People who shut down those with different opinions have a less rich life, and make less rich art.
Theater
Posted inArts & Culture, Theater
In ‘Corsicana,’ playwright Will Arbery writes an ode to his sister with Down syndrome
“Corsicana,” named for the small Texas city in which it is set, is odd and stiff—qualities that are only exacerbated by director Sam Gold’s spare, often awkwardly formal staging.
Posted inArts & Culture, Catholic Book Club
Theophilus Lewis: A Black Catholic convert who brought the Harlem Renaissance to the pages of ‘America’
Theophilus Lewis wrote hundreds of theater reviews for “America,” though he got his start as a critic for a magazine central to the Harlem Renaissance in the 1920s.
Posted inArts & Culture, Theater
‘Macbeth’ and ‘Cyrano’ are two classic plays getting fresh interpretations — with very different results
Classic plays don’t require updates or new translations to stay fresh, but if they are indeed classics, they can withstand new interpretations.
Posted inArts & Culture, Theater
‘A Case for the Existence of God’ is not a theological argument. It’s a parable.
Hard truths spill out in the tentative friendship of two men in Samuel D. Hunter’s Off Broadway play, “A Case for the Existence of God.”
Posted inArts & Culture, Theater
Two new Broadway musicals show the pitfalls of turning complex history into song and dance
With “Suffs” and “Paradise Square,” Broadway offers two new musicals that address the great animating subject of the American musical: America itself.
Posted inArts & Culture, Interviews
The Bob Dylan Bible: In ‘Girl From the North Country,’ an Irish playwright takes inspiration from the prophet of folk
“Bob Dylan is in the tradition of great writers stretching back to the biblical prophets—there’s something in his songs that is so resonant that people will be trying to figure the songs out for generations.”
Posted inArts & Culture, Theater
Dante’s ‘Divine Comedy’ has been set to ballet. It won’t meet your expectations (in a good way).
In making the poem into a ballet with original music, much has been gained, both for the significance of the new ballet and for a fresh appreciation and engagement with its source.
Posted inArts & Culture, Theater
‘To Kill a Mockingbird,’ ‘Assassins’ & ‘The Lehman Trilogy’ — the three ghosts of the 2021 Christmas season
Seeing these shows, I was reminded of Dickens’s famous ghosts, warning us about where we have been, where we are and where, if we’re not careful, we may be headed.
Posted inArts & Culture, Theater
Broadway is (finally) embracing Black writers. But the work of diversifying theater is just getting started.
Can Black writers flourish in a marketplace dictated by white tastes?