If Irish Rep's Meet Me in St. Louis doesn't get you reaching for some special 'Irish water' then nothing….(last shows Jan 2) This is produced with such virtual staging finesse with all that talent it makes one wonder if backers' readings of plays and musicals could be done like this at a fraction of the normal cost. There is a MGA13 rating for cats under 13months.
Season 3 of The Marvelous Mrs Maisel (Amazon Prime). How many home runs can this series hit? ! The season conclusion whacks it right out of the ball park. You'll be sobbing into those 'baseball' cards. More 'Irish water' anyone?
Unlike animals, most humans are flawed. Inevitably. Very. Some so deeply. Amazon's The Man in the High Castle is testament to that. Adapted from Philip K. Dick's book it occurred to me: who would I save if the escape boat was overloaded? Hemingway or Dick? Although the latter is relegated to sci-fi, it's consistently amazing how prescient a writer is Philip K. Dick. So not elitist. And yet. The subject matter of High Castle will be deeply disturbing for many. But in 40 hours of 4 seasons I wasn't bored for a minute. Often quite moved. The antiques dealer Robert Childan, case in point. A die hard aesthete selling Americana of a lost world to an occupying elite Japanese cliental on the West Coast in San Francisco. Childan far from a perfect man. Equally far from being a criminal. He makes mistakes. Yet finally finds happiness. Hard won. With a beautiful someone also scarred. A survivor. Luck and chance always the freedom fighters in Philip K. Dick's multi-verse.
The series ending mayn't quite make sense. However, poetically does. Certainly not 40 hours of life wasted.
Two further thoughts of clarification. A significant plot strand in High Castle is that Robert Childan's destiny elicits an expert metalworker into his orbit and vice versa. Now: is faking Americana objects that never survived (or in the case of Lincoln's cuff links, Childan owns one, from the night of the assassination) a crime as much as, say, faking a Monet? If a collector believes and buys and is happy with an object that never survived only through simulacra, is that the same as a fake painting? Interesting moral and legal question.
Thought two: when it comes to writers, aren't those whose ideas resonate way beyond the grit or beauty of syntax and linguistic dexterity just that more interesting? Once interviewed film director Hector Babenco (I know, namedropping) and he pointed out that 'magical realist' writing, for the most part, was simply the real in streets of South America. There was no 'Western' magic. As much as I admire and thank writers who are almost obsessed with the foibles of human existence, aren’t writers such as Paul Auster that 'portal' into a parallel world of Philip K. Dick. Better stop before creating trouble for myself:)
Maestro Riccardo Muti speaks about Vienna New Year's Concert 2021
From Vienna: The New Year’s Celebration 2021 [expires Jan 31, 2021]
Interesting blurring of cultures when presenter 'Downton Abbey' star Hugh Bonneville couldn't possibly present that script on American TV. Nothing offensive, simply a bit ‘honest’. Ever so poignant historical fact regarding Strauss' Radetzky March. Couldn't PBS wait until the very end of the concert to 'plug' the DVD of the event? There is, American public broadcasting: Ah, Liberace's The Loved One…
Was a' thinking 'bout live theater. My internet 'stream' gurgled with the incandescent Sierra Boggess and The John Wilson Orchestra at the BBC Proms o Carousel. Can't imagine they'd achieve that performance without a live audience. Can't imagine replicating the second to last performance I saw of Oklahoma! on Broadway (director Daniel Fish, Circle in the Square first developed at Bard’s Fisher Center, in 2015). Even the greatest cameraman couldn't give you the 'high' as I had standin' there at the very close back of that theater.
There's a series (again on Amazon Prime) that keeps haunting me back when nothing else seems to light a flame when needed: The Wilds. Directed by notable Australian John Polson (1st 3eps…), on the page, it doesn't seem promising. With a lesser talented female cast probably, all indeed would plummet into melodrama. What's somewhat intriguing is that the teenagers [not really a spoiler alert] are being watched, stranded on a desert island after their plane crashed into the sea. Moreover, they begin watching, analyzing, tormenting themselves. Refusing to 'wiki' the conclusion, have no idea how this all plays out. Originality lies not in the concept, perhaps, more in the astute casting. Whether it's a Lord of the Flies with teenage girls: one will have to wade it out. Have no idea whether these 'gals' are in fact teenagers, if not then, they sure fooled me. If you've learnt to loathe humans on desert islands then 3/4 of this series seems back story. ..[Jan 5-Oooh, aaah. Just got to the storyline nexus. Well, this is totally Philip K. Dick prescience. Scarily so. Maybe you just don't know it. Reeks reality!] Well, there was Dave Eggers’ novel The Circle and the movie but memory tends to erasxe itself symbiotically. Nowadays..
Heard of lot of teenagers ‘on the subways’ stating how 'OMG' she/he is 16/18/20 relevant to their own age! What a difference makes 2-years. Strange as one gets older there there seems an arithmetic equation. 2-teenage years equal 10. Meow: like get real: a cat suffers this their entire life!
I am 16 going on 70teen:
I'll'll take care 'air' of you.
Does the end ever justify the means?
