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#81
General Discussion / Re: The Simple Wooden Shaker C...
Last post by Leighton - Dec 30, 2023, 01:27 PM
I am so, so saddened by this news :(
#82
General Discussion / Re: The Simple Wooden Shaker C...
Last post by DiveMilw - Dec 29, 2023, 04:08 PM
Our beloved friend, Gordon Barkaway, passed away earlier this year in August.  I realized I hadn't seen a post from him a while so I visited his FB page.  That is how I found out the news.  I don't know any details other than what is there.  Apparently it was unexpected.  There was a post from one of his friends looking for a home for his dog, Pepe.  (I think that may have been Pepe II)  I hope they found him a new place to live. 
#83
Daily Threads / Re: 26 December 2023 The day a...
Last post by KathyB - Dec 27, 2023, 04:07 PM
I received nothing, except for the stuff I bought myself (yes, those toilet valves look great inside a stocking). Bernadette, however, got two large boxes of Greenies (accepted by the Veterinary Oral Health Council), and she also got a bath and grooming on Saturday, so her fur is especially soft.

We got about four inches of snow Monday night, which has been extremely fun to walk around in. NOT.

I spent Christmas watching season 3 of Only Murders in the Building (I renewed Hulu for Black Friday for 99¢ a month for a year). I am halfway through episode 5, which I had to stop midway through due to a technical glitch. While I have Hulu, I need to watch The Bear and Reservation Dogs. I have written down in large letters on my calendar when to cancel Hulu.
#84
The Work / Re: HERE WE ARE
Last post by scenicdesign71 - Dec 26, 2023, 11:09 PM
Nothing really new here, but, for what it's worth:

The Observer:   David Ives On Collaborating With Sondheim On His Final Work, Here We Are


 
#85
Daily Threads / 26 December 2023 The day after...
Last post by scenicdesign71 - Dec 26, 2023, 04:21 PM
Some Sondheim- and other forum-relevant gifts I received yesterday:


My mom and I have been spending the holiday rewatching Slings and Arrows, thus far making it through two of the show's three seasons over the past few nights, with S3 on the docket for tonight.  It's been at least one decade, and probably closer to two, since I last saw S&A.  It's still charmingly Canadian, hopelessly goofy, and now sometimes awkwardly dated (the productions at "New Burbage" were dated even when the show first aired in 2003, having seemingly wandered in from the 1950s; and the company's repeatedly-quoted mission statement mandating "the highest production values" plays as a kind of running meta-joke, given the anemic tackiness of those we're shown), but I'm enjoying watching it again nonetheless.

Along similar thematic and tonal lines, we did our traditional rewatching of Kenneth Branagh's A Midwinter's Tale early this year, on Thanksgiving, so I doubt we'll watch it again just a month later; but never say never.  If I haven't previously recommended AMT here, it's a delightful holiday treat.


#86
The Man / Re: R.I.P. STEPHEN SONDHEIM 3...
Last post by scenicdesign71 - Dec 26, 2023, 12:27 PM
I don't love reviving this thread, but between the headline and my distinct sense that the phenomenon it describes is not purely coincidental, I do think this article belongs here.

NYT:  Sondheim Was a Critical Darling.  Since His Death, He's a Hitmaker, Too.

I wish I was fonder of these recent productions (the ones I've seen, anyway).  If I'm able to see Merrily on B'way at some point, or if I ever work up the stomach to see Kail's Sweeney yet again (perhaps with Tveit and Foster), it's not inconceivable that my opinions might yet soften.  But regardless, I'm glad the work is being kept alive and that new audiences are being introduced to it.  Even if I personally don't happen to love these current incarnations, by helping to enshrine SJS's oeuvre in the repertoire -- as box-office successes, for a change -- they'll indirectly lead to future productions that might blow my mind.


#87
Movies / Re: Maestro
Last post by scenicdesign71 - Dec 26, 2023, 10:56 AM
For a movie that hasn't, either in its premise or its execution, actually fascinated me as much as this thread might seem to suggest, I have admittedly been plowing through a fair amount of its surrounding press over the past month or two.  The following article is a bit older, from 2018, and non-film-related; but I found it the most interesting piece I've yet come across -- a review of Jamie Bernstein's book Famous Father Girl: A Memoir of Growing Up Bernstein ...

The New YorkerLeonard Bernstein Through His Daughter's Eyes

...Which still isn't to say that I've become a passionate devotee of LB* or his family, or of Maestro, though I will probably give the movie another look at some point.  On the basis of the review, I might possibly give Famous Father Girl a read too, though not right away; for the time being, at least, I'm feeling a little Bernsteined-out.


* But for what it's worth, I did also find a YouTube playlist of all 53 of his Young People's Concerts, which originally aired on CBS from 1958 to 1972; and another playlist of his 1973 Norton Lectures at Harvard.  Both series are also available on DVD from Kultur International Films, here and here respectively.  The Norton Lectures were published as a book in 1976, while the TV scripts for most of the Young People's Concerts can be read on the Bernstein Office's website or purchased in a paperback edition here.


#88
Daily Threads / 24 December 2023 THE TWENTY-FO...
Last post by KathyB - Dec 24, 2023, 10:16 AM
One day to Christmas
One day to Christmas
Not enough time to do our Christmas shopping
We're not the shopple who peeped in time
We're not the sheeple who popped in time
We're not the people who shopped in time
Shopped in time, not enough time
We are the people who always wait until it's much too late, OH!

One day to Christmas
One day to Christmas
How will we ever do our Christmas shopping?
Why did we ever delay so long, who can recall?
Some of the family may not get a Christmas gift at all!



The thing I've found myself needing at the last minute is batteries. I don't really need them at the last minute, but I need them by January 2 so I can take a blood pressure reading before an appointment. I found a 20 pack of AAs on Amazon for $8.41, which I figure is less than I would spend for four batteries at Walgreens.

It snowed last night--a whopping half an inch.
#89
Movies / Re: Maestro
Last post by scenicdesign71 - Dec 23, 2023, 02:56 PM
A dissenting opinion (with which I'm sorry to agree, at least in part -- though Cooper's film, even while giving somewhat short shrift to LB's work, still offers many compensatory pleasures), from a classical-music critic:

NYT:  Maestro Won't Let Leonard Bernstein Fail


And a graceful fact-check/overview of the relationship between the real Bernstein and Montealegre:

Smithsonian magazine: The Real History Behind Maestro


Plus, a Times podcast dissecting Cooper's [mimicry of Bernstein's] skill at the podium:

NYT Audio:  Our Critics on the Conducting in Maestro



#90
The Work / Re: ASSASSINS
Last post by scenicdesign71 - Dec 22, 2023, 01:26 PM
From the link above, I finally finished reading Norman Mailer's lengthy 1995 New Yorker piece on Lee Harvey Oswald's three years (1959-62) living in the U.S.S.R. as a Soviet not-quite-citizen. 

He remains a fairly opaque figure, as even his widow Marina admits in the final paragraphs.  She also notes that actors, working from very limited photo and film documentation, invariably fail to capture the real "Alek" by a wide margin.

Still, it's a fascinating article, and I imagine it would be very useful reading for any actor preparing to play Oswald.  (Wikipedia currently lists 27 "cultural depictions" of him over the years, though their list includes novels and songs as well as stage and screen portrayals).