved American musicals are national treasures that will continue to provide valuable cultural lessons and stimulate discussion for generations. For goodness sake, let George and Ira rest in peace.

Downton Abbey's U.S. Visit

April 2, 2014, 11:08 am

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America has gone mad for Downton Abbey. And now the country's appetite for all things Downton can be sated. For the first time, a major exhibition of the costumes from the BBC program can be seen in the United States at Winterthur Museum, Garden and Library, a 1,000-acre estate that belonged to American aristocrat Henry Francis du Pont.

"Costumes of Downton Abbey" is an original exhibition of 40 costumes on loan from London-based Cospro, the world's leading suppler of costumes for film, TV and theater.
Fans of the show will instantly recognize costumes, like Lady Sybil's harem pants, Lady Mary's engagement dress and Lady Edith's ill-fated wedding dress. Visitors will marvel as they study the workmanship that has gone into creating these period costumes. (The creation of some of these dresses sprang from tiny fragments of vintage originals.)





Maggie Lidz, one of the three curators from Winterthur who worked on this exhibition, traveled to London to collect the costumes. While the costumes belonging to the "upstairs" actors were labeled, preserved and catalogued among the thousands of costumes at Cospro, the "downstairs," servant's clothing proved more difficult to secure.





"Like in life, the things that are saved are those worn by the wealthiest," says Lidz, who was given free reign by Cospro to trawl their stash. To assemble some servants' outfits, she had to dig out an apron from one bin, a black dress from a rack and shoes from another corner of the warehouse. By studying photographic stills from Downton Abbey, she was able to reunite dozens of pieces belonging to characters like Bates, Anna and Mrs. Pattimore.





The curators have grouped the costumes in a smart, forward-thinking way. The exhibit begins in early morning in the servant's cellar and weaves visitors through the day pausing for servant tasks, like shoe shining and Grantham family activities, like garden strolls and heath stalks. It concludes in evening with the cast's most spectacular formal wear, like Lady Rose's beaded flapper dress. All of the costumes are put into theatrical and historic context through the use of video, photographs and antiques.

After visiting this one-of-a-kind exhibit, it's all but impossible to ignore the lure of a tour of Winterthur, the 175-room mansion that's a treasure trove of American antiques, one of the world's largest with nearly 100,000 objects dating from 1640 to 1860. Henry Francis du Pont so loved these objects that he didn't simply collect; he lived with these pieces in every room of his house from the formal dining room to the library to guest rooms. In fact, du Pont was so keen about preserving American arts and workmanship that he had facades of entire historic buildings moved inside his home.

Winterthur has worked diligently to give visitors a deeper understanding of the similarities and differences between aristocratic families in England and American in the early part of the 20th century.

Shirley Maclaine's character, the progressive American heiress Martha Levinson, often taunts her daughter's mother-in-law, an old school dowager played by Dame Maggie Smith, for her very English brand of formality and tradition. It turns out that this social divide in both style and substance is rooted in fact.



American sensibilities of the time prized the modern and mechanical. Like most of their American counterparts, the du Ponts were on the cutting edge of new technology, ever embracing that latest equipment and gadgets that would make life easier from electric servant bells to refrigeration, whilst the English manor house, much like Downton, were much slower to modernize.

Although visitors can't spend the night at Winterthur, they can do next best thing by booking a room at the gracious Hotel du Pont, which is a 10-minute car ride away in downtown Wilmington, Delaware. Built in 1913, the hotel is defined by old-world grandeur. The lobby ceiling is carved from wood and painted with gold and hotel's acclaimed restaurant, The Green Room, may just have the most beautiful dining room in America. A meal as humble as breakfast becomes Downton-worthy thanks to the lush surroundings and impeccable service, which give guests a taste of the aristocratic life.

Must-see Painting Shows: April 2014

April 2, 2014, 11:43 am

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Back in December, I wrote an article in which I suggested that, after a number of years in which abstraction has been the dominant mode of painting in the "contemporary art world," we might start to see an upswing in image-based painting. It is not exactly a Delphic prophecy, given the way in which today's market driven art world is constantly craving the next best thing, and, I might add, in ever more compressed cycle times. In conducting my monthly survey of commercial gallery shows this month I was struck by the amount of representational work on view, and even more so by the "academic" rigor much of it evinces. There are some examples of what I am talking about on this list, and many others can be seen on the NAP/BLOG.

In Miami, Jenny Brillhart's studio landscapes can be seen at Emerson Dorsch. Trained at the New York Academy of Art, Brillhart is deeply concerned with the language and practice of painting. In New York City, be sure to check out New American Paintings' alum Alison Blickle's solo debut at Kravets|Wehby, and the exquisite work -- which is rarely seen in the United States - of mature German painter Peter Dreher at Koenig & Clinton. In Chicago, Anthony Adcock takes trompe l'oeil painting to the edge with his gritty urban subject matter. And on the West Coast, mid-career painter Deborah Oropallo continues to astound with her painterly pyrotechnics at Catharine Clark Gallery in San Francisco. Oropallo has been exhibiting actively since the mid-1980s, yet rarely east of the Mississippi.

In Boston, Barbara Krakow Gallery has a very special husband and wife exhibition on view featuring Bronlyn Jones, whose work is non-objective, and Robert Bauer, who produces extraordinarily nuanced landscapes and portraiture. (If you have never seen one of Bauer's small portrait paintings, visit Forum Gallery's site and have a look...they possess a shocking immediacy.) Though their journeys begin in different places, Bauer and Jones are both ultimately interested in the ability of visual language to reveal something essential about how we think and perceive.

In other news, the Whitney Biennial Effect can been seen this month as strategic dealers around the country mount exhibitions of artists featured in the show everyone loves to hate. In The Windy City, Philip Hanson, an artist associated with the Chicago Imagism, has a solo show at Corbett vs. Dempsey. In New York's Lower East Side, Etel Adnan is on view at Callicoon Fine Arts, as is Tony Lewis at Room East and Rochelle Feinstein at On Stellar Rays. Just uptown in Chelsea, one of my favorite mid-career painters, Dona Nelson, opens this week at Thomas Erben Gallery.


Please visit the New American Paintings/BLOG for a more comprehensive list of must-see painting shows in April.

New American Paintings magazine is a juried exhibition-in-print, and the largest series of artist competitions in the United States. Working with experienced curators, New American Paintings reviews the work of thousands of emerging artists each year. Forty artists are selected to appear in each bi-monthly edition, many of whom go on to receive substantial critical and commercial success. Additional content focuses on the medium of painting, those who influence its direction, and the role contemporary painting plays within the art world. Visit New American Paintings for more information or to subscribe.

Chashama

April 2, 2014, 12:14 pm

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Anita Durst photo credit 2012 The NASDAQ OMX Group Inc.

Chashama is Persian for "to have vision." Actress Anita Durst vision for chashama was born out of a request for space from artists in Manhattan. Nineteen years ago, chashama began as a theater group to honor the creative energy and talent of Anita's mentor, Persian theater artist Reza Abdoh. The Renaissance woman turned to her father real estate scion Douglas Durst for her first vacant property on West 42nd Street for space to create her own theater productions. In poured a steady stream of requests from struggling artists asking to use the space on off-nights. The overwhelming need for affordable artist space in what Forbes magazine calls the most expensive metropolis inspired Anita to respond, create and sustain a diverse, dynamic and provocative cultural landscape in New York. "I wanted people to feel the power of creativity by giving them space as a place of solace, exploration, and presentation," declares Anita Durst.



Chashama's mission to provide free and subsidized space for artists to live, work, and present has exploded to 125 artists studios, six galleries, two performance spaces, curated lobbies, a residency program in Upstate New York and affordable artist housing throughout New York City (Midtown, Harlem, Long Island City, Sunset Park, and the Bronx). Chashama programs present the emerging artist community with free public installations and performances and a variety of visual artist exhibitions throughout the year. Her nonprofit property portfolio partnership has grown to include Atlantic Development Corporation, Rockrose Development, Newmark Knight Frank, New York Economic Development Corporation, Stonehenge Management LLC and Forest City Ratner to name a few. The developers and property owners benefit by transforming their vacant buildings into creativity spaces which increases foot traffic, and bringing support to surrounding businesses. The nonprofit model of create-place-making and utilizing vacant spaces for creative use Anita created has been copied by other nonprofit art groups thereby increasing the competition for funding, audience engagement and demand for space. "Funding for arts organizations are limited, while the demand for affordable space is much larger than the supply chashama has," Durst says.

Clearly Anita is up to the challenge. She owns it: "Since 1995, chashama has fostered the careers of over 12,000 artists and has sparked the lives of over a million audience members."


"Rhythm #3" Lisa Ingram Oil on linen 2013

"Jasmine Night" Songyi M. Kim Oil and mixed media on Plexiglas 2013

"Stop and Frisk" Tirtzah Bassel Duct tape on Wall 2013

"Nature's Order 5" Diane Davis Acrylic/Paper 2009

"It's the Threshold that Hurts" Kenneth Parris III Mixed media on wood panel 2013

"Pow Bang Boom " Gregory Russell Oil and Wood on Wood 2013

"Water's Fine" Alicia DeBrincat Oil, acrylic and silkscreen on canvas

The chashama mama is throwing a gala on June 9 catered by Charlie Palmer's Aureole and featuring the talented artists nurtured by her organization on Anita's Way naturally.

Gerd Ludwig, Chernobyl Through His Lens

April 2, 2014, 1:02 pm

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Some people can't just let things drop. They just can't let them go. In some cases passion and commitment to a higher cause keeps them hanging on. Such is the case with National Geographic photographer Gerd Ludwig.



On April 26, 1986 at 1:23 am Chernobyl's Nuclear Power Plant reactor #4 blew up after a botched safety test triggered an explosion and caused a fire that burned for 10 days. The radioactive fallout spread over thousands of square miles and sent more than a quarter of a million people from their homes and now 28 years later it still darkens, damages and debilitates both the people and the land.



For the past 20 years, Gerd Ludwig, winner of the 2006 Lucie award for the International Photographer of the Year, has been telling the story of Chernobyl through his photographs. Cataloging the devastation's changing shapes and faces over time so that we will remember and not forget. So moved and motivated by the horror of Chernobyl that he has, over the last 20 years, made this his ongoing project and professional mission statement. Again, it takes passion, and commitment to summon the energy to keep giving one's all to anything for 20 years and that alone peaked my curiosity as to the origin of his passion for this subject.

"It was my father's bedtime stories" said Ludwig with a low laugh in his undiluted German accent. Making LA his primary residence for the past 25 years while he flies all over the world for National Geographic, hasn't minimized his accent the way time has turned his once blond hair more white than gray. He went on, professorial and sincere, to give me the story of how a born and bred German man could have so much affinity with the Russians and their plight to make it his heartfelt cause célèbre.

His father had been part of the Sixth German Army that invaded the Soviet Union in 1942. Barely making it out alive, he brought home images of snow covered fields and peasants in babushkas', memories of kindness as well as bloodshed. An ancient bent over Bubbe offering milk to a starving German soldier hiding in her basement. Soldiers huddled against the cold passing a cigarette from one frozen set of fingers to the next. Ludwig says his father processed what he'd witnessed into bedtime stories as a way of dealing, and possibly healing his war trauma. As a young man filled to bursting with the guilt of being German, straddled by the weight of his father's generation and the horrors they perpetrated, Ludwig's way of processing and possibly healing was to form an empathetic connection to the Russian people.

From his first trip, as a 30-year-old fledgling photographer on assignment for a European magazine, he says he felt an instant affinity for Russia and the soul of its people. With the stain of war on his soul he sought redemption. What he eventually found was another war, a different war of destruction and devastation that would indeed hold him captive. Later on, while working in Russia in 1993 shooting for National Geographic, in the midst of its chaotic transformation from a state controlled to a market controlled economy, Ludwig's shame based blindness towards Russia eased. He realized that government officials were motivated by greed and self interest to the detriment of their fellow citizens and to their environment, opening his eyes to the hypocrisy, deceit and cover ups on every bureaucratic and government level in his adopted land.

Photographing children in orphanages classified as victims of Chernobyl, opened Ludwig's heart and brought home to him the truth of the physical, mental and emotional devastation the nuclear explosion has caused. Children with missing limbs and cancerous tumors the size of grapefruit protruding from their foreheads told his camera their stories.



His photos of Pripyat, the town 3 kilometers away from the Chernobyl power plant, the once beautiful, thriving town built for the 50,000 power plant workers and their families, a town once throbbing with life and the laughter of little children, are of a grey ghost town devoid of any life at all. There, the stillness and complete lack of life scream at us in their silence.



Limbless children, abandoned school rooms crumpling and concrete grey, the wooded-over ghost town, all stares at us asking us to feel and remember. Through Ludwig's photos we do both.

There are no words for the devastation caused by Chernobyl. Thank God we still have dedicated photojournalists to say it for us with their pictures. There are some people that hope we forget and encourage the easing of restrictions on power plants. They do not want us to think in terms of toxic land, contaminated machinery, poisonous DNA and cancer mutating cells. It takes the courage of a Gerd Ludwig who continually puts himself in harms way to keep the truth alive.



"Chernobyl is not over. The contamination will be here for hundreds of years. But it is old news" says the photographer. So how can he keep going back? Going back to those children, to those elder "returnees" who'd rather die on their own contaminated piece of land than relocate to a cold urban refuge, to the infants all grown up now and of child bearing age who worry about what deformities their own offspring might be born with.

"I go for dusha and dusha only" answers Ludwig, going on to explain "dusha" as the mysterious well of compassion, depth and empathy that is unique to the Russian soul. It is this dusha that Pushkin, Tolstoy, Chekov and Dostoyevsky, wrote of and tried to illuminate. And what Ludwig has glimpsed, and captured in Broken Empire, his love song in pictures to Russia published in 2001. The Russian soul, this dusha, that keeps dragging him back.

"As photographers we do this to give voice to otherwise voiceless victims," says Ludwig, and that the people in his photos know that the pictures of them won't change their lives but maybe they will protect someone in the future. This, noble as it sounds, is also what spurs Gerd Ludwig on.

Noted photographer Douglas Kirkland a contemporary of Ludwig's says that what impresses him with Gerd's work on Chernobyl is how "he has relentlessly pursued the story and fearlessly reported it in depth with great honesty and integrity."



The publication of this collection of photo's and text, entitled "The Long Shadow of Chernobyl", was first published in 2011 as an iPad App, and is now being published as a 20-year retrospective photo book, funded in part by a Kickstarter campaign to offset the high cost of printing. In the book, noted scientist Alexi Okeanov is quoted as saying that the health effects of the accident are "a fire that can't be put out in our lifetimes". Devoted photojournalist that he is, Gerd Ludwig, will spend the rest of his life chasing and shooting, its flames.




The Long Shadow of Chernobyl - A Photo Book by Gerd Ludwig
Support the book and pre-order today at http://gerdludwig.com/kickstarter
View more of Gerd's work at: http://www.gerdludwig.com
Learn about Gerd's Chernobyl coverage at: http://longshadowofchernobyl.com