New Music New Haven

Another wonderful performance by NMNH, and another reason why New Haven is a great place to live.

Highly Recommended.

De Profundis (Yale School of Music)

 A program of music for low instructions, my favorite timbre. There's not a flute that I wouldn't trade for a bassoon, a violin for a cello, or a trumpet for a trombone.  Thus this program was ready-made for my tastes with nary a flute or violin or trumpet.

Heinrich Schutz. Absalon, fili mi
Mozart. Duo for bassoon and cello in B-flat major, K 292
Jacob Druckman. Valentine
Sergei Prokofiev. Scherzo Humoristique, Op. 12b
Bach. Prelude and Fugue in D minor
Bruckner. Two Aequale
Penderecki. Serenata for three cellos; Capriccio for solo tuba
Sofia Gubaidulina. Concerto for bassoon and low strings

Recommend

Cindy Sherman Retrospective (MoMA)

Exciting and revelatory.

Highly recommend.

The Maids (Genet)

Once again, Red Bull Theatre has pulled off a daring yet lucid production of a difficult play. Concerned with the nature of identity and performance, Genet's play always has the audience--as well as the characters themselves--wondering who or what is the authentic self and how can it be distinguished from its doppleganger. Through all these twists and turns, Jesse Burger's keen direction goes beyond presenting a comprehensible performance to involving the audience in those very questions. Great set that turns audience into voyeurs. Highly recommend.

'Tis Pity She's a Whore (John Ford)

I've never read this Ford play from the late 1620s, so my impression of the production is based solely on the production.  That is, I didn't come to the performance with any notions of what the play was about or what I expected to see.

Cheek By Jowl modernized this production by setting it in the bedroom of a 16-year girl, complete with posters on the wall and clothing strewn about.  This girl, however, will be courted and eventually impregnated and murdered by her fawning older brother.

I found Lydia Wilson's performance as the Annabella who is pulled between her brother Giovanni (Jack Gordon), her maid Putana (Lizzie Hopley), and her (eventual) husband Vasques (Laurence Spellman) engaging and convincing. 

The production, however, tends to be too busy: do I really want to watch actors dance and/or sing for more than 12 seconds? And should I be expected to understand lines delivered while actors are jumping about to loud music? 

Recommend...highly, if only because this play deserves to be seen.

The Lady from Dubuque (Edward Albee)

Signature's Theatre's revival of The Lady from Dubuque is an excellent production of an intriguing, moving, yet nevertheless flawed play.  The characters from the first scene, three couples, none of whom seem to like another, suffer from a dearth of kindness and intelligence.  None of the witty repartee that we expect in an Albee play.  That appears, like a breath of fresh air, when the Oscar and Elizabeth (The Lady from Dubuque played by Jane Alexander) arrive to bring comfort to the hostess Jo, who is dying. Though Elizabeth claims to be Jo's mother, her husband Sam vehemently refutes that claim.  Jo, reduced to whimpering pain, merely embraces Elizabeth without identifying her one way or the other.

Elizabeth and Jo are more than the charming urbanity that we've been wishing for.  And they are more than Jo's mother and her friend (or not). They are allegorical representations of Death, who confront the reality of Jo's imminent death (which neither her husband nor her guests are willing to do) and gently usher her beyond the pain.

Fine performances by all..though I can hardly imagine what it's like to inhabit such distasteful characters eight times a week.

Highly recommend. 

The Winter's Tale (Shakespeare)

A fine, refined production by Yale Rep and directed by Liz Diamond.  Except for the inexplicable decision to have Autolycus sing many of his lines, the production provided the audience with clearly conceived characters whose lines are so well delivered that no notes were necessary to follow the plot.

Highly recommend.

Friends with Children (Jennifer Westfeldt)

Fun romantic comedy that questions the role of sexual attraction in a successful, long-term marriage.   After lots of ups and downs, friendship rules.

Recommend

February House (Gabriel Kahane)

A couple of years ago, I spotted Sherril Tippins, February House, on a library shelf and checked it out on a whim.  Though it sat beside my reading chair for several weeks, maybe months, I never even opened it because more professional reading duties beckoned.  Apparently Gabriel Kahane was able to align the book with his professional duties better than I, for when the Public Theatre commissioned a new work from him, he decided to base the book of his next musical on Tippins' work. 

The narrative arc is the story of George Davis' efforts (both high-minded and low-minded at the same time) to create an inexpensive living community for artists.  The audience watches him lure Carson McCullers, W. H. Auden (and his lover), Benjamin Britten and Peter Pears, Erica Mann, and Gypsy Rose Lee into taking up residence at 7 Middagh Street in Brooklyn during 1940-1941, and we watch them leave, one-by-one (sometimes two-by-two), until Davis is left alone in the crumbling Victorian.

The cast and direction of this production at Long Wharf (before it moves to NYC in April) were surprisingly good.  (I'm not a fan of musicals.)  Perhaps that's because this musical could fall under the genre of "chamber musical": no big rousing numbers, only two musicians (generally playing piano and banjo), and plenty of dialogue to keep the storyline moving along.  

Recommend.


The

We Need to Talk About Kevin (Lynne Ramsay)

...but, of course, no one ever does.  In fact, no one really even talks to Kevin.  They ask his permission and apologize, but that's just about it.  A maddening film about bad parenting gone bad.  And we're never given reason to understand why Eva, Kevin's mother (Tilda Swinton in an excellent performance), is vilified by her community; instead, we're given every reason to understand why the community might grieve along with her.

Joins Sid and Nancy as one of the great, all-time depressing films.

Caveats.

In Darkness (A Holland)

This Polish film recounts the gripping narrative of a Lvov sewer manager who helps a small group of Jews survive 14 months in the city's sewers. Sympathetic portrayals of the reluctant savior and his Jews. Recommend.

The Yiddish King Lear

A delightful recreation of an art form that has almost disappeared.

Recommend.