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Memorable |
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Not to be missed |
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Worthy of your attention |
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Satisfactory |
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Disappointing |
All concerts at 8:00 p.m. (excepting Governors Island.)
Fireworks after each concert.
Music Director Designate Alan Gilbert
Principal Associate Concertmaster Sheryl Staples
NY Philharmonic Concerts in the Parks
June 24
The Great Lawn, Central Park
• Westside entrances: W. 81st or 86th Sts. @ CPW
• Eastside entrances: E. 79th or 85th Sts. @ 5th
Ave.
Bramwell Tovey, conductor
Shostakovich Festive Overture
Mendelssohn Symphony No. 4, Italian
Tchaikovsky 1812 Overture
Sousa Selected Marches
July 5 6:30 p.m.
Governors Island Parade Grounds
Tovey, Conductor
Smith, The Star Spangled
Banner
Rossini, Overture to the Italian Girl In Algiers
Copland, Four Dance Episodes From Rodeo
Rimsky-Korsakov, Capriccio Espagnol
Tchaikovsky, 1812 Overture
July 8
Richmond County Bank Ballpark, Staten Island
July 10
Cunningham Park, Queens
July 11
Van Cortlandt Park, Bronx
July 12
Heckscher State Park, East Islip, Long Island
Xian Zhang, Conductor
Sheryl Staples, Violin
Michelle Kim, Violin
Mozart, Divertimento in D Major
J.S. Bach, Concerto for Two Violins in D Minor
Elgar, Enigma Variations
July 14
Prospect Park, Brooklyn
Alan Gilbert, Conductor
Staples, Violin
Kim, Violin
J.S. Bach, Concerto for Two Violins In D Minor
Beethoven, Symphony No. 4
Sibelius, Finlandia
July 15
The Great Lawn, Central Park, Manhattan
Gilbert, Conductor
Lang Lang, Piano
Tchaikovsky, Piano Concerto No. 1
Beethoven, Symphony No. 4
Sibelius, Finlandia
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MOVIES
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The Refuseniks (L-R
back): Vitaly Rubin, Vladimir Slepak, Lev Ovsisscher,
Alexander Druk, Yossi Beilin, (front): Natan Sharansky, Ida
Nudel, Alexander Lerner.
Refusenik
This is an absorbing and sobering film that bears viewing,
not only for its historical significance in chronically the
30-year international movement to free Soviet Jews, but
because – like a good book, it is a veritable
“page-turner.” And yet, it puzzles me that it came and went
in New York unceremoniously, coincident to a tepid review in
the NY Times. Yet, I am told by its excellent public
relations person Sasha Berman, who emigrated from the
Ukraine and is now based in Los Angeles, that it is doing
respectable business in the City of Angels. Sasha had sent
me a DVD “screener,” which my friends are clamoring to see,
in the absence of the big screen version. As a matter of
industry ethics, I’ve told them to be patient until the
inevitable commercial release of the DVD. Log on to
www.RefusenikMovie.com
from time to time to find out when the DVD will be released.
As you doubtless remember, in the early 1960’s, there were
disturbing reports of anti-Semitism in the Soviet Union.
Synagogues were being closed by the government and the study
of Hebrew was forbidden. Soviet Jews were required to carry
“internal passports” identifying their Jewish heritage.
They were barred from studying at universities, refused
entrance into selected professions, and when requesting
permission to emigrate to the U. S. or Israel, received an
unconditional “Nyet.” The courageous stories of such
Refuseniks as Natan Sharansky, who took the
unprecedented step of publicly challenging the communist
regime, and activists in the United States, England, Canada
and France who organized demonstrations, smuggled contraband
and lobbied democratic governments to put pressure on the
USSR, are fiercely documented by Laura Bialis. What does
not go unnoticed by Ms. Bialis are the nuclear disarmament
negotiations with the USSR which included American demands
for a change in Soviet emigration policies. In 1989, the
Soviet Union finally succumbed to international pressure –
and Ronald Reagan’s intransigence -when the gates were
opened. 117 minutes. In English and in Russian and in Hebrew
with sub-titles. and in English,
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Laurence Fishburne as Justice Thurgood Marshall.
Thurgood
Booth
222 W. 45th
St.
212-239-6200
Through August 3.
I observed the man in the
seersucker suit, seated two rows ahead of me during a matinee. He
was taking copious notes throughout the performance. It was not an
unusual incident, since not a few of my drama and movie critic
colleagues write bits of dialogue longhand in the dark while staring
at the stage or screen. I wish I had
that dual facility. After the
performance and the ubiquitous standing-O’s, I intercepted the
gentleman and asked what media organization he represented. He
smiled and said, “None. I used to clerk for Justice Marshall when
he was on the Supreme Court, and I can tell you that Laurence Fishburne was dead-on in his portrayal.” I introduced myself, and
asked what he presently does. “My name is Randy Kennedy and I teach
at Harvard Law.” When I related the story to my kids and son-in-law
(lawyers all) they were incredulous. “You never heard of Randall
Kennedy?” “Well, er, no.” So I Googled him and learned that not
only is he a professor at Harvard Law, but that
he holds degrees from
Princeton, Oxford and Yale Law. Moreover, he was a
Rhodes
Scholar and is a prominent author. Mr. Kennedy’s
information fortified my judgment that Thurgood is the best
one-person show of the season, and in my view, the best solo show
about a prominent figure of law since Henry Fonda as Clarence Darrow
in 1974. Laurence Fishburne is a superb movie actor. His understated
performance in 2003 as Clint Eastwood’s police partner in Mystic
River quietly pilfered the movie from a cast that included such
luminaries as Sean Penn, Tim Robbins and Kevin Bacon. Here, in a
role created at the Westport Playhouse by James Earl Jones and
scripted by George Stevens, Jr., Fishburne is astonishingly riveting
, and at times wistful and funny. I was pleased to see a balcony
filled with high school students, who were attentive and, no doubt,
rapt by the humanity and
heroics of Howard University Law’s most famous grad (where I am
proud to say I have a number of friends). Marshall’s victory in
Brown v. Board of Education (1954), was the legal precursor of the
civil-rights movement of the next decade. Please do not overlook
this all-too-brief opportunity to take your grandchildren to see it.
John Gallagher Jr. as Kevin, Jim Norton as Joe and
Brian d’Arcy James as Dermot co-star in the Atlantic Theater
Company’s production of Conar McPherson’s
Port Authority.
Photo: © Doug Hamilton.
Atlanta Theater Company’s
Port Authority
Linda Gross Theater
336 W. 20th St.
212-645-8015
Through June
26 at least (there is talk of an extension). I shall advise you as
soon as I get word.
The 37-year-old
Irish playwright Conar McPherson continues to astound. Bounding
directly from his Broadway comedy/drama The Seafarer this
very season, he
has
fashioned
a masterpiece
(originally introduced in London in 2001)
to take its rightful place along such jewels as The Weir and
Shining City. Now here’s the windfall. All three of the three
generations of Dubliners in Port Authority are played by
gentlemen who – this very season - were dazzling in other shows.
The first two: John Gallagher, Jr. and Brian d’Arcy James were
respectively in two astonishingly innovative musicals, Spring
Awakening and Next to Normal. Gallagher,
who won a Tony last season, is Kevin, the youngest of the three who
is living outside his parents’ home for the first time, sharing a
ramshackle house with two inebriated men and an enigmatic woman;
d’Arcy James as Dermot is the indolent
middle-ager. The third, that irrepressible leprechaun of a man, Jim
Norton,
who should win a Tony this year for The Seafarer, is
Joe, who lives with his memories of the real and the
what-might-have- been in an old folks’ home
and, though maneuvering about with the aid of a “stick,” looks to be
ready to do a jig, if not a step dance. The setting is a bus
station, and for the next 90 minutes, with the trio seemingly
oblivious to one another, they each take a turn saying his piece
then retiring to a seat either back on the waiting room bench or
standing behind it. All of the show’s monologues, delivered in
rotating sequence, are in essence lyrical love stories tempered by a
surfeit of that Irish theater staple: a draft, a G & T, a cold one,
and a “trink.” In 2006, I saw the Irish playwright Brian Friel’s
Faith Healer, which also employed the three-monologue
device with
Ralph Fiennes,
Cherry Jones
and
Ian McDiarmid.
I wrote that of these three noteworthy actors, only McDiarmid
sustained my attention. In Port Authority, thanks to three
bravura performances, ingenious staging by Henry Wishcamper, Matthew
Richards’s skillful lighting and McPherson’s genius, I hung on every
stunning word.
Michael Stuhlbarg is the
Melancholy Dame and Lauren Ambrose is Ophelia in Shakespeare in the
Park.
Free Shakespeare in the Park
Hamlet, Prince of Denmark
Delacorte Theater
Through June 29
Tues.-Sun. 8 p.m.
ENTRANCES: 81st St. & CPW OR 79th St. and Fifth Ave.
Priority Ticket Line (bench seating) for Seniors 65+ (Bring ID) to
Delacorte Theater Box Office. Best idea is to come midday and pick
up tickets in advance.
Noteworthy performers in this first Park production of Hamlet since
1975, are Michael Stuhlbarg in the title role; Lauren (Six Feet
Under) Ambrose as the fair Ophelia (so magnificent as Juliet
last summer), Andre (Homicide) Braugher as Claudius, which
should be more suited to his theatrical chops than Henry V , which
he rendered in the Park in 1996 ; Sam (Law & Order) Waterston
as Polonius. I saw Waterston play Hamlet in the unremarkable Park
Production of 33 years ago. I believe he'll do much better as the
fuddy-duddyish Polonious. An inspired idea is having the
play-within-a-play which Hamlet authored to spook out Uncle
Claudius, performed by puppets, one or two of which are manipulated
by old friend Bruce Cannon of Central Park's Swedish Marionette
Theater. 3 hours 25 minutes.
The NY
Philharmonic Presents
Lerner and Loewe’s
Camelot
Avery Fisher Hall
Lincoln Center
May 9.
212) 875-5709
Simulcast on Channel 13
Live From Lincoln Center
on
PBS
The two saving graces
of a dismal semi-concert version of a Camelot, once enlivened
by Richard Burton as King Arthur, were the Philharmonic orchestra
itself, led by Paul Gemignani and a dashing baritone, Nathan Gunn,
with a marvelous operatic voice, as Galahad. He sang If Ever
Would I Leave You so magnificently that when I later
watched it on Live from Lincoln Center, I kept replaying it
from my DVR and glorying in its musical majesty. Gunn and Paul Szot,
his operatic counterpart, across the Lincoln Center Plaza in
South Pacific have given theatergoers and critics like me,
something to cheer about. When I learned that Gabriel Byrne, fresh
from his triumph on the HBO series In Treatment, was chosen
for Arthur, I regarded it as inspired casting. Sad to say, I was
dead wrong. Byrne was infuriatingly tentative, almost oblivious to
the tempo of the orchestra. Marin Mazzie who stirred my hormonal
juices in Stephen Sondheim’s Passion, as Guinevere, though
likely distracted by Byrne’s ineptitude, from my orchestra view was
adequate, but she was ill-served by close-ups on High Definition
TV, which is unforgiving, especially in love duets with a young
swain. The tubing of her microphone over her ample bosom, was
clearly discernible and to say the least, intrusive. Josh Prince’s
so-called “choreography” was spectacularly sophomoric.
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FREE MEMORIAL
DAY CONCERT |
NY
Philharmonic at
The
Cathedral of Saint John the Divine
Amsterdam Ave. @ 112th St,
Monday, May 26, 8 p.m.
For
the past 16 years, one of the joys of my wife’s and my
Memorial Day summer weekends has been visiting St. John
the Divine for a free concert by our great New York
Philharmonic Orchestra. The glory and majesty of this
fantastic gothic cathedral mitigates its poor acoustics,
which I expect will be improved at next year’s M-Day
concert, when the re-furbishing of the vast structure
will have been completed and the seating expanded. This
year, conductor David Robertson led the orchestra
splendidly in Schubert’s Symphony No. 8 (Unfinished)
and Mozart’s Symphony No. 4 (Italian).
Karen
Akers
Karen Akers
The Oak
Room at The Algonquin Hotel
59 West 44th St. (betw. 5th & 6th
Aves.)
212-840-6800
Through
June 14
Tuesdays- Saturdays: 9 p.m. Fridays - Saturdays
additional show, 11:30 p.m.
Appropriately, my favorite cabaret singer Karen, uses
the irreverent poetry of Algonquin Roundtable habitué
Dorothy Parker, music and lyrics of Stephen Sondheim
(The Glamorous Life)
and Kander & Ebb (At The Rialto),
with songs by Maury Yeston, Amanda McBroom & Michele
Brourman, Leiber & Stoller and theater tunesmiths
Stephen Flaherty & Lynn Ahrens. She is accompanied on
piano by longtime musical director Don Rebic with Dick
Sarpola on bass. The evening is directed by Eric Michael
Gillett who did such a commendable job with Karen’s
brilliant
Simply Styne
last year.
Left:
Keelmen Heaving in Coals by Moonlight 1835
Joseph Mallord William Turner (English,
1775–1851) Oil on canvas ;
National Gallery of Art, Washington, Widener Collection,
1942. Right:
Venice, from the Porch of Madonna della
Salute
ca. 1835 Joseph Mallord
William Turner (English, 1775–1851)
Oil on canvas; The Metropolitan Museum of Art,
Bequest of Cornelius Vanderbilt, 1899
First Major Retrospective of
J. M. W. Turner
in the U. S. in more than 30 years.
Metropolitan Museum of Art
Fifth
Avenue @ 82 St.
212-570-3791
July 1 – September 21
I’ve
wandered the halls of London’s Tate – how many times in
the past half-century? (I can’t keep track) - to view
its Turners. What a pleasure to welcome an old friend
to these shores , Joseph Mallord William Turner – he
of the fabled seascapes and topographical views,
historical subjects and subjects of his own invention.
More than half of the approximately 140 paintings and
watercolors on view are on loan from Tate Britain,
complemented by works from other collections in Europe
and North America. The retrospective offers a panoply of
the heady artistic achievement of a career that spanned
more than six decades, Turner essayed a wide range of
subjects, from landscapes—a genre that he dominated
during the first half of the 19thcentury in Britain—to
historical and modern scenes . Born in London in 1775,
Turner spent his early childhood in Covent Garden, where
his father had a barber shop. At a very young age he
showed talent in sketching and became a draftsman with
an architect. When he was fourteen, Turner enrolled in
London’s Royal Academy of Arts Schools and in 1802
became the youngest artist to be elected as a full
Academician. As a student, Turner studied with Sir
Joshua Reynolds (1723-92), who was in his last years as
president of the Royal Academy. Reynolds encouraged his
students to study the techniques of the Old Masters The
exhibition will be organized both thematically and
chronologically, beginning with his earliest historical
landscapes and culminating with his late seascapes and
light-filled
canvases.
Prior to its showing at the Metropolitan,
J. M. W.
Turner
was on
view at the
National
Gallery of Art in Washington, D.C., and the Dallas
Museum of Art.
Honky Tonk Angel
The
Intimate Story of
Patsy Cline
Updated edition
By Ellis Nassour
I’m not a Country Music maven, even though my Grandson
James wrote the lyrics to the Bluegrass song,
Sayings, but I know a good writer when I read him or
her. And I can tell you that Ellis Nassour, a colleague
from the Drama Desk in New York, is a helluva
storyteller. His definitive, biographical account of
Patsy Cline’s poignant and explosively creative career,
unrequited loves and ultimately reckless life, is the
stuff of Greek Tragedy. Nassour has added more than 50
pages of updated material, including excerpts from
Cline’s own handwritten letters replete with details of
her rollercoaster marriage to Charlie Dick and her
disillusionment with her career path. The paperback
has 424 pages with 60 pages of photos including
exclusive shots by Grand Ole Opry photographer Les
Leverett.
For ordering information, log on to
www.patsyclinehta.com/orderbook.htm.
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